Then Rescalyn motioned, and all the officers seated themselves. The governor remained standing. After everyone was seated, he began to speak.
“Gentlemen of the mess … I can’t ever stand here and look out without feeling a debt of gratitude for the dedication and leadership you all embody.” There was a pause and then a grin. “But I’ll be the first to apply a boot to your backside if you ever try to rest on it … or on your laurels.…”
The way in which Rescalyn spoke brought low laughs from the assembled officers.
“… you may ask why we’re working so hard when most of our problems lie in and around the Boran Hills or with a few disgruntled High Holders so far to the north that they’re walled off behind ice for all but a few weeks out of the year. The reason is simple. There’s a ruler. Rex Kharst.” Rescalyn’s sardonic delivery brought more chuckles. “He has this habit of massacring people, and he’d like to put all of Lydar under his fat thumb. We have to be ready to deal with him when he tries … and after what he did to the good people of Khel, there’s no doubt that he’ll try, sooner more likely than later. Just keep that in mind.
“Now … I’d like to note particularly noteworthy evolutions this past week…”
As he listened, Quaeryt couldn’t help but note that the governor’s delivery was far better than his words and that most officers listened intently.
“… and like all marshals … I’ve probably used more words to say less … and I wish it were the other way around.… Enjoy yourselves.”
Abruptly, Quaeryt realized something else. Rescalyn had never mentioned Lord Bhayar. In fact, while the governor mentioned Bhayar to Quaeryt, Quaeryt had never heard the governor utter Bhayar’s name or title in public, and certainly not before his officers.
“Red or white wine, scholar?” asked Dueryl.
Quaeryt had seen the carafes on the table, but hadn’t actually paid them much attention, since he’d been concentrating on Rescalyn. “What’s on the platters?”
“Whitefish with a cream sauce or veal cutlets with mushrooms and brown sauce.”
“Red, thank you.” Quaeryt took the carafe and filled the goblet he’d been provided rather than the mug usually placed before each officer.
“Scholar … how soon do you think Kharst will attack?” That came from the captain beside Haestyn.
“I’m more of a historian. Historically, there are more attacks in late spring and summer. Offhand, I don’t know of any wars started in late fall or winter. If I had to guess…” Quaeryt paused, then went on, “I’d say that if he doesn’t attack now in the next week or so, it’s unlikely until spring. But, as I said, I’m a historian. What do you think?”
“If he attacked in midfall, we’d have trouble getting from here to the border with Bovaria.”
“You’d have to swing south of Montagne,” replied Quaeryt, “but that would only add a week or two, and his forces would have trouble in the north, especially if they tried to move on Extela.”
“He uses more muskets, and they aren’t much good in the rain, and there are a lot of cold rains north of Solis in fall and winter,” added someone else.
“… it rained in Khel, and that didn’t stop them…”
As the others talked, Quaeryt helped himself to the veal and mushrooms and the seasoned rice, as well as the stewed and sweetened quince slices. Then he began to eat, occasionally adding a comment, but mainly enjoying the fare and the wine.
Later, during a lull in the conversation, Quaeryt looked across at Dueryl. “I’ve been told we get paid tomorrow, but not the details.…”
“Oh … they set up a pay table here in the mess for the glass before the evening meal, and if you don’t want to take it, they’ll just leave it in your pay account until you do.”
“That’s good to know.”
A louder voice rode over the others. “I still say that we’ll be at war in less than a year.…”
“… where … with Kharst or the Antiagons?”
After leaving the mess, much later, Quaeryt headed back to the main part of the palace. He had to finish reading the remainder of the dispatches.
44
After sitting through mess night, Quaeryt had returned to the dispatch room with the key he’d kept and spent two more glasses reading by lamplight in order to finish reading all the dispatches. None of those he read differed in tone or outlook from all those he’d read before. There were only a few mentions of disturbances in or around Tilbora. As in the dispatches he’d read earlier, almost all the problems mentioned were in or around the Boran Hills, from what he’d been able to tell. He’d gone to sleep Jeudi night more confused than ever.
He was less sore and more rested when he woke on Vendrei morning, but no less confused. He ate quickly, then retrieved both envelopes from his study and hurried out to the dispatch station next to the gatehouse. There the courier waited beside his mount, accompanied by two other hard-faced rankers, already mounted. Quaeryt handed the first envelope to the man.
He looked at it and at Quaeryt, then nodded. “Yes, sir, for Lord Bhayar. The governor told us.” The sealed report went into one of the saddlebags. Then he looked at the second, and his eyes widened, doubtless at the addressee—Mistress Vaelora Chayardyr. But he nodded again. “Yes, sir.”
“Thank you.” Quaeryt handed over a silver—the rate for a private dispatch.
“Thank you, sir.”
Quaeryt stepped back, but did not leave until the courier mounted and the other two riders escorted him out through the gates and down the long paved lane to the lower gates. Quaeryt had had his doubts about whether either missive would reach its destination unread, but that was why each had been written in the fashion that it had been.
The bells had just finished ringing out seventh glass when he stepped into the princeps’s anteroom. “Vhorym?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I’m going to be checking on some matters in the harbor area of Tilbora, in case the princeps inquires.”
“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”
After returning the dispatch-room key to Caermyt, who barely concealed a frown, even after Quaeryt’s explanation that he had been reading late, Quaeryt made his way to the stable, groomed and saddled the mare, and then rode to the gatehouse, where he logged out. As he left the upper gates, he looked to the east, since that was the direction from which the wind was blowing and since the sky seemed hazy. He thought there were clouds on the horizon, but he wasn’t certain, and the wind was light enough that, if a storm happened to be coming in, he should have several glasses at the least before it hit.
Still … he had the feeling that he had less time than he’d counted on to discover exactly what was bothering him. The problem was that there didn’t seem to be a problem … and yet, he felt that there was.
He didn’t press the mare, and it was close to an hour later before he reined up outside Thayl’s stable. A burly man with a protruding paunch appeared.
“What’s the tariff?”
“Depends on how long.”
“No more than a couple of glasses, if that. Are you Thayl?”
“That I am. Couple of glasses is just a copper. Two coppers for all day.” The big man grinned.
“I doubt it will be that long, but that’s not because of the adjoining establishment. One of the patrollers suggested your stable if I happened to be spending much time around the harbor. He was rather insistent.” Quaeryt dismounted and handed the reins to Thayl, along with a copper. “By the way, I’m Quaeryt.”
“You with the scholars at the Ecoliae? You don’t look familiar.”
“No … I’m a scholar working at the Telaryn Palace for a time.”
“Never knew they had scholars there.”
“They didn’t.” Quaeryt smiled. “Take good care of the mare. She’s carried me a long ways.”
“That I can do, sir.” There was a pause. “What do you do there?”
“I was sent to write a history of what’s happened in Tilbor since t
he war ended.”
“Not much.” Thayl spat into the street. “Could have been better. Could have been a lot worse.”
“Do any of the soldiers come here … next door, I mean?”
“Nope. Governor said that Shariela’s place is off-limits. ’Sides, they got their own place out by the palace. Some of the girls went there. Said they made more.” The ostler looked directly at Quaeryt again. “You sure you’re not with those scholars at the Ecoliae?”
“I’m not. I did deliver a letter to a student there, as a favor to his father.”
“What do you think of the place?”
“It seemed to me that it had seen better days.”
“Did once. My cousin worked there. They let him go after the war. Said that they couldn’t pay him no more. The Khanar used to give the scholars golds. The governor doesn’t.”
“Do you think he should?”
Thayl spat again. “Nope. Hard on Taxyr, but why should folks who spend all their time in books, begging your pardon, sir, get golds when the rest of us don’t?”
“That’s true. The Scholars’ Houses in other cities don’t.”
“They don’t?”
“No. Scholars who stay more than a night or two have to pay for their food and lodging. Why did the Khanar pay them? Do you know?”
“Always did, from way back in the time of Nidar. Couldn’t say why.”
“That’s the way things are, sometimes.” Quaeryt nodded.
“That they are. Don’t you be worrying about your mare. She’ll be fine.”
“I’m sure she’s in good hands.”
Quaeryt walked from the stable and turned toward the harbor, walking past the unnamed brothel, not gawking at the women who stood just inside the windows, adorning them, after a fashion.
“Do scholars really know how to do it better?” whispered a throaty voice from one of the upper windows.
Quaeryt couldn’t help grinning slightly, and he replied, “Knowledge isn’t the same as skill or practice, and I defer to you ladies in both.”
An amused, if husky, laugh followed.
When he reached the corner, he turned left and crossed the street. The shop on the corner was an apothecary’s, and he entered.
The man behind the low counter, with the rows of shelves behind him, looked up. “I’d not be selling to you.”
“I’m not looking to buy. I’ve been sent—”
“You’re not from the Ecoliae.”
“No. I came from Solis. I’m trying to get information for a history.”
The apothecary nodded. “I don’t know history.”
Quaeryt smiled. “Recent history. What you’ve lived through since the time of Eleonyd. That’s all history is, except after we’re dead, if it’s written down, it becomes history. If it isn’t, more of the truth is lost.”
“Not much to say. Eleonyd was a good Khanar until he got sick. His daughter would have been a good ruler, too. Rhecyrd and the northers and the timber holders didn’t like her. The Guard sat on its honor and lost it, and Chayar came in and defeated Rhecyrd and his clan militia. That’s what happened. Nothing will change it.”
“Why didn’t the southers stand up for her?”
“We couldn’t. All the men in arms from the south were in the Guard.”
“But—”
“I’d rather not talk about it. You’re probably not like the others, but let’s leave it at that.” He turned his back and begin to grind something in a pestle.
Quaeryt eased out of the apothecary’s. He could have pressed some, but his reception hadn’t been that good to begin with.
When he stepped back outside, the door to the adjoining shop was shuttered and closed. So was the adjoining shop. He didn’t think either had been when he entered the apothecary’s.
He shook his head and went back across the street. The silversmith’s door was shuttered. The next shop was tiny, with but a single narrow window beside the door. While the door was unshuttered, the window was not, but the door opened, and he stepped inside.
“You must have the wrong shop,” came a voice from his left.
He turned to see a thin woman adjusting the fabric on a frame shaped like a woman’s figure. The woman didn’t look to be much older than Quaeryt, although there were streaks of gray in her short-cut hair and lines from the corners of her eyes. “Why? Because you’re a dressmaker?”
“I don’t see you wearing a dress, and few scholars have either wives or mistresses. Even if you did, you’d not likely have the coins for what I sew.” She paused and studied him again. “You are a scholar … but you’re not from the Ecoliae, are you?”
“Actually, I’m from the Scholarium in Solis. I’m here to study the history of Tilbor.”
“You do have the wrong shop.”
“I think not. You probably know more of what happened here since just before the war than most.”
“The Khanar wasn’t strong enough. His daughter was. The north didn’t want a Khanara, and neither did the hill people. Those in Tilbora did; the others in the south didn’t want a civil war. We all lost. Things turned out better under the governor than they would have under the Pretender. What else is there to say?”
“Well…” said Quaeryt with a smile. “… there is the question of why it all came to that. What would have been so bad about a Khanara?”
“It wasn’t that she was a woman. It was that she was smart, and she saw that Rhecyrd would lead Tilbor into war with Telaryn. She also saw how the timber holders and the northers were evading tariffs. She was keeping her father alive, and she was really the Khanar. But things worked, and no one said anything. Then Rhecyrd brought all his clan militia—and his imager—south, and Eleonyd got sicker and died, and then the imager imaged Antiagon Fire over the envoy from Telaryn. That was because she would have wed Lord Bhayar to save Tilbor, and Rhecyrd knew it.”
“And Rhecyrd knew she wouldn’t marry him?”
“No woman with any sense would. His wife got sick and died when he needed her out of the way.”
“Did you ever meet her?”
“Lady Tyrena? She had me sew several riding outfits for her … she was young then.” The seamstress laughed so softly that there was almost no sound. “Weren’t we all?”
“What can you tell me about her?”
“What is there to say? She was young, a bit too strong-featured to be beautiful, but attractive in a handsome way. She was very intelligent, more so than her father, I’d say, and Tilbor might not be a part of Telaryn had he listened to her.”
“Why do you say that?”
“She was the one who truly commanded the Guard. The old commander—Gustraak—knew she understood battles better, and she rode beside him and advised him. Then he died—I still say that he and Eleonyd were both poisoned by Rhecyrd’s imager. Commander Traesk refused to listen to her, and she had the imager killed and forced a Bovarian merchanter to take her away with her personal armsmen. Before she left someone put a knife in Traesk’s ribs, and he died, and the Guard retreated to the palace and closed it off. If she’d been in command … who knows?”
“Strategy isn’t everything,” Quaeryt pointed out.
“No. It’s not. Soldiers are important, too, and the men of Tilbor make the best soldiers. Why do you think the governor recruits so many of them.”
At that moment, a muscular man burst through the rear door and moved quickly toward Quaeryt, a stout club in hand. The scholar barely got up a forearm to deflect the arm with the club.
“Haarl! Stop! He’s not one of them!” snapped the woman.
One of whom? The local scholars?
Quaeryt had to block another attempt with the club before the attacker stopped.
“I told you to stop.” The woman’s voice was acid-tinged.
“They’re all the same … don’t care what Thayl or you say…” said the ginger-bearded bear of a man who glared at Quaeryt even as he lowered the club.
Quaeryt wanted to massage his forearm, but
he just waited, if warily. “I take it that the local scholars are not exactly in your favor.”
“You’re not from here. You don’t talk like them.”
“I told you that, idiot,” snapped the woman.
“I wasn’t going to wait. Thayl told me one of them was prowling around. Said he was different, as if that mattered…”
“You go and tell your brother that he’s not one of them. Do you understand?”
Haarl looked at Quaeryt. “Sorry … didn’t mean to take you for one of them.” He turned and walked out. His tone was scarcely apologetic.
Quaeryt looked to the seamstress. “Might I ask what offenses the local scholars have committed?”
“You could. Why would it be to my advantage to tell you?”
“Because I might be able to do something about it.”
The woman studied Quaeryt once more. Then she smiled, if faintly. “You might. You’d try, anyway.”
He waited.
“The scholars have always been the tool of the timber holders. Eleonyd and the Khanars paid them to run the school, but it was as much tribute as anything. It was cheaper than fighting. In return, the timber holders built their road and allowed the Khanars to use it without tariffing them.”
“The governor doesn’t pay the scholars for the school. Is that why he is always fighting the timber holders?”
The seamstress shrugged. “I do not know what the governor or the scholars do these days.”
“Go ahead. You were going to say more about the scholars.”
“It has to do with Commander Traesk. He was one of the few officers from the hills. He joined the Khanar’s Guard as a young man. In time, he became an officer, and later, subcommander. All said that he was courageous and a good leader … until he betrayed the Khanara. Traesk’s son was—he still is, I guess—a scholar. He was also a Guard officer during the fighting. I don’t know as he was that good a Guard officer, but he was well-trained in using arms, and he was there to ward his father’s back.”
“So the scholars supported the Guard?”
She shook her head. “Traesk supported Rhecyrd. Most of the Guard officers supported the Khanara, but they would not break their loyalty to the Guard commander.”
Scholar Page 29