The Sword of the Lady c-3

by S. M. Stirling

  Tiphaine sighed.?You?re right, of course. She?s not any less ambitious than Norman was, just a hell of a lot more patient and sneaky. Oh, well, she?s the sovereign.? ?Until Mathilda comes of age,? Conrad said, and grinned like the ornament on a cathedral waterspout.? That?s going to be interesting.? ?Then it?ll be the Changelings? turn. I suspect by then a lot of things will be different.?

  They drew rein near the pavilion, under the branches of the great garry oak that shaded it; Tiphaine returned the salute of the Guard captain with a curt nod and a lift of her riding crop. ?Sir Lothair.?

  He wore half-armor like the two-score mounted crossbowmen, and a peaked Montero cap with a long curling feather at one side, what she?d have called a Robin Hood hat in her youth. The dozen lancers nearby were in full fig, armored cap-a-pie on barded destriers, blazing steel statues with their visors down and eyes invisible behind the narrow vision slits. The men-at-arms would be feeling like buns in a bake oven right now, combined with a sauna. She?d experienced it often enough, and would again unless the enemy were civilized enough to fight only in cool weather.

  Though oddly enough, when the weather?s really cold, full armor doesn?t give you any warmth at all. ?My lady Grand Constable,? he said after a moment?s scrutiny for form?s sake.?My lord Chancellor. You are recognized and may pass.?

  Grooms took the horses as they dismounted, and the hunt servants brought up their count of pheasant and duck, quail and rabbit, for the semiritual inspection.

  They are, indeed, very dead, Tiphaine thought with a trace of whimsy as she looked at the limp, bloodied forms and prodded one with a gloved finger. And someone should eat them very soon in this warm weather.

  She went on aloud as Conrad handed his hawk and perching glove to his falconer:?The game to good Father Mendoza, with my compliments.?

  She nodded towards the steeple of the village church a mile westward across the great common field, rising above trees and red-tiled roofs, with the Coast Range green-blue beyond it. They?d give the parish priest, his household and some of the ill or indigent a couple of good dinners.

  Slyly:?And tell him that my lord the Count of Odell has graciously donated five rose nobles for the almshouse fund.? ?Gold? I didn?t say anything about?three gets you five? in gold ,? Conrad said, alarmed; that was a month?s wage for a mounted man-at-arms. ?Even for someone who started out as an accountant you are such a cheapskate, Conrad. You?ve got the whole Hood River Valley in your fief, for God?s sake. And two toll bridges. And a chartered town to tax. I?m a lowly baroness with a few manors. Show some class.?

  She stripped off her gauntlet and held it out. He unwillingly dropped the little dime-sized coins inside; she folded the long cuff over and into the wrist, then tossed it into the game basket. ?Go,? she said.

  The varlet gulped thankfully and jogged away. Listening to the higher nobility exchanging badinage wasn?t comfortable for someone that low on the food chain, though it would probably make excellent gossip at the village taverns, crowded as they were with the entourages of the visitors.

  The pavilion was Sandra?s, and hence in exquisite taste-heavy oiled silk striped white and blue on a hidden framework of galvanized poles. Bullion tassels all around the edges were woven with glass strips that chimed lightly when they touched. Rugs covered the ground, glowing with designs of flowers and vines in wine red and green and blue. A light folding table and chairs of carved reddish wood stood within; it was quite private, and even the men-at-arms and crossbowmen of the Protector?s Guard were at a discreet distance.

  Tiphaine removed her round roll-brimmed noble?s hat with the broad trailing tail and joined Conrad in two elaborate leg-and-hand-flourish bows to the pair of noblewomen within. One was Delia de Stafford, blue-eyed and black-haired and delicately beautiful and thirty to her own thirty-eight, and dressed in a daring new mode she?d pioneered for semiformal occasions away from court. It was based on what commoner women wore; a long light under-tunic and knee-length over-tunic, but with gauzy silks and lots of lace making it a fantasy in white and lavender instead of utilitarian plainness. A belt of old woven gold held a jewel-hilted ceremonial dagger to show that she was an Associate, and the equally symbolic ring of silver keys that marked her as Chatelaine of Barony d?Ath.

  The other was Sandra Arminger, Lady Regent of the PPA, in a conservative pearl gray and white cotte-hardi and a silk headdress confined in a net of platinum and diamonds. To her Tiphaine and Conrad added a bend of the right knee that touched the carpet for an instant.

  Although technically I should curtsey, she thought. It looks ridiculous in pants, though. ?My liege lady and Regent,? she said. And:?My lady Delia.? ?If you two are finally finished slaughtering harmless birds and quite small animals we can get to work,? Sandra Arminger said.

  She folded the Weekly Trumpet she?d been reading-it was turned either to the crossword puzzle or to an article headlined:?Feudalism: God?s Will Or Just Common Sense??-and tossed the newspaper on top of two illustrated magazines, Tournaments Illuminated and The Associate?s Town and Castle Journal. Then she extended her hand to both of them in turn for the ritual kiss of homage. ?The social cover story for this is a bit of hawking,? Conrad of Odell pointed out.?It helps to actually do some hawking.?

  Tiphaine nodded, standing hipshot at catlike ease with her left hand on the hilt of her longsword. A falconry party was something you could invite only chosen people to, without offending anyone-or at least without giving them formal reason to be offended, as exclusion from a Council meeting would. Even if everyone knew it was really a political conclave before the Council. ?Though we?ll miss the boar hunting this year, with the war,? she said with a sigh, looking westward.

  Montinore village was in the foreground, just across the road and railway that led south to Newburg; beyond that was the white manor house, the fields and hilly vineyards and orchards of her demesne, and then the stark square tower and walls of Castle Ath on its height, ferroconcrete covered in pale stucco, like a fortress in a picture book with banners streaming from the turrets.

  After that started the great forests of the Coast Range, mile after mile of quiet umber shade. She thought of the quick belling of hounds through the glades in the chill October air, and the quarry at bay beneath a half-fallen fir tree… ?Fighting with pigs?? Sandra said, sipping at a glass of scented herbal tisane that tinkled with ice.?In freezing mud? While it?s raining? This is recreation?? ?It?s not quite as much fun as hot sweaty sex,? Conrad acknowledged.?But in the right season you can do it more often, or at least for longer.? ?Speak for yourself, Odell,? Tiphaine said with an expression that had the shadow of a wolf?s grin behind it.?Not all of us have your limitations.?

  Delia smothered a chuckle, and Sandra sighed. ?Children, children. Oh, sit down, Tiph,? she went on, tucking a lock of graying brown hair back under her wimple.?You do tend to.. . loom over one.? ?My lady Regent is… a dimensionally challenged person,? Tiphaine said; Sandra was five-two, and still slight in her fifty-fourth year.?I was fourteen when you took me and Kat into the Household and I was already taller than you. I can?t help looming.? ?You can?t help being a big blond horse of a woman, you mean, d?Ath,? Conrad said.?That?s why you?d never have made it to the Olympics.?

  She nodded, although she had a whipcord-and-steel length of limb that made her look quite slender at first glance. The Olympics had been her dream before the Change, but…

  But in fact I was already too tall and still growing. Gymnasts were all munchkins, like muscular little steroidal pixies. I?d have ended up a Phys Ed teacher or a girls? basketball coach or something. Or, maybe if I?d switched to track and field?Whereas I just cast a welcome shade,? Conrad continued smugly, slapping dust off his blocky torso.

  His chair creaked a little as he sat. The Chancellor of the Portland Protective Association was no taller than Tiphaine-around five-ten-but he?d always been shaped like a fireplug made of bone and muscle. Now that he was past fifty and not taking the field anymore he?d added some solid flesh to that, and he grunted with relief as he sa
t, running one spatulate hand over the shaven dome of his bullet-shaped head. ?That?s one way of saying I?m getting fat, Odell.?

  Tiphaine sat with more than her usual leopard grace and crossed ankle over knee. Conrad grunted again as he reached to take a handful of shelled hazelnuts and walnuts from a Venetian glass bowl on the table, salvage from some museum. ?You too shall be in your fifties sometime, my lady Grand Constable,? he said, tossing one of the nutmeats into his mouth.?In precisely twelve years, in fact.? ?Possibly, my lord Chancellor,? Tiphaine said. In the unlikely event someone doesn?t kill me first.?But I don?t think the years shall weigh quite so heavily on me as they do on you.?

  Conrad?s facial nightmare of thick white keloid scars made his laugh even more alarming than that gravelly sound would have been otherwise. A steward with a white tabard and ivory baton made a gesture, and two pages brought trays from the other-much plainer-tent twenty yards away. They set out a platter of sandwiches, petit fours, and chilled pinot grigio wine with seltzer and waited, demure in their black livery of silk hose and pourpoint jackets embroidered with the d?Ath arms, curl-toed shoes of gilded leather cutwork and fezlike brimless hats. ?Your sons make such charming and efficient pages, Lady Delia,? Sandra Arminger said.?With such large, pink, shell-like, quivering ears.?

  Delia took the hint:?Lioncel, Diomede,? she said, and made a graceful gesture.

  The boys-blond Lioncel was twelve, dark Diomede two years younger-bowed in unison and walked backward until the distance was outside easy hearing, even with keen young ears. Tiphaine took a sandwich. The PPA?s liege lady Sandra and Tiphaine?s lady-in-waiting and chatelaine Delia- My girlfriend-for-the-last-fourteen-years Delia , Tiphaine thought, with a familiar flicker of resentment at the necessity for discretion. Best not to get out of the habit of being careful, though -shared a liking for dainty little things on manchet bread with the crusts cut off and some parsley on the side; in this case potted shrimp in aspic, deviled ham with minced sweet Walla Walla onions, or cucumber. Since this was Tiphaine?s own personal fief, there were also some substantial examples of bacon, lettuce, and tomato with mayo on sourdough. She smiled a little as she bit into one, savoring the smoky taste of the apple-cured meat and fresh, melting-ripe tomatoes and almost-warm crusty bread. ?What?s the joke, darling?? Delia asked.

  They?d been together since Kat died in the Protector?s War, and she knew that slight curve of Tiphaine?s lips was the equivalent of a grin or even a chortle.

  The baroness shrugged, swallowed, blotted her lips with a linen napkin and said:?A pleasant memory. The only pleasant memory our unlamented pseudo-Pope Leo ever gave me, but it made up for all the rest.?

  These days the local branch of the reunified Church was just annoying to someone like her, guarded by rank and powerful patronage. She pretended to be a good Catholic with sardonic relish and with gritted teeth the clergy pretended to believe her; Delia did the same, and was a secret witch to boot and High Priestess of a coven. But Norman Arminger had been literally medieval on the subject of gay people, as on much else, and his psychopathic pet?Pope? Leo had been worse.

  About the time her husband died Sandra Arminger had found out that the real Catholic Church had survived-a remnant had fled dying Rome behind the halberds of the Swiss Guard and ended up in the little Umbrian hill town of Badia, still their HQ-and that they?d managed to call a conclave to elect an equally real Pope. To lay the groundwork for reunion the Lady Regent had delegated schismatic Leo?s tragic, timely and officially accidental demise to Tiphaine, who?d been her wetwork specialist of choice back then. ?One sane Pope half the world away by sailing ship is much less trouble than a deranged one right next door,? Sandra acknowledged.?We needed our own Church immediately after the Change, but by that time Leo was… a problem.?

  Tiphaine?s smile grew a little wider. Sandra was fond of an old Russian saying: When a man causes you a problem, remember: no man, no problem. The recollection of the look on his starved-eagle ascetic face when he saw her step silently from behind an arras in his private chambers and hold up the hypodermic…

  I smiled then, too, she thought, happily nostalgic. That was a good day. We did a lot of housecleaning around then. ?Ah, if tombstones were only honest-how many would read died of being an inconvenience to the powerful,? Conrad said genially.

  He was obviously following at least some of her thoughts; Delia winced slightly, for the same reason. She was a gentle soul. ?It?s not as if it was a personal impulse,? Tiphaine said, mildly defensive.?As the Lady Regent said, the man needed killing.? ?And you certainly didn?t leave muddy footprints all over the place,? Conrad said admiringly.?Very neat. Until just now I actually thought there was an outside chance it was really natural causes.? ?I don?t screw up. And I had a lettre de cachet with me just in case, anyway,? she pointed out.

  Sandra smiled, with a faraway reminiscent expression of her own: ? The bearer has done what has been done by my authority, and for the good of the State. I always loved actually writing that… milady.? ?Tiph never had one stolen by a dashing Gascon musketeer, either,? the Count of Odell said.?And God knows she had enough of them pass through her hands-or did you just use the first and not bother having a fresh one made up for every job, d?Ath?? ?No, a new letter every time. I?ve still got all the old ones, stamped canceled in red ink.? ?You?re joking, right??

  Delia shuddered and rolled her eyes.?No, she isn?t. A whole file of them, all on parchment and all tied up with ribbons.? ?That?s sort of sick, you know?? the Count of Odell laughed. ?We all have our hobbies, Conrad,? Tiphaine said, pouring herself a glass of the fizzy white wine, and taking a sip that tasted of flowers and almonds and oranges.?The Regent has her cats. You and Lady Odell are always on about those roses of yours. Delia loves babies.?

  Sandra turned to Delia and asked politely:?And how is little Heuradys??

  The younger woman brightened.?Teething, poor lamb, my lady. But?-she caught Tiphaine?s eye and abbreviated the details to-?still cute as a button.? ?Oh, cute as a puppy,? Tiphaine agreed.?She?s going to be fair, like Lioncel.?

  And this is the last one!

  Three was a smallish family these days, and Delia had wanted to try again for another daughter to balance the set, but…

  We?re retiring that turkey baster, if I have anything to say about it! Which admittedly I may not. ?However, babies are much harder to housebreak,? she finished. ?Plus puppies don?t need to be found dowries or fiefs when they grow up.? ?And on that note,? Sandra said more seriously.?What do you make of the situation? Not the details-the larger picture.?

  As always she was in combinations of gray and white, with silver gilt buttons down the sleeves and bodice of her cotte-hardi. A Persian kitten rested in a small basket on her lap, and dodged a paw out at the dangling trails of the wimple now and then. ?The enemy are still not pressing us very hard,? she added, reaching in a hand and running a finger down its head; the little beast turned on its back and began to wrestle with the digit as she tickled its stomach.?I expected them to be more aggressive.? ?The dance starts soon,? Tiphaine said, and went into the details.

  Conrad nodded agreement when she?d finished.?It?s a persisting strategy. Subtle, for an alliance. The sum total of a whole lot of little fights is more predictable than one or two big ones where luck and generalship can overcome the odds.?

  Unlike the older noble, Tiphaine reached for a second sandwich. Benefits of an active metabolism, she thought, as she marshaled reports and observations in her mind. Perks of running around wearing sixty pounds of steel half the time. Also good food makes me feel less pessimistic.

  Sandra pursed her lips and tapped a finger on them.?I?m surprised our enemies are being so… farsighted. They?re both young men-Prophet Sethaz is barely thirty, and General-President Martin Thurston of Boise is younger still. In my experience, patience isn?t a quality of which men that age show any great fund.? ?Sethaz is… I?m not sure if he?s altogether human,? Tiphaine said.?He?s certainly mad and I wouldn?t rule out the stories of demonic possession.?

 
Conrad grunted agreement. Sandra raised one elegant brow; her brown eyes were a little surprised. ? Et tu, Tiphaine?? ?I?ve had too much contact with the CUT to doubt that something very strange is going on out there in the Valley of Paradise,? she said.?Strange and… unpleasant. You taught me to evaluate the evidence, my lady, not reject it because it conflicted with my assumptions. And you heard about Lady Astrid?s headache??

  Sandra?s brow went up.?That was supernatural?? she said.

  Conrad snorted.?Damned straight it was. I?ve seen Tiph draw, spin a hundred and eighty degrees, cut a dragonfly in half on the wing, sheath the blade and be back where she started in about a second,? he said.?Astrid?s just as good.? ?Just as fast, certainly,? Tiphaine said with hard-won professional detachment.

  The Hiril Dunedain had killed her lover Katrina during the Protector?s War in the course of the botched first attempt to get Mathilda back from the Mackenzies. Tiphaine didn?t dwell on the memory; it was too stressful. ?Stress? is mostly the result of not being allowed to kill some asshole you really want to slice and dice. ? Something is going on,? Conrad said grimly.?And I lost my belief in the absolute reign of impersonal natural laws about twenty-four years ago. There?s something else at work in the universe. And it doesn?t seem to like us much.? ?A point,? Sandra said reluctantly.

  She was that rarity these days, an atheist to the core, a complete materialist and rationalist. Tiphaine had been one herself, until recently, though they were both pious enough in public. As Sandra said, God was a myth but religion was as real as rocks and far more useful to rulers.

  Now I?m… not sure anymore, Tiphaine thought. I?m still not sure about God, that is, but the devil is starting to look awfully convincing. I?m going to have to have a talk with Delia about aligning with some protective spook or other. Even if I?d rather pull out my own toenails with my teeth.

  She went on aloud, her voice coolly neutral: ?And Thurston is just too smart for comfort. He is having riverboats built in Pendleton, with the locals and the CUT supplying materials. Sethaz lets him do that-the Cutters have those religious taboos about machinery. But as long as we hold the castles and walled cities along the Columbia we can strike north or south at the flank of any invader and we have superior water transport for our logistics.? ?Clear enough, then. Let?s not get bogged down in military details at this point,? Sandra said.?I leave that to you, my lady Grand Constable, and to the Chancellor. What?s the state of morale, Conrad?? she went on.