by Tad Williams
Morgan did not think he had made a noise, but somehow the Sitha heard him behind her and turned. She did not cover herself or look surprised—she did not even look embarrassed—but only gazed at him with the kind of offhand interest another solitary bather might have felt to discover herself observed by a deer or a squirrel. After a moment she turned away again, not to hide, but to continue what she was doing. Morgan sloshed back against the slow current, looking for a less problematic spot—for him if not for the Sitha—to dry his clothes.
* * *
• • •
“How long will it take to reach the Hayholt?” he asked that night as they ate a meager and not particularly satisfying meal of boiled acorns and dandelion leaves.
“I do not know the answer to that, Morgan. In fact, I think I will take you someplace else first.”
He didn’t like that sound of that at all. “What do you mean? Where?”
Finished with her food, she fixed him with a sharp, steady gaze. She had not mentioned his appearance at her bathing spot, and he had not wanted to bring it up, but it now seemed to hang between them somehow, or at least so it felt to Morgan. “Just my finding you has changed things already. I suppose that your grandparents and the others must still think you lost.”
“I still am lost until we get out of this forest,” he reminded her, a trifle cross.
“I gave you most of the dandelions,” she replied. “Did you mutter at your Chikri friends too for not supplying you with a sufficiency of hazelnuts?”
“No. I’m sorry.” But he wasn’t really, not too much. How long could he be expected to eat the sort of things sensible farmers plowed under before he went mad from hunger?
“In any case,” she continued, “I need to tell my friends that I am with you. Jiriki and Aditu might be able to send word to your family somehow, but even if they cannot, they still will be relieved to know you are safe. It is also important they know I have seen Sacrifice scouts as close to them. As near as Misty Vale.”
Morgan was pleased to hear that not all the Sithi wanted him dead. Still, the idea of anything other than heading straight home undercut the relief he had been feeling since Tanahaya had told him her plan that morning. “God save us, you’re not going to take me all the way back to those Sithi villages are you? They must be leagues and leagues away, and in the wrong direction!”
She showed something that again seemed nearly a smile. “From following your trail, I suspect you are not the best person to decide which direction is which. The Veil of the Sa’onsera snared you and would not let you free.”
If she meant the mad untrustworthiness of the sun and stars, he didn’t want to talk about it. “I didn’t ask to be lost.”
“True. No, I do not intend to lead you back to H’ran Go-jao. With only a slight alteration to our path we can reach the Flowering Hills on our way to your home. My teacher Himano has his house there, and I have not seen him for so very, very long.”
“So we’d go out of our way to visit some old friend of yours?”
She gave him a look this time that could only be irritation. Apparently, Morgan decided with a small thrill of triumph, the Sithi were not as emotionless as they wanted everyone to believe. “Have you not listened to what I said?” She spoke carefully, as though to a bad-tempered child. “I wish to tell those who need to know that I have found you, and that there are Hikeda’ya Sacrifice warriors roaming much farther into the great woods than before. My teacher Himano will have a Witness. Do you know what that is?”
He was about to say that, yes, he certainly did know, because his grandfather had told him all about them, but then he realized that he could scarcely recall a single detail of what King Simon had said. Humbled, he said, “A bit. Some kind of magic mirror?”
Tanahaya made a hand-sign he hadn’t seen before, a quick touching of all her fingertips, almost as though she were folding her hands in prayer. “I have never understood what your folk mean by ‘magic,’ because they use it to describe not only impossibilities seen only in your children’s tales, but also things we Zida’ya do every day, even those who are untutored. Yes, Witnesses, especially the smallest ones often appear to be mirrors, but they can be many things of many sizes—‘Stones, Scales, Pools, and Pyres’ as the saying goes.”
“I’ve never heard that saying.”
“Because you are . . . young.” She hesitated before choosing the last word. “The Witnesses are a way to speak through the between places over great distance, so that our voices do not have to travel through the naked air. But all that matters is, with Himano’s Witness I can speak to Jiriki and Aditu and tell them what I have discovered.”
She gave him another stern look, her golden eyes intent as a hawk’s, and for a moment Morgan almost felt afraid.
“Do you understand? Or will we argue more?”
“Yes, yes, very well.” He tried to surrender with good grace—she had saved him after all. “I suppose it makes sense.”
“It does, so that is where we will be headed tomorrow, although I doubt we will reach it in daylight.” She paused. “And if you are not going to finish eating those leaves, I will have them.”
23
In the Root Cellar
By the time Miriamele reached the deep part of the Sancellan Mahistrevis—which most of its inhabitants called the root cellar, though it had been more than a century since it was used for something so ordinary—she and her guards had collected a crowd of dismayed functionaries, all trying to tell the queen where she should not go go, which happened to be exactly where she was going. A pair of sentries in kingfisher livery stood on either side of the heavy, barred door. At the sight of her they blocked the door and lowered their pikes.
Sir Jurgen stepped in front of her. “Put those up, you fools! Would you have it said you threatened the High Queen?”
“But the duke said nobody may pass,” declared the braver of the two.
“Am I nobody?” Miriamele asked, struggling to keep her temper in check. “Or am I somebody? Think carefully before you answer, because it will be judged by these Erkynguardsmen, loyal servants of the High Throne.”
The sentries looked at each other, then at Miri’s guards, who looked quite capable of dispatching a pair of such trivial obstacles. At last one of the sentries reached up a gloved fist and knocked loudly on the door, then stepped back and lifted the bolt. Jurgen stepped between the duke’s men and pushed it open; Miri swept in after him.
It was much as she had imagined: a man chained to a post at the center of the low-ceilinged chamber, sagging, chin on his chest, with a hooded jailer on either side of him. Coals in a brazier lit one side of his body in hellscape red, but the embers were clearly meant for more than light: a trio of metal instruments rested on the brazier’s edge, heating for eventual use.
Duke Saluceris, who had been sitting on a stool at the far side of the root cellar, now stood, unfeigned surprise on his face. “Majesty! What are you doing here?”
She looked around at stone walls hung with chains and various devices crafted to cause pain and damage to human bodies. “Rather I should ask that of you, Your Grace.” She looked at the prisoner’s cut and bruised head, his face largely masked by drying blood. “Especially since everything you do, you do in my name and my husband’s. I see you have not yet removed anything from this man that will not heal, and for that I give God thanks. Now unchain him.”
Saluceris shook his head, half-angry, half-worried, uncertain how to respond. “Your Majesty, I understand that you are upset, but this is not your concern.”
She glared at him. “You dare say that to me, Saluceris?” She fought to remain calm. “Who put you on the throne? Who has kept the Benidrivines in the Sancellan Mahistrevis all these years? My grandfather John could have exiled your entire family or worse after he defeated Adrivis, but instead he handed them back the reins of power. No, I think this is utt
erly my concern.” She stepped forward. Several more of the duke’s soldiers stood in the shadows, as many as the guards Miri had brought, who now crowded into the chamber behind her, but even in her current fury she could not imagine the Nabbanai soldiers offering resistance.
She leaned over the prisoner. “Who are you, man?”
“He is a criminal, Majesty,” said the duke. “That is why he is here, because he will not give us the names of his associates.”
Miri gave him a look, then turned back to the bloody man. “Speak. Tell me only the truth. Your name?”
“Yuvis, my lady,” he wheezed, a little red bubbling at the corner of his mouth. “Called the tailor’s son.”
“This man knows the bandits that were hired to attack the wedding party and cast blame for it on the Benidrivine House,” Saluceris said angrily. “He protects them because some are his relatives. Please, Majesty, do not interfere.”
“I interfered at the wedding, and that is likely why your wife and children are still alive, Duke.” She was doing her best to remain calm. “If you think you know the names of some who were actually responsible for the planned attack—an attack that did not happen, remember—arrest them. Get your information from their mouths, not his. Dozens of people have sworn to me that this man is guilty of nothing more than having a criminal cousin. His wife and five children are on the steps of the Sancellan Aedonitis now, crying out to Heaven to save their father from the monstrous duke.”
“But, Majesty . . .” Saluceris was desperately trying to stay between her and the prisoner, as if hiding what had been done to the man would make it go away. “I know that sometimes what must be done in the search for justice is ugly—that women and the gentle-hearted cannot bear . . .”
Miriamele jerked up her hand to stop him, clenching her teeth so hard to avoid shouting that she bit her own cheek. “Let us step outside and talk, just the two of us, my lord,” she said when she had regained her composure. Without waiting for his assent she strode to the door and pushed it open, hitting one of the sentries who had been listening at the doorway. She knocked his soup plate helmet off.
“Step inside with the others,” Miri told the other sentry as the eavesdropper crawled across the floor trying to retrieve his clattering helmet.
“Yes,” said Saluceris, perhaps hoping to regain a little control. “You men, inside.”
When the door had closed and they were alone in the corridor, Miriamele held up her hand again. The duke’s nostrils flared but he remained silent. “Did you learn anything about this man you have tortured other than what was told to you by an informant?”
“What do you mean?” Saluceris barely remembered to add the words, “Your Majesty.”
“I mean that if you had bothered to speak to the local people before snatching this fellow out of his shop and dragging him here, you would know that this Yuvis is an important man in his neighborhood. Respected by all. But as Count Froye discovered by asking only a few questions, Yuvis the tailor’s son is also a loyal supporter of your dukedom and of the High Throne. His cousin, the one you are torturing him to learn about, is the shame of the family. There are dozens you could have arrested and questioned about this, but you have somehow chosen the only one who would have defended you to the rest of his kin and fellows.”
“But the informant—”
“—may have been lying, may have been mistaken, or may simply have told you the first thing he thought of because he feared getting the same treatment from your torturers.”
“I have no choice, Majesty. We cannot let the Ingadarines get away with such a thing, sending bravos and killers to a wedding, putting my own family in danger—”
“This is not practicality, Saluceris, this is pride.” She said it quietly, but she made sure that he heard each word. “If you cannot stand to think people might tell lies about you, you should hand over the ducal crown today. It is part and parcel of being a ruler.”
“But Dallo Ingadaris wants—”
“Please stop making me interrupt you, my lord. It is nothing so simple and stupid as a woman shuddering at the sight of blood. What makes me shudder is how you are doing exactly what the Ingadarines want. If you respond to every provocation with this kind of gross, heedless violence, the streets of Nabban will be ablaze before St. Granis’ Day. Do you understand? Count Dallo wants you to do this, until innocent people are afraid and murder is answered with murder, until the people no longer trust you to keep them safe. And all the time, without having to say a word, he offers them your brother instead. Can you not see that? Even if you trace this back to Dallo, you will never prove that Drusis was in any way involved. A bitter fight between you and Honsa Ingadaris will still leave your brother the last one standing.”
She was almost out of breath by the time she had finished. Look at me, she thought. Oh, Simon, we are old now, but they still have learned nothing. How do we keep them from taking what small good we leave behind and turning it into ruin?
Saluceris swallowed, no more interested in a shouting match that others might hear than Miri was. At last he said, “What do you wish me to do, Your Majesty?”
“I want you to speak to me before you take any more steps like this.”
“But you will not be here in Nabban much longer now the wedding is over.” He didn’t sound like the prospect saddened him much.
“Long enough perhaps to help you. And that is what I’m trying to do, Duke Saluceris, whether you know it or not.” She paused. “You must let this man go. You must apologize to him.”
“Apologize?” His eyes widened as if she had just suggested he ask the fellow to dance.
“Yes. And you will have your most discreet servants pass the word around that he was denounced by one of Dallo’s hirelings—that the entire thing was Count Dallo’s revenge on the tailor’s son for not supporting the Ingadarines.”
Saluceris paused, for the first time thinking of something beyond his own frustration. “Do you think it will be believed?”
“At least it will be another story—and one that will make more sense to those who know this man as one of your supporters. Let them do your work for you. Clean him up, let him rest for a day, then send him home with a bag of gold. You have not harmed him in some way I did not see, have you?”
The duke shook his head like a sullen child. “No. He was barely touched, just cuffed and bruised.”
“Lucky man—and lucky us. But do not forget the apology, I beg you.” She considered. “When he can think clearly again, tell him you did not know you had such a loyal supporter in the Cloth District, and that you are heartbroken by the mistake. The arrest was all a terrible trick played on him by the his enemies among the Stormbirds.”
“I suppose it is best, if what you say about him is true.”
“I do not act until I know as much as I need to.” She tried not to show the bitterness she felt. “You might find it a more practical method in dealing with Count Dallo and your brother than what you’ve been doing.”
* * *
Ever since she had seen the queen frighten a dozen armed men into running away, Jesa had been in awe of her. In this foreign land of women who hid behind veils and pretended, at least in public, not to understand anything to do with either violence or lovemaking, it was the first thing that had reminded her of her own upbringing in the Wran. Jesa had once seen her mother, small and plump and with no weapon but a wooden spoon, chase a large, drunken fisherman with a grudge against her father off the family jetty.
“Be glad my husband was not home!” she had shouted after him as the other women stood in the doorway laughing. “He would have given you more than a poke in the eye!”
Not that what Queen Miriamele had done was the same—it had been much braver, much more dangerous. But Jesa had not seen that spirit for some time, and it reminded her of how much strangeness she had come to take for granted.
But it also made her shy, and when the queen and her envoy, Count Froye, visited with Duchess Canthia, Jesa took the baby to the next room but left the door open. She was doing her best to calm Serasina, who had a tooth coming in and would not sleep. Jesa could hear most of what was being said, but Miriamele’s firm voice brought her to the doorway with the infant in her arms.
“Canthia, I think it is time for you to leave for Domos Benidriyan,” the queen said. “Take the children and stay there.”
“I do not understand, Majesty.” The duchess was quiet but stubborn. Canthia was trying to hold young Blasis on her lap but the boy was squirming and struggling to get down. “This is our city. The people are our subjects and we have been nothing but good to them. Why should I fear them?”
“First of all, never make the mistake of thinking that because nobody says anything bad to your face, nobody is saying anything bad about you at all.”
Jesa could see that Count Froye was silently trying to get the queen’s attention but the queen ignored him. “At this very moment,” Miriamele went on, “Dallo Ingadaris and your husband’s brother are saying many bad things about you, and not just in the Dominiate where all can hear. Their servants are poisoning the marketplaces and guildhalls all over Nabban with talk of how the duke doesn’t care if his subjects are robbed and killed by Thrithings-men.”
“But none of that is true!” protested the Duchess.
“What is true doesn’t matter, Canthia. That is what I am trying to tell you. And your husband is already making mistakes—I’m sorry, Froye, but don’t wave your hands at me like that,” she told her envoy sternly. “It has to be said. Canthia, your husband is already letting Dallo’s tricks and treacheries anger him. Imagine what will happen if some band of so-called outlaws were to attack you and your children. The Duke would lose his wits and strike back without thinking, and then the city will burn. The Sancellan Mahistrevis itself will not be safe.”