by David Drake
Mahaut didn’t make it to Edgar Jacobson’s funeral.
3
Loreilei Jacobson did not heal easily. The shot had hit her lower rib and broken it. Mahaut suspected that it had then been deflected into her small intestines and done damage there. There was no exit wound. Controlling the bleeding was very difficult. The wound was large—the ball seemed to have entered at an angle—and she had to apply bandages and pressure to a large area until the servants came with a board made into a stretcher.
It’s the same board they used to carry Edgar in, she reflected.
It had been scrubbed, but there were still bloodstains within the willow-wood grain. Getting Loreilei onto the board had provided its own difficulty. Mahaut was determined not to move her very much, and she’d had to make the servants understand this and not jostle her.
Meanwhile poor Frel sat nearby looking on worriedly with his one unswollen eye. He was hurt, and maybe hurt badly, but someone else would have to tend to him. Later she learned that the someone else was Bronson, the stable master, and his wife. Frel had recovered for a day in the feedloft while the couple attended him between their duties. A day later, Josiah Weldletter had come to take his son home in a padded wagon bed.
By the time Loreilei was in a bed, shock had set in. There was little Mahaut could do but keep the girl in clean bandages and alternately warm or cool her as her body shuddered with fever and chills. She did not regain consciousness for three days. During that time, she had occasionally stopped breathing, and Mahaut had pushed her own breath into the girl’s lungs to keep her alive.
Always Loreilei’s breath came back within moments. Her niece was tough.
Deep sepsis had set in, and with it great pain. Mahaut allowed Loreilei to eat and drink only broth of wheat, strained dak soup, and water for many days. She was afraid that whatever healing might be going on in Loreilei’s gut would be undone by food passing through it. The wound healed slowly, but within a month new skin and scar tissue had covered it.
It’s a very pretty little scar in comparison to mine, Mahaut reflected. Of course, she’ll never think so. If she lives.
Yet slowly the girl recovered. After three weeks, Mahaut believed her niece fit enough to leave her side for several hours to take exercise and weapons practice. Loreilei’s parents and uncles and aunts came by frequently after Mahaut permitted them in her rooms.
Never Benjamin.
Even in the early evening, when she went through the main sitting room to get to the latrine, she did not find him in his usual spot in the large chair he adored.
“Has he left the house?” she asked one of the servants coming by on his rounds.
“No, Land-heiress, he is still sleeping here. But he takes his meals alone and comes and goes like a ghost.”
After two weeks had passed, Frel and his stepfather, Josiah Weldletter, had appeared at the door one afternoon. They would never have been allowed to come unless Benjamin had known of it and approved. Loreilei had immediately brightened. The two sat and talked while Weldletter, who was a captain in the Regulars and a cartographer working full time in the office of the district military command, told Mahaut what news there was of the wider world.
After the first visit, Frel came often. It seemed that Benjamin had resigned himself to the match. He’d spoken before of marrying Loreilei to a powerful First Family in Lindron who had expressed interest in establishing a connection to House Jacobson. Solon had four daughters, however, and Loreilei had a sister who was now a toddler. Benjamin might get his wish for the union of alliance sooner or later without Loreilei. He usually did.
Finally, after ten rises of the three-day moon, Levot, Loreilei was well enough to walk, gingerly, to her own quarters and begin her life anew. Mahaut doubted she would ever be able to run and gambol again. Any jarring movement brought her pain. Being alive at all would have to be consolation.
4
Mahaut took a long ride down to the lake and did not return until well after dark. She’d ridden past the family graveyard, but hadn’t felt the slightest interest in going to see Edgar’s grave. The next day she got up and went in to work. Benjamin would have to be confronted one way or another. But she sent word ahead that she was coming.
Benjamin looked at her without betraying an emotion when she entered the office. Solon found something that needed doing outside. They went to the corner desk where Benjamin liked to work. As usual, it was piled with scrolls. Benjamin’s absolute control of his surroundings did not extend to the desk. Mahaut took the visitor chair. Benjamin pushed a scroll aside and leaned on his desk, looking down at her. He gazed at her a long time, then allowed himself the faintest of smiles.
“We’ve missed you here,” he said.
Mahaut nodded, but said nothing.
A sob rose in Benjamin’s throat. Mahaut could see him choke it back. “You killed my son.”
“He was coming at me with a knife, Pater.”
Benjamin held her gaze for a moment, then said, “I know.”
“I’m sorry. I never wanted to hurt Edgar. I did love him once. Briefly.”
“We have that in common, don’t we? Only I find that I love him still, despite what he became.”
Again, Mahaut did not reply.
“But it hurts me to see you,” Benjamin said. “I think it will for a long time.”
Mahaut let out a nervous breath close to a whimper. She’d been expecting this moment, but still it was a like a pain shooting through her heart.
So this was it. She was being thrown out of the family. Benjamin wouldn’t put it that way, but that’s what it would be. Where would she go? To her parents, she supposed. Or maybe her brother, Xavier, and his wife would take her in. She would still have the Treville Women’s Auxiliary to keep her busy. But after the heady days of working with a trading house that stretched up and down the Land, this option seemed to her . . . smaller. Or was it that her world had gotten larger?
No, maybe going back to the auxiliary was not a good idea. She’d put new leadership in place herself. To demote them would do a lot of damage to morale she’d spent years to build. So she’d have nothing. Maybe when Xavier’s children came along, she’d at least be able to help Helga raise them.
“I’ll leave in the morning for Hestinga, Pater,” she said.
Benjamin shook his head. “No. I have another idea in mind, if you’ll hear me out.”
“Yes, of course.”
“It occurs to me that we have an opening in Lindron.”
Benjamin scooted himself up on his desk and sat with his elbow on a knee and his hand on his chin. A wave of nostalgia washed over her for a moment. She’d seen him in this posture so often when he was working out a problem or thinking through a possibility.
So, she was to be shipped off to clerk somewhere far away. It wasn’t the worst thing.
“Are you sure whoever you’ve put in Abram Karas’s spot will want to work with a woman? The men who don’t mind are rare. You know that.”
Benjamin smiled slyly. “Daughter, I want to put you in charge in Lindron.”
“In charge? You mean factor?” She could hardly believe this.
“We can’t call you the factor. We’d call it chief consort to the House. We’ll send someone along, someone who will know his place, to take on the factor title. But he’ll answer to you. I’ll make that clear. Dillard might suit.”
For a moment, Mahaut allowed her heart to leap. But the feeling was quickly replaced by uncertainty. Could she do the job? So far, she’d been a second to Benjamin and Solon, a manager, certainly. But not in charge. Not ultimately responsible. Not like the factor of a large trading house in the biggest city in the world.
“Dillard would be fine.”
“So you accept?”
“I would have conditions.”
Benjamin took his hand from his knee, sat back on the desk. “Oh?”
“Freedom to invest fluid assets where I see fit.”
“Of course. That’s part o
f the job description.”
“Perhaps not for a woman, though?”
“I said you’d be in charge. You will.”
Mahaut nodded. “Good.”
“What else?” asked Benjamin.
Mahaut took a deep breath, let it out. “I want freedom to avenge Abram Karas. In my own time, and how I see fit. I want to use the full resources of the House to do this if I have to.”
Benjamin smiled. “A license to kill, eh?”
“Assassination would be easy enough. But maybe I can arrange something worse.”
Now Benjamin did allow himself a full smile.
“You are free to do as you want in this matter, and the House resources will be at your disposal in Lindron and at all Jacobson Houses,” he said. “But there is something else. I want your advice.”
“Yes?”
“Loreilei and this boy,” he said. “Edgar was right in a way. It probably isn’t a good idea. A land-heiress’s place is to serve her house. In return, she has the house’s protection, its wealth and power. Of course, Loreilei will not be poor when she marries. We’ll always see to that. But she’ll miss out on her chance to make a mark. A son is like chits that can be spent a little at a time. A daughter—”
“—can only be sold once, and had better bring a good price?” Mahaut said. “And the price is alliance.”
“Or a truce. Or a spy. You get something.”
“She was a slave to the Blaskoye. I’m pretty sure she doesn’t ever want anybody telling her what to do again.”
“But she trusts you,” said Benjamin. “She loves you.”
“I love her. Most of all, I feel responsible for what happened to her. You know that.”
“Then take her to Lindron with you.” He said it as if Mahaut had already accepted the position, as if he had heard it in her voice. Maybe he had. “Take her for a year or so. I won’t forbid her attachment to the boy. I know where that would get me.”
“Yes.”
“But you think a year apart would break it?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “But she’s very young, and we owe it to her to test it, don’t you think?”
“I agree with that.”
“I’ll talk to the boy to make sure they don’t try something idiotic, like running away together. I’ll put it to him as a way of proving himself. In a way it will be.”
Mahaut nodded. “I think that’s a good plan, Pater. I believe I can convince her. I’ll try, at least.”
“So it’s decided? You’ll do this?”
She took a moment, looked down, rubbed her forehead. “And what will I call myself? Not the position, I mean. What will be my name now?” she asked in a low voice.
Benjamin smiled crookedly. She recognized that smile. He wore it when a deal of his had gone particularly well.
“Why, Her Gracious Excellency, Land-heiress, the widow Jacobson, of course.”
This will be my life for years to come. To say good-bye to the family here. To say good-bye to my parents and brother. No more rest day trips to Hestinga to see Mamma and Pappa. To be really, truly, for the first time, my own woman.
Then she realized that this is what she’d been waiting for all along.
“Thank you for the opportunity, Pater,” she said. “Yes, I’ll take Lindron.”
5
Her desk was made of imported Delta hardwood, and large enough to lay a body on. But when she rolled out the ledger scrolls for House Jacobson Lindron, they covered the whole surface. In this way, she could see it all in a glance. The accounts, the connections, the flow of grain, goods, and barter chits. The liabilities. The possibilities.
Karas had done a good job, as far as it went. He was conservative with Jacobson funds, as was she. But it was clear from the outlays that he had been more concerned with keeping peace among the First Families of the capital city than with making a profit. And look where that plan had gotten him.
That’s not fair, she thought. No one could pay his way out of a House disaster such as Edgar Jacobson’s duel had been. No, that took blood. It may take more.
Karas was also cutting deals with the Blaskoye raiders from the southern border of Lindron. They were deals to trade the goods that they’d robbed from elsewhere in the Land. She supposed Karas would view this as a necessity of doing business. Perhaps. But maybe something could be done to stop the blackmail once and for all.
She’d hired a tutor for Loreilei and was bringing her along on her rounds of house visits to the capital First Family matrons—a necessary social duty—and on evening functions and get-togethers. She’d even allowed Loreilei in on some business meetings. She supposed she was trying to train Loreilei in the things of the world that she, Mahaut, had learned the hard way. It wasn’t so long ago that she herself was headstrong Mahaut DeArmanville of Hestinga, invincible, young, ready to take on the world—and hopelessly naïve.
She’d been beaten down, wounded, betrayed—but she’d fought back. Now she was chief consort of the House of Jacobson in Lindron. Factor. Here in Lindron there were so many things to consider. And most days she felt up to the task.
“Master Marone to see you,” said Dillard, who worked in the outer office.
“Send him in.”
“Very good, Land-heiress.”
Marone looked even more grizzled than usual. There were several bulges under his jacket that would be weapons, and she noticed that the knuckles on his right hand were scraped red. She motioned for him to sit, and he lowered himself into the chair with a delicate grace for such a big man. He sat ramrod straight.
“What do you have for me, Marone?”
“It took a bit of doing and more than a bit of spending, but I believe I’ve found the child.”
“Submit your expenses to Dillard,” she said. She leaned forward. “Tell me.”
“The Eisenach woman came to term and delivered a boy,” he said. “Then it was carried away quickly, out of Eisenach House here in Lindron. I have this from the nurse. She gave the child to a man she didn’t recognize. I spent more than a few day tracing this person, but I finally found him. I questioned him thoroughly.”
Mahaut glanced down and noticed Marone’s skinned knuckles.
“His name is Dubin, but that’s no matter. He’s an orphan monger. He takes them and sells them, Mistress. He’ll take a fee and place them as shop apprentices, fieldhands, sweeps, whores in training—and other things too vile to mention.”
“I understand, Master Marone,” she said. “Go on. What happened to the child?”
“He was sold to the orphanage near the Lindron gunpowder works. It’s run by priests. Sort of a monastery.”
“That doesn’t sound so bad, considering. At least he’ll be near the family trade.”
“It is bad, Land-heiress.” Marone shook his head ruefully. “It’s the workhouse that the Silent Brothers are drawn from.”
“Those wretches who work at the gunpowder factory?”
“Yeah, those ones, Land-heiress.”
The Silent Brothers were the priestly worker caste who made gunpowder. Making gunpowder was a prerogative of the priest-smiths only. The recipe, or magic, that went into creating it must be kept a secret at all costs. One of those costs was to develop a priest caste of men to carry the secret knowledge of gunpowder’s making. The Silent Brothers were castrated at a young age, and their tongues were cut out. Abel had dealt with them. He’d told her that they had a complicated sign language among themselves, but otherwise they communicated with no one. They went about their jobs in the gunpowder yard, they ate and slept there, and never left except as a cadaver—an event which usually came at a young age. Those who worked with the materials that went into gunpowder tended to have short lifespans.
“When is the . . . when does the operation on the children take place?”
“The tongue at age three. The other at around seven years old, I believe, your grace.”
“So they haven’t . . . done him yet. Cut off his little balls, I mean.
The tongue’s no matter.”
Marone started at Mahaut’s graphic language. “That’s right, Land-heiress.”
Mahaut was quiet for a moment, then cleared her throat and spoke. “I want this child. I want him here.”
“Here?”
“In this house. In House Jacobson. He is a Jacobson, after all.”
“A bastard urchin.”
Mahaut bristled. “Don’t ever let me hear you say that again, Marone. If I do, I’ll have you turned into one of those Silent Brothers.”
Marone hastily nodded. “No offense intended, your grace.”
“Can you arrange to take the child? Steal it, I mean?”
“Might take some doing, but I think I can handle it with a good purse of chits.”
“Whatever it takes,” Mahaut said. “No price is too high.”
Marone allowed himself a smile. “It won’t take that much, considering the kind of folks I’ll be dealing with. Nothing that will break the House, that’s for sure.”
“Like I said, do whatever it takes. Understand, Marone?”
“I do, your grace.”
“The sooner the better. I want those scissors as far away from the little thing’s testicles as possible.”
“Yes, Land-heiress,” the trader replied.
“We have to keep this as quiet as possible. I think one of the maids has a sister who has recently delivered. I’ll make arrangements for her as a wet nurse.”
Marone nodded. He shuffled his feet a bit, started to speak then stopped himself.
“What is it, Marone?”
“I was just thinking, your grace . . .” He hesitated, then seemed to start over and spoke again. “You know I have young ’uns of my own, Land-heiress. I know that every day I miss ’em something awful, and I think they miss me. So does the wife. Miss me, I mean to say. But what I’m saying is, the boy should have someone to look after him like that. Like they would a son.”
“He will,” Mahaut said. “He’ll be a son of Jacobson House. He’ll get plenty of affection.”