The Two of Swords--Part Nineteen

by K. J. Parker

  Anyway, that’s why Lycao and I got married. No point keeping up the pretence any more, with Lycao being the only piece left on the board, so to speak. So, we got married, and she’s sticking with me closer than a lid on a jar from now on. It’s a risk, but now that you Lodge people are coming out into the open, and you’ve got all the money and all the soldiers, I fancy protecting her will be your job as much as mine. That business at Beal gave me a real scare, I can tell you, but he won’t be in a position to try anything like that again for a long time. And who knows? By then he could be dead.

  Didn’t they tell you? No, the war is now officially over, now that Glauca’s dead. So Forza’s signed up with the Vesani Republic, commander-in-chief of land forces, and I’m to be the grand marshal of Mezentia. Well, they had no choice, did they? Obviously the Vesani wanted Forza so they could rub the Mezentines off the map. I didn’t have to offer: they came and pleaded with me, you’re our only hope for survival, all that sort of thing. So it’ll be business as usual, only with a brand new chess set. I’ll be honest with you, I’m looking forward to it. Once you’ve got used to practising your trade at the highest level, anything else would be the most awful anticlimax.

  Lycao? Well of course she’s coming with me. She says there are outstanding opportunities for the Lodge in Mezentia. And in the Vesani Republic. Well, that’s what she said. Not sure what she means by it, but she knows the Lodge business far better than I do.

  “I know exactly what she means,” she said. “Now, will you answer my question?”

  “I thought I just did.”

  “Who’s the Queen of Blemya getting married to?”

  Senza pulled a sad face. “Well, you’ll find out soon enough. If you must know, it’s your pal, the song and dance man. Oida.”

  She looked at him in total silence, until she realised she was embarrassing him. “Yes,” she said, “of course it is. I’m sorry. How silly of me.”

  She tried to find out how you went about making an appointment to see Director Procopius, but nobody knew. There was no established protocol, because it was something that simply didn’t happen. If he wanted to see you, you were told. That was that.

  So she started figuring out a plan. The logical person to seize and hold hostage was Lycao, because of her obvious value. Easier said than done, since a dozen very good men went with her everywhere she went, and at night you’d have Senza to reckon with; but she didn’t see that she had any choice. It was a good plan, one of her best, and when you’re good at something you enjoy doing it for its own sake, as a great man once said; so she was mildly disappointed when Procopius suddenly appeared in the doorway of her room, and the whole thing was suddenly redundant.

  She said as much; but Procopius smiled and shook his head. “You really think I didn’t know what you were planning? That’s why I’m here. So, the plan worked, you got what you wanted, I’m here.” He looked round, saw the spindly chair, decided against it and lowered himself slowly onto the floor, tucking his feet under his knees. “What did you want to talk to me about?” he said.

  She didn’t know whether to stand or sit; either would be mildly ridiculous, as would squatting down next to him on the hearthrug. She gave up and sat on the end of the bed.

  “Just confirmation, really. Of course, if you tell me I’m wrong I won’t believe you.”

  He nodded gravely. “Belief,” he said, “it’s all that matters. Also, I fancy, you want to show off how clever you’ve been, figuring it all out for yourself. You know, it’s a shame we didn’t get to know each other years ago. You’d have benefited from a father figure.”

  She took a deep breath. “How did you do it?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “How did you start the war?”

  “Oh, that.” He sounded disappointed, as though he’d been expecting a more challenging question. “To be honest with you, it was luck as much as anything. That’s to say, it was sheer dumb luck that Glauca and his nephew were so alike. Stubborn, I mean, and stupid in a clever sort of way. As soon as I realised that, I knew it would be pretty straightforward. I had to control certain variables, of course. The nephew was ideal for my purposes, so I had to get rid of Glauca’s wife and his sons, while they were still children. Fortunately, the old fool never showed any interest in marrying again, so that was one less thing to worry about. But, no, mostly it was just making good use of what was offered to me. I stirred up a little bit of fuss in the East, nothing serious but enough to warrant sending the heir apparent out to deal with it, a good chance for him to win his spurs and get a bit of hands-on experience of coping with a situation. Then, while he was there, I cooked up fake evidence that he was conspiring against his uncle. Glauca believed me, of course, I was his chief of security and I was never wrong, he trusted me implicitly, and also I had proof, buckets of it. And, of course, there’s nothing so infuriating as being accused of something you really wanted to do but nobly forebore doing; so when Glauca ordered him back home to stand trial for treason, naturally the idiot boy refused and proclaimed himself emperor of the East. I’d made it known to him, you see, that Glauca was terminally ill and couldn’t last more than a year or so. A little white lie in a good cause.”

  He paused and looked at her, waiting for her to respond to her cue. But she didn’t, so he smiled and said, “Confirmation?”

  “Mostly. But why didn’t you just kill them both?”

  “You don’t know?”

  “I want confirmation. A confession.”

  He shook his head. “That would imply that I’ve done something wrong.”

  “Confirmation, then. Humour me. Give me the satisfaction.”

  That made him grin. “If you insist on finding something to blame, I guess you can have the fact that I was made head of the Lodge at such an early age. Thirty-two, actually, the youngest ever by at least fifteen years, but there, I was the outstanding candidate, there was never really any other possible choice. And it meant I had enough years ahead of me to be able to think long-term. That’s a luxury none of my predecessors ever had. I was able to look at the empire and realise that it was basically incompatible with the aims and objectives of the Lodge, and therefore it would have to be disposed of and replaced. I contemplated an invasion by a powerful enemy, but back then the empire was plainly invincible, so it would have to be civil war. The Belot brothers were a gift from heaven, of course. If I was that way inclined, I’d say it was vindication. If the Great Smith didn’t want me to succeed, why did he send me Forza and Senza?”

  “Hang on, though,” she said. “The Belot boys made the war go on and on, when it could’ve been wrapped up quickly—” She stopped. “Sorry, I’m being obtuse. That was the whole point.”

  That got her a gentle smile. “You got there in the end,” he said, “that’s the main thing. It wasn’t the emperors I wanted rid of, it was the empire. The whole thing: constitution, laws, economy, social and political structures – all too big, too powerful, too constricting. I think that’s the difference between a mortal Craftsman and the Great Smith. A human will keep on trying to mend something that’s broken, because he knows that making a new one from scratch is beyond him. Only the Great Smith has the – well, I guess you’d have to say the self-confidence, to smash it up, grind down the scrap, put the whole lot in the crucible, melt it down and pour it into a brand new mould. Sorry,” he added, “I’m not very good at Great Smith imagery. I don’t really believe in Him, not as an individual entity, a person. I think I may have at one time, but not any more. The further you get in true faith, the less you need personifications and anthropomorphisations. Or don’t you agree?”

  “I don’t matter,” she said. “Go on with what you were saying.”

  “Oh, there’s not really much to add, is there?” Procopius yawned. “Like I said just now, we got there in the end, and that’s what matters. Now we have a huge country, mostly empty, which we can restock according to our own specifications; we have the money to buy that good stock, from Saevo
lus Andrapodiza in the first instance, and then with refugees from Mezentia and the Vesani Republic, where they’re about to have a truly ruinous war, and so on; what they call in mathematics a recursive loop. At Beal we have the resources and facilities to train the leaders and directors of this perfect society of ours. To keep order, we’ve got the horse-archer people, and quite soon we’ll have Blemya, with a perfectly good army and plenty of money. That’ll tide us over until we’ve bred our first generation of new imperials, and after that it’ll all take care of itself. You agree, don’t you? It’s all worked out rather well.”

  She chose her next words with a degree of care. “Axio didn’t agree, though, did he?”

  Procopius shrugged. “He was a great disappointment to me. That’s all I want to say about him.”

  “He knew what you were doing, and he wanted to stop you.”

  A shake of the head. “That’s one interpretation,” Procopius said. “I prefer the version that has him down as simply ambitious. He wanted to rule to world. That’s never a good thing.”

  “But that was the whole idea,” she persisted. “That was the plan. You recruited him to be your puppet emperor. All he had to do was what he was told. But when he realised that you didn’t just want the empire, you wanted vacant possession—”

  Procopius held up his hand. “I don’t think his motives are particularly relevant, do you? All that matters is that he tried to subvert the Lodge and take it over for himself, thereby defying the ordained chain of command, which is intolerable blasphemy and an abomination in the sight of the Divine. So he had to be dealt with, and it was just as well that I had the foresight to keep a reserve. Who,” he added, rather more pleasantly, “will do just as well if not better, so no harm done. And a real stroke of luck for you, so I don’t see why you’re complaining.” He looked at her as if she’d just appeared out of nowhere. “You’re not questioning the decision, are you? Where’s your faith?”

  It was a perfectly valid question. She chose not to answer it. “What happened to him?”

  “Axio?” Procopius looked down at his hands. “To be honest with you, I’m not entirely sure. You’d have to ask that Rhus archer, the red-headed boy.” He looked up. “Does it matter?”

  “Not particularly.”

  “He had it coming,” Procopius said. “There was a warrant out for him.” He paused, then added, “I still think he could have been a useful emperor, but we’ll never know now, will we?” He yawned again, and slowly got to his feet. “And now I really must be going. I’ve been awake for forty-eight hours straight, and I need some sleep. We’ll be seeing a lot more of each other in the future.”

  His hand was on the latch. “Director,” she said.

  He turned to look at her. “Well?”

  “Is that it? The end justifies the means, and nothing else matters?”

  “Yes,” he said. “I thought everybody knew that. Good night.”

  She sent for the Rhus boy, Teucer, but nobody knew where he was. Nobody had seen him since he brought Axio’s head to the front gate, in a bag. The garrison colour sergeant said he wasn’t allowed to talk about it.

  “I’m allowing you,” she said.

  Oh well, in that case. It was just rumour, of course, but they were saying that Teucer killed Axio before the warrant actually left the duty officer’s desk, and he hadn’t known a thing about it. “Came in here expecting to be arrested,” the sergeant said, “I’ll come quietly or something like that, could’ve knocked him down with a feather when he heard it was all right and he wasn’t a murderer, he was a bloody hero. They reckon he cleared off after that. He’ll turn up sooner or later, mind. After all, there’s nowhere left to go, is there?”

  Indeed. He turned up the next day beside the road, with a bloody head, an empty purse and no boots. She went to see him in the hospital wing as soon as he woke up.

  “Yes,” he said. “I killed Axio.” He frowned, as if he knew he’d forgotten something important. “Am I in trouble?”

  “No,” she said. “There was a warrant out for him. You did your duty.”

  “Did I?” The boy tried to smile. “I can’t remember any warrant.”

  “It must have slipped your mind. A bang on the head can do funny things to your memory.”

  “That wasn’t why I killed him. I’m pretty sure of that.”

  “But you can’t remember the real reason. That’s an odd thing to forget, don’t you think?”

  “I suppose it is, really. Are you sure I’m not in any trouble? Surely it’s murder, if you don’t know the other person’s guilty of something.”

  She gave him a mock scowl. “Well,” she said, “I can arrange for you to be hanged if you really want me to, apparently I’m not without influence these days. But it’d be a bit of a nuisance, and I’m really busy right now.”

  That made him laugh. Easily amused, the Rhus people.

  Being not without influence, she found someone to ask about a search party.

  The man to ask about everything, it turned out, was an elderly clerk whose face she vaguely remembered from the Intelligence office in Rasch. There he’d been – well, a clerk, someone who copied out copies of copies of letters, for the files. His name was Sutento, and it turned out he was something frightfully grand in the Lodge, though not – now – nearly as grand as she was.

  “And all that time,” she asked him, “you knew—”

  He was one of those craggy old men who don’t look like they’re capable of smiling, but who look totally different when they do. “Oh yes,” he said. “I was Master Procopius’ personal clerk.”

  “In the Department.”

  He shook his head. “Not in the Department,” he said, “in the Lodge. He dictated letters and I wrote them out, I sorted and filed documents for him, all the usual things. You don’t imagine he did all that for himself, do you?”

  “No, but—” She found she’d run out of words. “But I thought only the Triumvirs knew—”

  “That’s right. Only the Triumvirs, and me. But a mere clerk doesn’t count.”

  She gave up. “Is that what he’s called, then? As head of the Lodge, I mean. Master Procopius.”

  That was funny, apparently. “Good lord, no. I’ve always called him that. I was his servant, right from when he was so high. Our family has always been in service with his family, as far back as anyone can remember.”

  She sighed. “Everyone says you’re the man who gets things done around here. I want somebody found. Can you see to that for me?”

  “I should think so,” Sutento said. “Who did you have in mind?”

  She hesitated for a moment, trying to find a way to describe him. “He’s an archer, a Rhus, who used to be Axio’s right-hand—”

  “Oh, him.” Sutento nodded. “Musen, the thief. Yes, I imagine he won’t be hard to lay hands on. It’s so much easier finding people,” he added, “now that there are so few people left. They tend to stand out, if you see what I mean.”

  She got the impression Musen hadn’t been cooperative. They’d patched him up with splints and bandages, and his bruises were just starting to come into flower.

  “I thought you were my friend,” he said.

  “Really?”

  He gave her a look that bothered her. “I just want to go away,” he said. “I’ve done my share. I’ve done everything I was told. Why can’t you people just leave me alone?”

  She smiled at him. “Where is it?”

  He was silent for just too long before he answered. “What are you talking about?”

  She knelt down beside him. “Axio was going to kill you, wasn’t he? But then your friend Teucer showed up, and shot him in the back.”

  “He’s no friend of mine.”

  “You should have told him that; maybe he wouldn’t have bothered.”

  “He didn’t have to kill him.”

  She sighed. A little of Musen went a very long way. “Tell me what happened,” she said.

  *

  It was
in Rasch (he said) before you showed up with that stupid box. Axio said there was a job I had to do for him. It was really important, he said, it was the job he’d brought me into the Lodge to do. I had to break into the old Intelligence offices and steal something, a box, from a big iron chest in one of the tower rooms, and put another one just like it where I’d got it from. He drew me a map, told me exactly where to look. Actually, it wasn’t all that difficult. The lock on the chest was about a hundred years old, I had no trouble with it.

  The box he wanted was locked, and it was one of those fiddly little locks, you need special tools. I took it to Axio, and he got me to open it. I had to file down a set of keys, it took a long time, and you know he wasn’t the most patient man in the world. Soon as I’d tripped the wards, he grabbed me by the hair and threw me out of the room, bolted it behind me. So I ran down into the yard and climbed up the side of the building. He didn’t see me looking in through the window.

  It was a silver pack, in that box. I watched him counting the cards. That’s when I knew what he’d made me steal, the first pack, the one with five suits. That’s when I knew what he’d made me do. I wanted to kill myself, for shame, but that wasn’t going to put things right. It was bad enough when he gave the other silver pack to the Eastern emperor. It was wrong, he shouldn’t have done it. So I knew I had to get it back.

  It took me a long time, and I knew if he caught me this time he really would kill me, so I had to be careful. I didn’t get my chance till we were on the ship back from Blemya. I picked the lock, took the cards and wrapped them up in my spare shirt, and I put in a load of strips of copper I’d cut from the sheathing on the stern of the ship. Then, when we landed, soon as I could I ran for it.

  Just my luck, it was Teucer who caught me. He had every man he could get out looking for me, but it had to be bloody Teucer. I beat the shit out of him before he finally put me down, but by then I’d hidden it where it couldn’t be found. Anyway, Teucer took me back to the camp and Axio started smacking me around. Teucer told him to stop but he wasn’t listening. I think Axio must’ve guessed I wasn’t going to tell him where I’d put it, I’d rather die first, and he finally lost his rag, he started throttling me and I don’t think he could’ve stopped even if he wanted to. I think he was disappointed in me, most of all. I don’t blame him for that. He trusted me, and I promised him, no more thieving. But Teucer didn’t have to kill him. When I saw what he’d done, I went for him. I was so mad I wanted to smash his head in, but after what Axio had done to me I just didn’t have the strength to finish him off. So I left him lying and crawled off, licked my wounds, so I’d be up to going back to where I’d hidden them. Nearly got there, too, but bloody Teucer found me again. One of these days I’ll do for him, I promise you. All my life he’s been getting on my nerves, and I’ve had enough of it.