by Jo Zebedee
The duke smiled grimly. “Dangerous times, Sliva. I felt it prudent to have a few companies at the ready.” He gestured vaguely. “That’s not what I meant. Your precious Oppies don’t worry me. Norioko worries me.”
The remark came as a surprise to Finesz. “What in heavens for?”
“The man’s a damn politician, Sliva. Don’t trust him. He’ll sell you out in an instant for an advantage.”
Finesz turned away. She didn’t want Kunta to see her expression. Yes, she trusted Norioko, trusted and admired him. She had known he was a supreme politician and she had seen him make deals that had left her investigations in shattered pieces about her feet. But he was dedicated to law and to the Imperial Throne. She had only disobeyed his order regarding Ormuz because… because she felt he was wrong. She knew he’d back her if she proved to be right. And she was right.
She turned back to the duke. “The Imperial Housecarls,” she said.
Kunta frowned. “What about them? Ah. Is that what you’re chasing? There’ve been rumours.”
“They’re starting to look like fact, Afi.”
“There’s been attempts on the Throne before. Can’t see why this one’d succeed where they failed.”
“The Housecarls are only a part of it. And they might not be intended to succeed.”
The duke turned and strode back to his desk. “You’ve lost me, Sliva,” he said, and settled heavily into his chair.
“Casimir thinks it’s a feint. The Housecarls will tie up the knights stalwart and the knights militant, and during the heat of battle…” She left the thought unfinished.
“Casimir thinks? How would he know?”
Finesz took a deep breath. “His father is the one behind it.”
“And you brought him here?”
“He’s the only one can stop him.”
“Sliva, Sliva.” Kunta shook his head sadly. “You’re out of your depth. Leave it to the Navy: they’ll sort it out.”
“If they stick to their oath to help the Throne.”
This piece of news surprised the duke. His eyebrows rose. “You’ve reason to think they won’t honour Edkar’s Promise? Damn it, Sliva, in twelve hundred years the Throne has never intefered with their operations. They got what they wanted. Why shouldn’t they step in when the Emperor asks?”
“You clearly think they might not,” Finesz pointed out acidly. “Else why the companies of Winter Rangers?”
Kunta grinned. “Well said, Sliva. Still sharp as a knife, eh?”
Finesz crossed to the desk, put her hands—one ungloved—on the desk-top and loomed forwards. “What have you heard, Afi?”
“Promises are always honoured more in the breach.” He shrugged. “It’s these new Lords of the Admiralty— What’s the name of the one they just put in? Fisc? Yes, Fisc: he wants a good war. I won’t be dragged in, Sliva, and I’m not the only one feels that way.”
“You can’t sit and wait for the dust to clear, Afi. You have to do something.”
“Like what?”
“Help Casimir—”
“Your damn by-blow? Never! I won’t put a prole in the Electorate of Peers. That’s even more dangerous.”
“He doesn’t have a single drop of prole blood in him, Afi.”
“So he should take his mother’s name… Or is Ormuz his mother’s name? Still can’t say I’ve heard of it.”
“He doesn’t have a mother.”
Kunta sat back and glared at Finesz from beneath lowered brows. “You’ll be saying he’s one of your damn Avatars next.”
Finesz snorted. “No, not an Avatar. But he’s proved to me he’s the best chance we’ve got. I have to stop the slaughter, Afi.” She banged her glove fist on the desk-top. “I have to stop it.”
CHAPTER FIFTY
The ceiling above the bed depicted a scene from Linna’s history but Ormuz did not have the referents to understand it. Colourfully-uniformed troops on feline steeds charged across a grassy sward towards a handful of sword-wielding men in outfits of green and brown. The painting was both photo-realistic and fanciful: the figures were rendered with amazing detail but appeared far too heroic to be genuine. Ormuz wondered who had won the battle. The cavalry had the advantage of numbers but why commemorate a massacre? Logic dictated the outnumbered defenders must have triumphed, although he could not see how they could have done. Ormuz certainly felt like those men in green and brown, although he couldn’t hope for their fortitude.
He sighed, unclasped his hands from behind his head and sat up. The Vankila Room was sumptuously furnished. If this was a prison, it was a luxurious one. He had been here now for a day and a night, and seen only the servant who brought him last night’s dinner and this morning’s breakfast. The door had been guarded by a household trooper while the servant was in the room, and loudly locked once he had departed.
Ormuz scrambled off the bed and trod bare-foot across to the window. It too was locked, so he couldn’t even step out onto the balcony. Not that he was dressed for outside: he’d been awake for three hours and had yet to change out of his night-gown. What was the point? He wasn’t going anywhere. Kunta had made sure of that. Several times during the night, as he lay in the vast bed trying hard to sleep, he had heard the clink of weaponry and lowered voices from the hallway.
The rattle of a key in a lock sounded. Ormuz spun round and saw the door swing slowly open. Was it lunch-time already?
No. The Marquess of Varä stepped into the room. The door was pulled closed from outside behind him and locked once again. Varä put his hands on his hips and gazed at Ormuz with disappointment. “Just got up, have we?” he asked. “Dear me.”
Ormuz scowled. He was about to making some cutting rejoinder but blinked as Varä’s outfit came to his attention. “What in heavens are you wearing?” he asked.
It wasn’t just the colour-scheme of the marquess’ clothing—pale blue and pale green, the Yalosukinen colours—but also the pattern. A pale green doublet edged in white, with puffed and slit sleeves; pale green shorts with white slashes; pale blue hose and soft ankle-boots. His sword hung on a belt angled from shoulder to opposite hip.
“It is,” said Varä, striking a pose, chest out, arms crossed, “Old Imperial and the latest fashion amongst the best circles.” He gave a self-deprecating shrug with one shoulder. “Well, I think it’s Old Imperial. In three thousand years of history, someone must have dressed like this somewhere.”
“You look like a…” Ormuz didn’t actually know what Varä resembled. An historical figure, certainly. He scowled again. “What do you want?” he asked glumly.
“Well, you can get dressed for a start.”
“Not like that.”
Varä put his nose in the air but the gesture was meant lightheartedly. “Dress how you want, Casimir. I’m sure we can dig out your old coveralls if you want. Mind you, it’ll only prove to Kunta you’re the prole he thinks you are.”
Ormuz ignored the comment. “Then what?”
“Lessons, my dear boy.” Varä looked about the room. “There’s plenty of space here: you can have a lesson with the sword.”
“The duke has allowed that?” Ormuz was surprised. He was a prisoner and the duke saw no reason he couldn’t be taught how to use a weapon?
“Then we’ll work on etiquette. And yes, Kunta has given his approval.”
“So why am I still locked up?”
Varä crossed to the bell-rope hanging by the bed and gave it a sharp tug. “It’s complicated, Casimir. He doesn’t disbelieve Sliva but he doesn’t entirely believe her either. He knows full well something is about to happen but he’d rather not get involved. And then you show up on his doorstep.”
“Sliva said he would help us.” Ormuz hugged his torso, wandered across to the bed and clambered up onto it. “She said he’d be a good ally.”
“Sliva, dear, is operating under a few misapprehensions. She thinks she can prevent what’s going to happen.”
/> “She can’t,” Ormuz said flatly.
“She’s an Oppie, Casimir.”
The door to the Vankila Room opened. Ormuz had not heard the key turn. He twisted round and saw a servant enter.
“Draw a bath,” Varä instructed the servant. “Lord Ormuz has chosen to get ready.”
The servant bobbed his head, muttered, “Your lordship,” and hurried across to the en suite bathroom. Moments later, the sound of running water drifted into the room.
When Ormuz exited the bathroom, wrapped in a towel, Varä was seated in an armchair, legs crossed, sword laid across his lap. He clearly did not intend to move, so Ormuz turned his back on the marquess and dressed quickly in underwear, a plain grey tunic, black trousers and boots. He pulled his hair back into a pony-tail and secured it with a silver clasp. He took his sword-belt and buckled it about his middle. Kunta had not disarmed him when he’d imprisoned him but Ormuz was no danger to the duke’s guards with a blade.
“Good,” Varä said behind him.
Ormuz looked up from his belt-buckle and slowly turned. The marquess was on his feet. He held his sword in both hands, one on the hilt, the other clutching the tip. He flexed the blade. “Let’s get started, shall we?” Varä said.
Ormuz withdrew his own sword, clumsily because it was not a move that yet came naturally. He adopted the stance Varä had taught him on the OPI sloop during the journey to Linna: slightly side-on, sword horizontal at chest-height with elbow bent, other hand held to one side at the same height.
Varä walked around Ormuz, inspecting his pose. “Good,” he said. “How does it feel?”
“Unnatural.”
“Sword-fighting isn’t natural, Casimir. It kills people.” Returning to Ormuz’s front, he put the tip of his own sword to the floor. “Now let’s go through some of the moves I taught you… On-guard… High… Middle… Now, low. Good, good. High outside… Yes, that’s it… Low inside. Excellent. Lunge.” Varä danced back as Ormuz took a step forwards and darted his sword ahead. “Parry high inside… Yes, that’s it.”
For half an hour, the marquess took Ormuz through the various stances and moves used in fighting with a regulation sword. When Ormuz got it wrong, Varä moved Ormuz’s arms, or poked and prodded his legs or torso until he posed correctly. At times Ormuz felt like a puppet but he knew it was necessary.
They segued straight into a slow-motion sword fight. Varä attacked, parried, defended, riposted, all at a speed that left Ormuz plenty of time to find a response in the accepted fashion. It was surprisingly hard work: within ten minutes, Ormuz’s sword-arm was aching from the weight of the blade and his free arm was stiff from being held high. But he was beginning to master the weapon. He had always been a quick-study but some of the moves seemed to come so naturally he didn’t even have to think about what response was required. Perhaps it was his blood: the instincts were written into the genes.
The marquess was approving of Ormuz’s progress. “You’re doing well,” he told him. “You’ll be a scholar in no time.”
“Scholar?” Ormuz looked askance at Varä.
“School of arms term, Casimir. Scholar, free scholar, provost and master.”
“You learnt to fight at a school of arms?”
Varä raised an eyebrow. “Of course. As the son of a duke where else would I learn?”
“So what grade did you reach?”
“Oh, I was never more than a free scholar. I took up other… ‘hobbies’ before I was more than halfway to provost.”
Ormuz lowered his blade and massaged his sore biceps. “What other hobbies?”
“Not a fit subject for this moment in time, I’m afraid. Let’s— No, I think you’ve had enough. You could probably defend yourself against a scholar at your current level but I doubt you would inflict much damage. We’ll practice again tomorrow.”
Sliding his sword back into its scabbard, Ormuz nodded. Varä also sheathed his weapon.
“Now,” said the marquess, “let me just ring for some refreshment and we’ll start on the etiquette.”
“Do I have to know that?” Ormuz complained. Sword-fighting was at least a useful skill—perhaps even vital: it might one day mean the difference between life and death. But etiquette? Knowing how to address a baroness? The exact degree of bow to give a social superior of a specific rank?
“You do if you don’t want them to think you’re a prole.”
The same argument again: do this or people will think you’re a prole. It was Varä’s standard answer.
As he tugged on the bell-rope, Varä asked, “A judge of the Bench.”
“What?” The conversation had made some turn Ormuz couldn’t follow.
“How do you address a judge of the Bench?”
“Oh. In court or outside?”
“In court.”
“Um.” Ormuz couldn’t remember. “My lord,” he said, falling back on the term used in court melodramas on the entertainments channels.
“Correct. Outside?”
“Er… my lord?”
Varä tutted. “Your honour, Casimir. You use ‘your honour’ should you be introduced to a judge outside a courtroom or an assize.”
“An assize?”
“Ah.” Varä crossed to an armchair and sank into it. “We need to get you an encyclopaedia,” he said. “Don’t they teach you these things at school?”
“Reading, writing, how to find information, basic history… that sort of thing.”
“No law?”
Ormuz smiled tightly. “You’re assumed to know what’s legal and what isn’t. They take us through the Subjects’ Charter but how many proles are likely to disobey that?”
“Well…” The marquess steepled his fingers and adopted a pedagogical expression. “The Imperial Judiciary is split into the Bench and the assizes. Fief-law tends to be overseen by an assize and the judges are appointed by the fief-holder. Everything else is the Bench, although sometimes the Bench may judge a case of fief-law. It depends.”
“Very helpful,” Ormuz remarked dryly.
“Yes, well. We’ll get you a law text. That should help.”
“And I need to know this?”
“I’m surprised you don’t already,” said a voice from the door.
Ormuz spun round. Kunta stood in the doorway, a pair of household troopers and Finesz behind him. He had one hand on the door-handle and the other on his sword-hilt.
Ormuz put his hand to his own sword. “I went to a different school,” he said defensively.
“No doubt.” The duke stepped into the room and Finesz followed him. The two guards remained outside, but stayed alert.
“Sliva has persuaded me of your…” Kunta winced. “‘Credentials’. You have one ally at least who will stand you in good stead. This one—” He indicated Varä with a wave of the hand. “Will do you no favours.”
Ormuz turned to the marquess, puzzled. Admittedly, Varä cut an odd figure in his green-and-blue doublet and hose, but he had proven both useful and a good friend in the weeks since Plessant had first introduced them.
“I’m flattered, Afi,” Finesz commented dryly.
“You’re persuasive, Sliva, I’ll have you know that much. I’m not sure I want to be caught up in this mess you’ve stumbled upon but it seems I have no choice.”
“You won’t regret it,” Ormuz said.
“I regret it already, boy,” Yalosukinen snapped. “Don’t make it worse.” He gestured dismissively. “You have the freedom of the palace but don’t try to leave. Sliva has persuaded me to throw an assembly in a couple of weeks time. We’ll get as many nobles as we can invite here and do some politicking. You’ll need their support too, if you want me to back you.”
Ormuz was shocked. An assembly? He knew what the term meant: something slightly less formal than a ball but much larger than a dinner-party. He was to be put on display, paraded before Kunta’s allies and acquaintances, all to curry favour and win himself some s
upport. “I think I’m grateful,” he said.
“You’d better start giving the boy some dancing lessons,” the duke told Varä, “unless you want him to make a complete fool of himself.”
The marquess nodded, smiling in amusement.
“And get his High Swovo more fluent. He still sounds like a damn prole at times.”
Vara’s smile slid from his face.
“Sliva and I will work on the guest-list.”
“We’ll have some, ah, ‘uninvited’ guests,” Finesz put in.
Kunta turned to gaze at her and frowned.
“Probably a dozen Navy officers.”
“Indeed? Whose?”
“The Admiral’s.”
“The Admiral?”
“Vengeful,” prompted Finesz.
The duke groaned loudly. “Heavens, Sliva, you’re not mixed up with her, are you? Leave that one well enough alone, that’s my advice. She was trouble from the day she learnt to crawl and putting her in the Navy only made her worse.”
CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
Finesz stepped into the room, stopped in surprise, looked back over her shoulder at the hallway she had just left and then turned again to gaze at the scene before her. She thought she had known Kunta but this… His ancestors, she decided. This collection—this impressive collection—could only have been amassed over generations. She took a step forward and turned slowly about. Swords, daggers, knives, shields, pikes, maces, lances, banners and pennants, even a pair of ornately-decorated directed-energy cannons… The room was not an armoury but a museum. Each weapon was displayed to advantage in a glass-fronted case or fastened carefully to the wood-panelled walls.
How very… male, she thought.
She rarely wore her own sword and was no more than competent with it. Before joining the OPI, she had fought her battles using those weapons available to a woman whose targets were men. Still, there was something morbidly fascinating about historical weapons—not just their purpose but the history attached to each. How many people, for example, had that sword there, the one with the filigree basket-hilt in the shape of ringed planet— how many people had that blade killed? And that wide-barrelled cannon with the decorative intaglio about its aperture, could the deaths it had caused be numbered in the tens or the hundreds?