Closer to the Heart

by Mercedes Lackey

  She bit her lip, feeling a little sick at the very thought. :But how? What Herald would ever go along with civil war?:

  :Lock him away from his Companion, and go to war in his name,: Rolan replied bluntly. :Or lock up his Companion and threaten to hurt the Companion if he didn’t go along with it.:

  That made her even sicker. She realized at that moment she had been laboring under a delusion that nothing could harm the Kingdom as long as there were Heralds and Companions, and that nothing could make a Herald do anything against his will. But that wasn’t true. She knew she would do anything rather than have a moment of harm come to Rolan. And without their Companions, Heralds were just . . . people. People with Gifts, but still, just people.

  “Ye all right?” She turned her head and saw that Renn was looking at her oddly. “Iffen yer skeert ’bout all the climbin’—”

  She shook her head. “No, I was talking to my Companion and he reminded me of something unpleasant. I’m looking forward to the climbing.”

  “Well, good, ’cause we’re gettin’ there inna bit.” Renn thrust his chin at the open city gates. The walls were high—three stories high at least. There used to be patrols of Guards on them, but not so much anymore. The Watch used them for looking down into the city streets and the alleys behind, not for their original purpose.

  Renn was looking up at the walls wistfully. “Gi’ a lot t’be able t’ take a free run up there.”

  “Maybe someday it can be arranged,” she replied, with a little smile. “Maybe even a race.”

  His eyes lit up. “A race! Cor, aye, that’d do ’er!” Renn, unlike some of the lads, was not a chatterer. She could see he was thinking about such a race, but he wouldn’t say anything about it until the idea was well formed in his mind.

  They passed under the walls through the gates standing open, and came out into common lands. They hadn’t been common lands before; they’d belonged to the temple that had burned.

  :I remember when it burned,: Rolan said, as they looked across the overgrown meadows where cityfolk who could afford such things had their goats, cattle, and geese grazing. Horses, too. Each little group was watched over by a young caretaker. Each young caretaker was armed, with a sling at the least. And anyone trying to walk off with so much as a goose-egg was going to be set upon by six or eight or ten of them.

  :You do?:

  :It was your father’s second year as King’s Own. It—the Temple—was all but abandoned. It was one of those religions that died out for being too rigid, too many rules, too exclusive. Too judgmental. I think this was one of the offshoots of whatever religion the Holderkin practice. They began by having charismatic priests, got themselves quite a lot of money and built this monstrosity out here outside Haven to show how very much more superior they were to every other religion and sect. That was, oh, about a hundred years ago. They had a lot of influence in some circles during their heyday, and in another land, might have had a lot of power. But not here.:

  Rolan tossed his head and uttered something that sounded like a chuckle.

  :With every succeeding generation, more and more youngsters questioned, were put down ruthlessly, and left—left the Temple, left their families, everything. By the time lightning finally hit that ugly pile and set it ablaze, they were down to one half-crazed old priest and a handful of adherents who were almost as old. Needless to say, there were plenty of people who said the strike was an act of their own God, passing judgment on them. They scavenged what they could out of the ruins, and went South. I really have no idea what became of them.:

  She regarded the ruined Temple in the distance. :And you don’t care?:

  :Someday they might be relevant. Right now, they are not. So I will not lend them so much as a single moment of my time.:

  “Come on,” said Renn, and led off at a trot. “Runnin’ a bit’ll warm ye up.”

  • • •

  Amily was winded, and there was the start of a stitch in her side, but as she looked out across the meadows from her perch astride the rooftree, she felt exalted. Renn sat in what she would have considered to be a much less stable position, and grinned at her.

  “Not bad,” he conceded. “Ye ain’t gonna be a messenger wi’ thet gimp leg, but ye’ll be able t’climb yer way outa ’bout any trouble. An’ thet’s the point, I reck.”

  “You’re right, it is the point.” She surveyed the rest of the ruins with a now-experienced eye. She could see Renn had only taken her over the easiest part. There was more here, a lot more. “Think I can learn to run the rest of this?”

  He nodded, slowly. “It’ll take time.”

  “However long it takes.” She was just ecstatic that she’d been able to get this far. A few months ago she never would have dreamed it.

  “Then keep on practicin’ where ye kin, an’ meet me ’ere ever’ three days,” he said, as if he had figured on doing that all along.

  Maybe he had.

  “Thanks Renn,” she said, with feeling. “This is . . .”

  He held up his hand to stop her from saying anything else. “Ye jest do wut Harkon tells us. Cain’t pay back, so help th’ next.”

  “I will,” she pledged. And he grinned at her.

  “Now we got th’ hard part,” he told her. “Gettin’ down!”

  • • •

  She was glad she’d had that moment of triumph, because when she got back to her real work, it was all . . . frustrating.

  So far, the King had managed to keep the reason for the Menmellith Ambassador’s presence quiet, and the Ambassador himself had kept himself and his men mostly in the suite of rooms in the Palace that had been provided for him. But everyone in on the secret was fully aware that the candle was burning down, and eventually. . . .

  She knew she shouldn’t be feeling so frantic about trying to find something. Mags had only just gotten to Attlebury, and they’d settled in. Her father couldn’t have gotten to the first armory yet. And as for her. . . .

  She spent most of every evening eavesdropping on the people the Inner Council considered the most likely culprits for supplying the rebels in Menmellith with arms—those who themselves were arms-dealers, or had near friends or relatives who were, those who had what the Seneschal considered to be “close” contacts on the other side of the Border and who might have some stake in who became King. Mostly she eavesdropped through lap-dogs, or some hunting hounds, and in addition there were quite a few cats—not pets, for the most part, but mousers. Amily’s odd form of Animal Mindspeech allowed her to see and hear through the eyes and ears of any animal and most birds. She could also sense their thoughts, but so far, had not been able to actually communicate with them. This was unfortunate, because if she had been able to do so, she’d be able to get them to move to places where she wanted them to be, rather than hoping there would be a suitable spy in place by happenstance. Still, she had been able to overhear a lot of conversations. The problem was, none of them had been pertinent to the revolution in Menmellith. She’d learned a great deal more than she really wanted to know about who was going to bed with whom, quite a lot about interfamily marriage negotiations, and more than she had imagined there was to know about estate management. But there had been nothing even remotely related to the situation in Menmellith.

  Tonight the King was sharing dinner with the Ambassador. They were on an informal, first name basis now, “Aurebic” and “Kyril.” She was with him, of course, as was Prince Sedric.

  Aurebic picked without appetite at the roasted chicken. “I wish I could help you more, Kyril,” he said at last. “I’ve told you everything I know, which is not a great deal. Unfortunately, I know very little about that side of our King’s family. Without resorting to a herald or genealogical records, both of which are in Menmellith, I don’t know who in Valdemar he might be related to. If anyone. And as for his adherents—” Aurebic shrugged eloquently.

  S
edric sighed. “And of course, you have no way of getting swift answers—”

  “I have no idea if anyone would give them to me,” Aurebic pointed out. “I don’t know if I’ve been missed as yet—I don’t often have duties involving Valdemar, as you have been a very good neighbor, and my post up until now has been largely an honorific. If someone notices I am gone, the Regent and the Council may think I merely went back to my own estate to find more men for the army. I hope that is the case.”

  “But if not?” asked the King.

  Aurebic shrugged. “As I told you, there will be a limited amount of time before the negotiations that they have opened with Rethwellan bear fruit—or not. In any case, I must return within a moon or two, and sooner if Menmellith and Rethwellan come to an accord and declare open war on you.”

  “What if Rethwellan declines to enter the quarrel?” Sedric asked, and glanced at his father. “We sent our ambassador down there at the same time Herald Nikolas left. We might be able to work some persuasion there.”

  Aurebic put his plate aside, and reached for his wine cup. “That might buy you more time,” he admitted.

  They continued talking, speculating, making half-plans that depended on information they simply didn’t have—and they knew it. And all the while Amily sat there, silently listening. And she knew that they wanted her there—they weren’t ignoring her, they needed her there in case she came up with some tidbit her father or Rolan might pass her. Because she was King’s Own, and she needed to know everything that was going on.

  But Rolan said nothing, although she sensed him listening through her, and she felt . . . helpless. Definitely out of her depth. But she also knew her own father would have been feeling the same, because, after all, what could he do, either, except what he was doing now?

  Now she understood, as she had not before, what it was that had driven him into the streets of Haven and beyond, hunting for that most precious of things, information. Now she knew why he was the King’s Spy. Because pursuing anything that might help was better than sitting here feeling helpless.

  When they had chewed over the last, ragged bit of ideas they had, Prince Sedric took his leave, and Aurebic and Kyril began pouring wine and reminiscing. “If you don’t need me, your Highness . . .” she said then, tentatively, the first thing she had said all night.

  “You’re welcome to stay, Herald Amily, but I suspect it is shortly going to get boring, maudlin, or both,” the King said with a smile. “You probably have better things to do than listen to a couple of old men lie about what handsome, charming, and utterly irresistible fellows they were when they were Sedric’s age.”

  Amily stood up, murmured something about how she would never be bored, but they would probably prefer privacy, then bowed and left. The King was perfectly safe with Aurebic; she was sure of that, Rolan was sure of that, and the King’s Companion was right outside the window. And there were two Guardsmen in the hall right outside the door.

  The night air smelled clean and green with all the new things pushing their way up in the gardens. :Mags is climbing about on a roof,: Rolan said, as if anticipating her next thoughts. :He misses you as much as you miss him.:

  :And Father?: she thought.

  :Is getting someone very drunk. I believe he is quite hopeful about getting something useful out of this man.:

  :Thank you,: she thought, as she reached the door of the greenhouse, opened it, and stepped through.

  If anything the air smelled even greener in here; it had come to be a scent of comfort to her. So many good things had happened to her here!

  She knew her way without setting a light and walked with steady, sure feet into the sitting room. She thought about going straight to bed but—

  —but there were still a few candlemarks until her usual bedtime. And she might just learn something herself tonight.

  There was no harm in trying.

  She settled herself into her favorite chair, and sought for the mind of a particular cat who was welcome on the hearth of her master every evening about this time. . . .

  • • •

  I do love Guild Halls, Mags thought to himself, with a chuckle. The thing about Guild Halls was that if it was a Guild that wanted to, well, show itself off, they did that on the outside of the Guild Hall with all manner of carved decorations, pillars and posts and unnecessary little toy turrets and things. All these bits and pieces made for ridiculously easy climbing. He had managed to find a place completely hidden by a false parapet, right at the chimney that led down into one of the upper rooms where the Guild Masters liked to gather and drink and gossip.

  Gossip? They’d put a gaggle of old women to shame.

  And since this was the Jewelers’ and Gem Cutters’ Guild . . . and since these were the men who were charged with assessing every gem, if there was anything amiss about what was coming into the assessment houses, this would be the place to find out.

  It was that rarest of things in his line of work—a perfect night, a perfect place to listen, and the perfect perch to listen from. The night air was mild enough that he didn’t need to hug the chimney for warmth. In fact, the men hadn’t even bothered to light a fire, so their voices came up clear and easy to hear. It was an utterly cloudless night, and he could lie on his back with his legs tucked up and his feet comfortably braced against the false parapet and look at the stars while he listened.

  :Wish Amily was here,: he said to Dallen.

  :She does, too,: Dallen replied.

  He was here for two reasons, mainly. One was to see if there was any gossip about one mine or another having bad luck of late—which could signal the fact that they were skimming the cream of their gems off and sending them elsewhere. The other was just to learn how these fellows did their business. He knew the mining end from the inside, of course, and he knew in general how to evaluate gems. But he didn’t know it as these men did, who could tell you the worth of a particular rock down to the copper.

  So he listened, simply absorbing the information, and watching the stars.

  He did make a few notes about particular mine owners to concentrate on, as their fellows commiserated for a bad run or a shaft gone dry. This was mostly the first probe; he also needed to find out so much more about this town. It wouldn’t be as hard as it was in Haven. For all that the buildings here reflected a high level of prosperity, this was little more than a large, wealthy village.

  :That would be because the poor are concentrated at the mines,: Dallen said, picking that thought right out of his mind.

  :Course they are. Those’re the only jobs here, ’cept the ones at this inn, an’ the skilled ones. An’ if ye got a skill, ye ain’t gonna be dirt-poor.: At least things were better for the miners now after the sweep through here when Cole Pieters’ wicked ways had been uncovered. Cole was by no means the only mine owner who had kept his workers as virtual slaves, just the worst. Now, at least, the miners had decent homes to live in, enough to eat, and clothing that wasn’t rags. That didn’t make their jobs less dangerous, and it certainly didn’t keep the mine owners from paying them as little as they could possibly get away with—but compared with how Mags had lived, this was paradise.

  And likely it won’t be hard to get ’em to talk. He just had to figure out how to get onto the mine property, how not to get caught doing so, and how to talk to the miners without anyone seeing him.

  Have to find out if they allow peddlers and the like into them mining villages.

  Not for the first time, he missed Bear and Lena. Having a couple of Bards about had been very useful for getting eyes and ears into places where a Herald wasn’t welcome. But then again . . . he wasn’t a Herald at the moment, was he?

  Wonder if we could get Keira flat invited out to visit these places? I’d have’ta go along as her escort an’ all. When she was bein’ entertained, I could go snoopin’. . . .

  It was certainly an ide
a.

  :How’d you fare today?: he asked Dallen.

  :Now that you ask . . . I’ve been doing some snooping myself.: Mags did not ask how it was that something the size of a horse, and stark white, could go “snooping.” He already knew that Dallen had ways of not being seen that he could not use when he was with his Herald.

  :Do tell!: Mags replied, still keeping half of his attention on the increasingly inebriated conversation floating from the chimney. :And what did you learn?:

  :To begin with, there is an astonishing number of young heirs to these mines that have no marriage prospects . . . :

  In the sitting room of Lord Jorthun’s suite, Keira was holding court.

  This was a sumptuous room by Mags’ standards, although, of course, it didn’t measure up to Lord Jorthun’s manor. The furnishings were all antique, very heavy, unornamented, dark wood, softened with goose feather cushions in equally dark colors. Lord Jorthun would normally have been the one “presiding,” but he had taken a throne-like chair off to the side, by one of the windows that had a small, square table next to it. Keira sat in a similar chair, placed with its back to the fireplace. One of the young men stood leaning on the mantelpiece. Two were in window-seats. The rest were on various ordinary (though still heavy) chairs and stools, and one occupied a sofa on his own. Coot served as page-boy, which meant he was right there to hear everything, but so was Lord Jorthun. That meant that Mags was perfectly free to bugger off and do investigations on his own, but right now, things were interesting enough that he was staying right here at the inn, acting as the second servant.

  Lord Jorthun looked elegant, with just the right touch of dishevelment that suggested he was relaxed and enjoying himself. Keira was . . . splendid. She was wearing a gorgeous dark green gown that had been Lady Dia’s, and suited Keira as it had never quite suited Dia. Dia had remarked without a hint of jealousy or rancor, that the color she had picked for herself made her look yellow, while it made Keira glow like an exotic jewel. Mags didn’t know much about ladies’ gowns, but he knew this much; the cut suited Keira as well as the color did, and it was modest enough and dark enough that it could pass for mourning. Lydia had tutored him through the ability to judge fabrics to the last copper, because knowing about the content of clothing told you a lot about the person wearing it. A gown of the latest style but made of cheap fabric would tell you that this was someone who was “reaching”—possibly far past her grasp. But a gown in an older style, but made of rich fabric meant this was someone who knew what she was getting and was willing to pay for it. He had no doubt that the gown Keira wore today was good enough to have been worn by Princess Lydia. And given that Lady Dia and Lord Jorthun were probably the wealthiest couple at the Court . . . likely Lydia had its twin somewhere in her closet.