by David Drake
Besides, though Valence had recovered enough to become a figurehead—Garric was King of the Isles, in all but name.
Waldron and Attaper had come out of one of the conference rooms to the side and were walking toward Garric. The commanders themselves were professionally polite, but the dozen' aides in either man's train glared at their rivals in a rage just short of blows.
Garric knew from the visits he'd gotten as he convalesced that there were arguments over how the royal army should be reorganized. He hadn't realized until now quite how serious those arguments were.
“They don't have a million Monkeys from Bight sweeping down on them,”murmured Carus in a grimly sympathetic tone. “So they'll fight each other instead of looking a half-step ahead at the next real problem the kingdom will have to face.”
A moment later—with the usual laughter back—the voice in Garric's mind added, “Or they would if it weren’t for you in charge, lad; but you are.”
Ilna and the baron from Third Atara had been in the group talking to Royhas at the chancellor's table. They'd moved close to Garric, waiting for an opportunity to speak. What was the baron's name?
“Baron Robilard,” Liane whispered in Garric's ear. Garric almost squeezed her hand in thanks for avoiding the embarrassment.
“Ilna,” Garric said, “I haven't seen you since—”
He didn't know how to describe it. The night as a whole was a blur, though he had clear memories of individual moments:
The Beast waddling toward them, huge even while still distant.
The coarse hairs around the monster's claws and the way its skin dimpled as Garric's sword penetrated.
The tears glittering on Cerix's cheek as his mouth shouted phrases that he'd sworn he could not speak...
“I haven't seen you since the other night,” Garric concluded awkwardly. Ilna’s crooked smile showed that she understood him perfectly. “And Baron Robilard, I still haven't received you as you deserve. I hope the staff has made you comfortable during the past few days?”
“The baron has been scouting the Monkeys with his warship Erne,” Ilna said. “He was hoping he might be able to report his findings to you, Prince Garric, though Lord Waldron—”
She turned, transfixing the oncoming noble with eyes as sharp as swordpoints.
“—has made it quite clear that he's in charge of naval matters as well as the army.”
Waldron flushed. He'd been treating Robilard as young, foolish, and the ruler of one of the lesser islands. All of that was true, but Waldron might also have remembered that the baron was under the protection of Ilna os-Kenset.
She, never one to neglect kicking an enemy while he was down, added, “Even though as I understand it, the only warship in the Royal Fleet at the moment is the one Baron Robilard commands.”
Attaper was far too professional to smirk. In a bland voice he said, “The Military Council thought it was best to integrate the rowers who escaped with the late Admiral Nitker into the city defenses. Though of course you'll want to review that decision and all the other ones we made, now that you're back on your feet, Your Majesty.”
What had happened to Admiral Nitker? Not that Garric regretted the swine's passing, but blood feuds and lynch law were no way to run a kingdom.
Garric remembered Liane, standing alone in a flame-lit chamber. His teeth clenched and his hand reached reflexively for the hilt of his sword. The new sword; it should prove thoroughly satisfactory as soon as Garric was healthy enough to put its pattern-welded blade through its paces, but the balance wasn't quite that of the weapon he'd become used to...
Garric laughed, surprising those around him even more than had his stark expression of a moment before. It bothered him that people were always watching him now. He didn't think he'd ever get used to that.
“Nor did I, lad,”Carus whispered. “But thank the Gods, I never came to like the attention either.”
“Blood feud is particularly a bad practice for a king to indulge in,” Garric said aloud. He tried to keep his tone cheerful. “Or even a prince.”
He cleared his throat and went on, “I'm going to assume that Lord Nitker died of injuries received when he attacked the palace with a gang of kidnappers... but I don't want any more unexplained deaths. Do you all, my friends, understand?”
“Actually, he hanged himself because he was afraid of the queen's victory,” Ilna said with a faint smile. She knew that she was the only person in the big room who could say that and be wholeheartedly believed. “Nitker seems to have made a career out of backing losers, himself included.”
Garric and the king in his mind bellowed their laughter. Courtiers watched in amazement. This wasn't the sort of decorum expected in the royal court.
“They'll get used to it,”Carus chuckled. “Just as they'll get used to having a real king.”
Garric stepped to Robilard and took his hands. He tried not to wince openly as movement reminded him of his burns.
“Baron,” Garric said, “the kingdom is in your debt for providing a naval force at a time we need one badly. Please, tell me the results of your scouting. I've heard only that the Hairy Men were no longer a threat. I'd appreciate the details.”
That was true, but there was more in the statement than the words. Robilard swelled with pride, and Ilna's smile of satisfaction was for her a shower of thanks.
In Barca's Hamlet you helped your friends—in small things as well as large ones—because your friends were the ones who would help you. That was a good way to live, for a peasant or a king.
“Let's sit down, please,” Liane said. “Mistress Ladra and Tenoctris both said you should keep your legs raised as much as possible.”
“If you want privacy, one of the side rooms can be emptied for you at once, Your Majesty,” Royhas said.
“In fact—the Military Council was meeting in Room Seven until a few minutes ago, but I see that they've adjourned—”
The chancellor nodded to Attaper, Waldron, and their aides. He smiled innocently. It wasn't only minions of evil like the queen and the Beast who fought among themselves.
But that was going to stop.
“If you don't mind, Lord Royhas,” Garric said, “I'll use your table here in the middle of things. I've been cooped up in bed for a day and a half now, and I'd like to have some space.”
He gave Royhas precisely the sort of smile the chancellor had offered the soldiers. At the back of Garric's mind, King Carus clapped his hands together in delight.
Garric led the baron toward the table with painful caution. “The Monkeys had captured most of the royal fleet,” Robilard said. “They'd apparently been towing the raft—parts of it—with the ships because the currents wouldn't actually push them to harbor, of course...”
Courtiers elbowed servants aside to offer Garric and the baron seats. Garric's face stiffened, though he hoped those watching didn't realize the disgust he felt. “Please!” he called. “I can get my own chair!”
There was nothing wrong with service. Garric's family was among the most prosperous in Barca's Hamlet, and they all had served their neighbors at the inn. Anyone who entered the taproom with a copper in his hand had the right to tell Garric to draw him a jack of ale.
What offended Garric was the way rich folk were using the opportunity to serve Garric as a way of abasing themselves. A freeborn citizen didn't do that.
And if these courtiers didn't know what was obvious to any Haft peasant, then by the Lady! that was another thing they were going to learn.
“I thought we'd capture one of the ships and tow it back to Valles,” Robilard was saying. “We shot some of the Monkeys aboard one—it was easy, they don't even know how to swim, it seems. But to tell the truth, we didn't have the stomach to finish the job. They just whimpered, and...”
Garric nodded as pulled out a chair for himself. It struck him as he sat that Baron Robilard might have more in his favor than had initially been obvious. From the appraising look the image of Carus wore as he listened t
hrough Garric's ears, Garric wasn't alone in reassessing his judgment.
Roses of a peach color like none Sharina had seen before covered the pergola. She touched one without plucking it, embarrassed that she and Cashel hadn't thought to step into the open air when the hunters and Zahag came to talk with them. Hanno had to squat in the archway because he was too tall to walk in without stooping.
“Seems like things are pretty well taken care of here, missie,” Hanno said. “That's right, ain't it?”
He wasn't carrying his spear here in the palace nor did Unarc have his hooked fighting knife, though both men had their usual assortment of butchering blades thrust under their belts. They probably didn't regard the butcher knives as weapons, and—perhaps because of who the hunters' friends were—Garric's guards hadn't chosen to make a point of it.
Sharina carried the Pewle knife. Nobody said anything about that, either.
“That's right,” she agreed. “The problem you and I knew about, the queen, is dead; and so is the other one, Tenoctris says.”
Cashel watched Hanno with a respect that the big hunter reciprocated fully. They weren't afraid of each other; Sharina doubted that either man was afraid of anything he could fight. It made Sharina nervous to see them exchanging glances and wondering, even though she knew neither man would ever show the other anything but perfect courtesy.
Workmen—gardeners, stonemasons, carpenters, and a dozen other guild specialties—were busy all over the palace compound. Such bustling activity in what had been a wasteland amazed Sharina.
The daughter of Reise the Innkeeper was pleased to see run-down, overgrown structures being cleaned and made right. The innkeeper's daughter also found herself totting up what the work must be costing—at Valles wage-scales, too!
Still, even more than the crowds cheering in the streets, these repairs meant that people believed in the new government.
Sharina remembered where she was. The men and even Zahag were staring at her, though the ape did it while upside down. He hung from a nearby archway commemorating a ruler who'd been lost at sea three centuries past. Unarc saw Sharina look at him directly. He immediately went back to what he'd been doing before: staring fiercely at a stone planter as his big toe probed the acanthus vines carved on the side.
“I was just thinking,” Sharina explained in embarrassment. “That people believe in Prince Garric of Haft.” “Huh!” Cashel said. “They'd be fools not to.” He gave her a slow smile, an expression that Hanno echoed unconsciously. “They'd be worse fools,” he added, “to let me hear that they didn't.”
Four fully equipped Blood Eagles stood politely out of earshot. They kept an eye on the surroundings in general, but particularly on the group at the pergola. Sharina supposed she and her companions were dignitaries being guarded from attacks like the one Admiral Nitker had made, though how could four ordinary humans think they were going to protect men like these?
She giggled. “I'm sorry, Hanno,” she said. “I'm still—”
“Recovering” wasn't the right word. “I'm still just so happy to be free that I'm not paying attention to things the way I ought to be.”
“I guess you did that all right the times it mattered, missie,” the big hunter said. He cleared his throat. “Thing is, me and Unarc don't belong here, though I guess we'll stay for the partying tonight.”
The bald hunter nodded violently, though he didn't turn his head toward the others. Now that Sharina was in a palace, she supposed she'd reverted in Unarc's mind to being a woman.
“You're going back to Bight?” she said. “Of course. I'll help you in any way I can, replacing your boat and the rest of your kit certainly. And anything else you'd like. You saved my life, both of you.”
Sharina wasn't sure how she went about getting actual money in her present circumstances, but she'd find a way. That she was sure of.
Hanno cleared his throat and looked away. He pushed his index finger into the soil for no better reason than why Unarc was polishing stone flowers with his toe.
“To tell the truth, missie,” the big hunter said awkwardly, “we figured we'd try someplace different. It's not like either of us liked the Monkeys, you see, but it just didn't seem like Bight would be the same without them. We thought maybe Sirimat instead. There's ivory wood trees there, the ape says.”
Zahag dropped from the arch with a grace that belied his size. He joined the group in a four-limbed, sideways shuffle. Hanno stood and moved aside to make room for him.
“In big slabs, ivorywood's worth more than real teeth are,” the ape said, looking at the ground also. “That's because the trees eat animals, and they're just as willing to swallow woodcutters as they are baby apes that haven't learned to keep clear.”
Zahag parted the hair on his thighs with two fingers of each hand, apparently searching for fleas. “I thought maybe I'd go along with them, chief,” he mumbled. “To show them around, you know.”
Cashel stood and walked forward to squat in front of Zahag. “That's a good idea,” he said. “And if you did that, maybe you'd get to see your own band again.”
“I might,” Zahag said, nodding. He looked worriedly at Cashel. “It's not that I want to leave you, chief. There'll never be another chief like you!”
“Oh, I guess Master Hanno might have another idea about that,” Cashel said. He chuckled, but Sharina noticed the sudden throatiness that entered the sound. “And I'd say he might be right, though we'll never know.”
“You got that right,” Hanno said, looking toward the horizon. “We'll never know.”
Cashel squeezed the ape on both shoulders. “Tell your family that Cashel or-Kenset was honored to have you in his band,” he said. “And if I ever learn somebody's caught you and means to sell you like a sheep again, well...”
Cashel didn't have the imagination or the need to complete the threat in graphic terms. He got up and moved back beside Sharina, though he didn't sit. His fingers caressed the quarterstaff leaning against the latticework frame of the pergola.
One of the iron ferrules had vanished when Cashel broke Sharina's imprisonment, though the flash had only scorched the hickory. The first thing Cashel had done on their return was to have the Blood Eagles' farrier replace the missing cap.
“Well, we'll get on,” Hanno said. “My credit with the outfitters is good, but if there's anything they can't handle, maybe we'll come to you, missie.”
He nodded toward two extremely young maids in fringed and colored tunics. They'd appeared while Sharina and her companions were talking. The maids shifted their weight nervously from one sandaled foot to the other, exactly like children in need of a latrine.
“Guess they'd like to speak with you,” Hanno said. He dipped his head in what was closer to a bow than a nod.
“Honored to have met you, Master Cashel,” the big hunter went on. “The missie's got the most impressive friends I ever thought to meet.”
“She was lucky to have friends as good as you and Master Unarc when she needed them,” Cashel said. His voice was unusually deep and rasping. “And I guess you know that I'll give you any help I can. Ever.”
The hunters and Zahag walked away, talking among themselves. Unarc's voice drifted back to the pergola: “...but I tell you, what wouldn't people pay to see it?”
The maids watched to make sure that the trio wasn't returning. Then they hopped forward, curtsied, and almost in unison began, “Lady Sharina—”
They stopped, looking at each other in horror. They were very nervous.
“You first,” Sharina said, pointing to the maid on the right. She didn't like palaces and she particularly didn't like palace protocol.
She grinned. Though it wasn't so long ago that she'd been in places that she liked even less. Her hand found Cashel's and squeezed it.
“There's to be a sacrifice of thanksgiving for Prince Garric's recovery, lady,” the maid blurted in a singsong. “He's gotten up and wants to thank the Gods first thing. He'd like you and...”
Sh
e looked at Cashel and froze.
“Lord Cashel!”the other maid hissed. Cashel winced.
“Lord Cashel and all his other friends to join him in the procession,” the girl racketed on, “and we're the ones who found you!”
Cashel led Sharina from the pergola. “You'd best go with them and put on the kind of clothes they'll want you in,” he said. “I'll find Tenoctris—I know where she is. We'll be along.”
He touched her hand again, Turning aside, he muttered, “I guess I've got more to thank the Gods for than anybody else.”
Cashel walked off, moving faster than he usually did.
“I don't know that you do, my friend,” Sharina whispered. To the maids she said, “Will you lead me to my apartments, then, mistresses?”
Giggling in delight, the girls skipped off down the flagstone walk.
“Excuse me, Mistress Ilna?” said an attendant with pale skin and hair the texture of raw silk, standing at her elbow. He was one of the clerks who'd been on duty at the palace entrance when Ilna and her party arrived. This afternoon she'd thought he was simply hurrying past.
“Yes?” she said sharply. She was in a bad mood, but there didn't seem to be much she could do about it.
Robilard and Lord Hosten were talking with Attaper, Waldron, and a score of earnest younger men in one of the side rooms of the hall. Ilna was welcome—there or anywhere else in the palace, Garric had made clear as he went off to have his bandages changed before leading a procession to one of the temples for a sacrifice.
The talk was of no interest to Ilna, and the room was packed like a sheepfold in winter, so she'd stayed in the main hall instead. There was nothing for her to do here either.
“There's a man outside the hall asking you to come out to him, mistress,” the attendant said. His cautious respect showed that he was experienced at intruding on people who might not be in the best of moods, and who had the power to give their anger concrete expression. “He says he's not a beggar, and I thought I should pass the message...”