The Lascar’s Dagger

by Glenda Larke

  Fox opened his mouth, obviously wanting to interject a protest, but the Earl held up his hand. “Go on, witan.”

  “The idea that I would countenance A’Va worship is baseless and deeply offensive to me. Moreover, it is contradictory to the very argument the Prime has been making: that I advocate a return to the pre-Va-Faith belief of the group called Primordials. No Primordial, or anyone else who believes in the importance of shrines and the Way, would ever voluntarily accept the taint of the devil-kin. A’Va is not just the antithesis of Va; he is also anathema to unseen guardians.” He indicated the bark papers on the bench in front of the judges. “You have only to read those tracts.”

  “That’s true,” the Earl agreed, looking at his fellow judges once more to assess their accord.

  “Do you accuse Mistress Penny-cress of lying, then, witan?” Fox asked him, mocking.

  “It is my belief that the wearer of such a black mark has been targeted by evil. A victim, not a perpetrator. However, in my case I believe Mistress Penny-cress was mistaken, not lying,” Saker said. “And with the court’s approval, I will call a witness to prove that.”

  Fox shot him a disbelieving glance.

  A-ha, you thought by denying me an advocate, you had me by the balls. Well, we will see, you slimy pulpiteer…

  “And this person is in the court?” the Earl asked.

  “Yes, your honour. There will be no delay.”

  “Then proceed.”

  “I would ask Lord Juster Dornbeck if he would answer a question or two about the day I visited the shrine. He will remember it well enough; it was the day of his celebration aboard the Golden Petrel.”

  Juster scrambled to his feet, startled. “Of course, if I can be of aid to the court…”

  “Come forward, Lord Juster,” the Earl said, “and reply to the accused’s questions. Remember that all who give evidence here are under oath.”

  “Of course, my lord.”

  “Lord Juster, thank you,” Saker said as Juster took his place before the court. “I think you’ll find my questions easy enough. On that day, you and I were up in the rigging of your ship. Now, for the sake of the non-nautical people in the room, would you tell us the difference between the stay ropes – those ropes that anchor the masts – and the ordinary rigging?”

  “The stays – well, they stay put, under tension. And they have to be stronger because they help to anchor the masts.”

  “Thank you. Now how do you ensure that a stay rope remains in good condition?”

  “Why, we coat it with pitch. Tar.”

  “So the stays on your ship were tar-coated. Quite recently, I suspect?”

  “Of course. The ship and the ropes are new.”

  “So the tar is not so very old and hard. And when two foolish men chose to slide down the stays from the mast to the deck – one of those men being myself – they were likely to get tar on their hands or clothes?”

  “Yes, indeed. And elsewhere.” Juster sounded rueful, and there was a titter around the court.

  “Is it easy to remove?”

  “No, it’s the very devil. I feel certain you still had dirty hands by the time you reached the shrine.”

  “Thank you, my lord. That’s all.”

  “Do you have any questions, your eminence?” Fremont asked Fox.

  “Yes, just the one. I believe you met with a painful accident on that day, Lord Juster.”

  “Yes, that is correct.”

  “So may I assume you knew nothing of what happened to Witan Rampion after you were injured?”

  Juster gave an amiable grin. “Yes, you may assume that.”

  The Earl sent Juster back to his seat, and Fox shot Saker an angry look before saying, “Penny-cress would know the difference between tarry hands and the mark of the devil-kin. Perhaps we can ask her to return…”

  Before Fremont could reply, another voice entered the conversation, calling down from the balcony. Saker blinked in surprise as Celandine Marten scrambled to her feet, throwing off her veil. “That won’t be necessary, your honour,” she said. “I can shed light on this matter. The witan’s palms were scraped raw by rope burns on board the ship. I was the person who bandaged them.”

  Saker’s heart plummeted. Va rot it, she’s going to send me to the gallows. She’s going to say she saw nothing black…

  He wasn’t the only one alarmed by her statement; the consternation of the group in the gallery was easy to read. The Prince leapt to his feet, speaking to Celandine with inaudible urgency while waving his hands around in an agitated fashion. The nun grabbed her and tried to pull her back into her seat. Ryce signalled to the guard at the back of the balcony, who came forward, his stance indicating that he was prepared to intervene.

  Saker looked from one to another, knowing now was not the time for him to say or do anything, but guessing his fate was about to be decided in the next few moments – either nullification, which he might survive, or hanging, which no bribe would halt. He gripped the railing in front of him tightly, welcoming the pain as a distraction.

  Fox turned to address the judges. “Your honours, it is not meet that women should speak in an ecclesiastical court! They are not capable of answering difficult questions with appropriate gravitas.”

  The Earl of Fremont’s mobile brows took on the appearance of a looming thundercloud. “You just this moment called a woman to the stand, Prime Fox.”

  “A shrine-keeper under Va’s guidance, your grace. Not a mere court handmaiden too foolish to know right from wrong!”

  “Are you, Prime Fox, about to tell me that a woman is foolish by nature and incapable of telling the truth in a court of law simply because she is a woman? Would your spiritual superior, the Pontifect, agree with you, I wonder?” His sarcasm cut like the honed edge of a new sword.

  Nobility, Saker thought, momentarily distracted, even as his heart sank. Can any commoner ever manage to achieve such a splendid level of imperious fury?

  Fox was at a loss. He opened his mouth, then closed it again.

  “Do you dare, Master Prime?” the Earl persisted. “By virtue of your position, you defer to the Pontifect in ecclesiastical matters. Yet you think she would be an unacceptable witness in this court of law because she’s a woman?”

  A titter rippled through the clerics, many of whom were women.

  Fox capitulated, his face now a deep shade of red. Rage, Saker guessed, not embarrassment. “My lord,” he said, “I stand corrected.”

  “Good. Now if the lady in the gallery would be so kind as to identify herself to this court?”

  Celandine, without a trace of nervousness, said, “I am Widow Celandine Marten, my lord, handmaiden to the Princess Mathilda. I assure the court that I know I speak under oath here, and I know the gravity of lying.” Although she was addressing the Earl, the angle of her head suggested she was looking at the Prime.

  Fremont nodded. “Very well. You need not descend, Mistress Marten. If you’d like to stand at the railing, it will be sufficient. Now tell us what you have to say on this matter, and please keep your statement relevant.”

  “Thank you, my lord.” She stepped forward, and Ryce followed her, his face a picture of grim anger.

  “On that day aboard the Golden Petrel, when I bandaged Witan Rampion’s hands at the bidding of Princess Mathilda, they were streaked with tar from the ropes. I wiped the worst off, but there were still streaks of it on his fingers. I do not believe there would have been any easy way of ridding himself of it for several days.”

  Saker almost gaped. She was going to save him? He took a deep breath. Mathilda, of course. Mathilda had told her to do what she could, or face the consequences of a Princess’s wrath.

  “After you bandaged his hands, was all the tar covered by the binding?” the Earl asked.

  “No, it was still visible.”

  “Would it be possible, do you think, that an elderly lady in a dimly lit shrine would be confused? That she’d think the tar was the touch of the devil-kin?
”

  “I think it very likely, especially as when I tried to scrub it off with my kerchief, it blurred into black smudges.”

  Saker hid his relief. Inside he was at war with himself over what to believe. Was she suffering an attack of conscience? Celandine knew that Mathilda had initiated their tryst that night, and perhaps she was suddenly awakening to the fact that he could die for it. Perhaps she was shocked to think that he could be unjustly accused of involvement with A’Va and his devil-kin. Or was it because she realised how appalling her own position was about to become if she didn’t worm her way back into Mathilda’s favour?

  “Thank you, mistress,” Fremont said. “Your eminence, do you have—”

  “No questions,” Fox said curtly. “Your honour, my apologies for taking up the court’s time on this matter. The shrine-keeper was obviously mistaken in her belief. I’ll revert to the two original charges against the accused. Blasphemy and apostasy concerning the supremacy of Va. He stands implicated by his association with members of his family, and condemned by the testimony we’ve heard, by the tracts he disseminated, which you have read, and by his own confession.”

  “Then you may be seated, Mistress Marten,” the Earl said. He turned to confer with his fellow judges in low tones, and for a while they spoke only to one another. When the Earl sat straight up again, his face was stern.

  “My fellow judges and I have decided there is no need to prolong this trial. In the light of what we’ve heard, we have reached a unanimous verdict on the grounds of blasphemy and apostasy. Saker Rampion, you have been found guilty of both charges and you are no longer entitled to be addressed as witan. Under the law of nullification you will be delivered to the mercy of Va exactly the way you came into the world, without possessions. If it please Va, you will survive. Your possessions are hereby granted to the Faith.

  “You will wear the mark of nullification on your cheek, to show that even if you survive, you are neither permitted to live within the boundaries of Ardrone, nor to wear the robes or medallion of a cleric anywhere within the Va-cherished lands. The sentence is to be carried out by sunset tomorrow. Do you have anything you wish to say to this court?”

  “My lord, the verdict is fair. I acquiesce to the justice of the court’s punishment.” He glanced up at the gallery. “If I have offended, I beg forgiveness. No one is to blame for this but myself.” And that last is true anyway.

  He bowed to the Earl, and allowed himself to be led away. As he passed the Prime, the man gave a smile full of promise.

  Saker, chilled, averted his gaze. Valerian bloody Fox isn’t done with me yet, Va rot him. He’s working out just how to have me murdered…

  “You know what to do.” The King’s expression was as tough and unforgiving as forged steel. “You wait until Rampion has been left at the shrine, then you move in to kill him. Alone. You leave your men back in the nearest town.”

  “Which shrine are they taking him to?” Prince Ryce asked.

  “The one atop Chervil Moors. Va can forgive and save him for apostasy, but as far as we’re concerned, he dies for the real crime. He defiled the Crown when he touched my daughter.” His grim tone made it clear he didn’t believe in the possibility of forgiveness. “The first snows should have fallen up there, and there’ll be no one much on that road over the Spine. The shrine has no keeper. An easy kill for you.”

  “He will be unarmed,” Ryce pointed out. The idea of murdering a chained and defenceless man, even one who had betrayed his trust, was a black storm cloud roiling through his mind.

  “Not murder,” his father snapped, as if he’d read the thought. “Execution. Remember your sister.”

  “I wonder if she wants him dead,” he said. “I’m still puzzling over why she asked you for permission to send Celandine Marten to the court.” Something about the whole matter didn’t sit well with him.

  “She said she wanted an account of the trial, seeing she couldn’t attend it herself. None of us could have guessed the giddy woman would defend the witan! She’s obviously not to be trusted. What’s her family? Does she have any connections to the nobility or important landsmen or Shenat families?”

  “She’s the niece of a shrine-keeper in Melforn. Perhaps she didn’t like the idea of Witan Rampion being charged with blasphemy and apostasy when that wasn’t what he was guilty of.”

  “Pah! Couldn’t stomach the idea of sending a man to his death, I suppose. Women of the lower classes are piss weak!”

  Ryce considered the tavern wenches and skivvies and flower-sellers he knew. Weak was not a word he would have applied to any of them, but he wasn’t about to contradict his father.

  “Fox is right. We ought to have her killed,” Edwayn muttered.

  He was startled. “Who?”

  “The Marten woman! Haven’t you been listening? Did I breed a total fool? Think! She’s the only other person, besides the Prime, who knows what really happened. The secret’s safer if she dies. See to it.”

  “I’m not killing an innocent woman!” For a moment they stared at one another, then he added, as respectfully as he knew how, “Sire, Thilda’s still begging not to be forced into this marriage. Not a day passes that she doesn’t ask me to come and see her. And if I do, she does nothing but entreat me to speak to you on her behalf. Do we really have to give her to the Regal? Is it worth it?”

  King Edwayn’s glare was thunderous. “Have you learned nothing about being a king, Ryce? Marriages are for whatever advantages they bring. Even you will marry the girl of my choice, and I will choose someone who’ll bring us something we want. It’s as easy and as simple as that. If we have to tie Mathilda up in a sack and dispatch her to Regal Vilmar, we’ll do it. We need that treaty port. Regal Vilmar is a fool to offer it, but he’s aching for a pretty young thing in his bed to revive his flagging manhood and he’s willing to pay the price. Mathilda never had a choice, not from the day she was born.

  “Don’t ever make the mistake of thinking a king hangs on to his throne by some divine right. Keeping your backside in the seat is all about money and influence and support. If you lack that, you’ll find yourself bare-arsed and one of your second cousins wearing the crown.

  “Now go and sharpen your sword for what you have to do tomorrow.”

  “Yes, sire. The witan cleric dies.”

  Edwayn stopped his pacing to face his son. There was nothing in his bearing that spoke of indecision or doubt. He looked every inch what he was – a monarch with the power of life and death over his subjects. “Don’t fail me, Ryce. The Marten woman must also die.”

  “I can’t just march into Thilda’s apartments and kill her handmaiden.”

  “No. Her tongue is tied while only the cloister nuns and Mathilda can hear. Her demise can wait until the day Mathilda and her retinue set sail for the Regality. I’ll put you in charge of getting the whole damn party and their luggage to the ship. Actually, you don’t have to do this one yourself. You can arrange for someone to push her into Betany Bay if you can’t think of anything else; the skirts women wear drag them under in a thrice and they can’t swim. But, by Va, just choose someone who’s already so indebted to you they’d never squeak a word, and of course, her death is never to be linked to Rampion in anyone’s mind.”

  He felt ill just thinking of it. Murdering the rapist of his sister was going to be difficult enough, but to kill a woman who’d done nothing except obey her mistress’s whims? Oh Va above, I don’t want to be king. I never want to be king if this is the sort of thing I have to order done.

  “One more thing,” Edwayn said. “Make it quite clear to your sister that if she breathes a word to anyone of her broken maidenhead before she is safely tied to the Regal, I will see to it that she is locked away in that Comfrey nunnery, the Order of Perpetual Silence or whatever they call themselves. Now you may go.”

  He bowed and headed for the door, but his father’s voice stopped him just as he put his fingers to the handle. “Son, when you are on the throne, you’ll have
to make many unpleasant decisions. People will die because of those decisions. You will perhaps send men to war, or women to the stake, or destroy whole families because of the treachery of a single man. It’s time you learned what it is to be a monarch. It’s time your hands were bloodied.”

  Ryce turned back to face his father. So, this was to be a test. And what if I fail it, Father? What then?

  He couldn’t bring himself to ask the question. He nodded and left the room.

  22

  The Branded Man

  This is barbaric.

  And it was part of a faith he’d followed and believed and preached…

  Thoughts slipped and slid through his skull, hammering him like hailstones, even as pain battered his aching body. I never thought to question its barbarism. I never thought about it at all.

  Perspiration ran down his face, trickled down his back. And it had nothing to do with the heat, though a brazier of glowing coals sat in the middle of the prison chamber, with the branding iron stuck deep into its glowing heart.

  Fox had considerately shown him the brand while it was still cold. An oak leaf, symbol of the Way and one of the motifs on the royal flag, drawn here with a bar through its heart to signify banishment, and all of it wrought in iron.

  They are going to brand me on my face. The cheek? The forehead? Dear Va…

  Take deep breaths. Don’t show them how scared you are.

  How long since this had been done to a cleric? Most Ardronese would know what the brand meant, though, if they saw it: a cleric who had denied his faith and betrayed his calling, and was not to be aided in any way. It was up to Va to save the poor fellow. To save him.

  Saker Rampion, witan no longer.

  The Pontifect would hammer him flat and sell his hide to a shoemaker. Her past anger would be nothing compared to this. And who are you anyway, Fritillary Reedling? In fact, I think I’m here partly because of you. You and your relationship with Valerian Fox. I’m just the pawn in the middle. What was it Fox had said? “I shall enjoy telling Fritillary Reedling exactly how and why you died…” Fox, in all probability, had arranged for his fingers to be marked. Fox had found out that he spied for the Pontifect and had intercepted his letters. Fox might know more about his own parentage than he himself did. The vile man had enjoyed the trial because he knew it would upset the Pontifect.