“You . . . want me . . . to ensure that each of my girls finds their perfect match?” the goddess asked, scandalized.
“They’re going to go husband hunting with or without you,” Pentandra predicted. “Without your guidance and encouragement . . . and divine enthusiasm . . . they will soon regress to simple whores, not the courtesans you’ve made them. Times are good, at the moment. The Commandos are in town, the garrison, plenty of fodder for their charms and opportunities to increase their purses.
“But the Commandos will be shipped out to various castles, soon. Many will marry, now that they have a secure footing and a future. If they are lucky, they will marry your Maidens. As much as some of them enjoy their work, they aren’t idiots. They know what an old whore can bring, compared to a young one - you’ve educated them well in that. The Commandos have coin in their purses and prospects for more to come – especially if they wed. And I think many will find the security of being a wife is far preferable to pretending to be a maiden long past the day when such a thing was believable.”
“Do you hate your fellow women so much?” pleaded the frustrated goddess. “Do you not appreciate what I have done for this town? I have freed your sisters! I have given them the means of making a living, of accumulating resources -- without the need of a man!”
“By making them dependent on the needs of all men?” Pentandra asked, an eyebrow arched. “For all of its gilded past, Vorone will not continue to be the cultural capital of the Wilderlands much longer. The war will re-ignite, the times will change for the worse, and what will you have taught these girls to do to weather those storms?”
“Would you have me make them Kasari maids? Embroidering patches for their brothers and sons, keeping the hearth tended like a good little wife?”
“They could do worse,” Pentandra shrugged. “Let them take holy orders, if they wish, and join the Temple of Ishi, or Briga, or any other they desire. They can find a living in service, if they do not wish to toil at a hearth. Or they can take a craft,” she proposed. “Perhaps some will become musicians. Or limners. Or copyists. There are plenty of ways for a woman to make coin without hiking her skirts,” she pointed out.
“Trading their divine femininity for the scantest security,” she scoffed. “When they could have been great ladies in fine clothes!”
“It’s not about the fucking clothes!” Pentandra fumed. “Honestly, I see why Trygg gets so frustrated with you! Femininity is not something you carry around between your tits and flash to get attention! Its being a girl, and being a mother, and being an old lady who talks to fenceposts because some fenceposts just need talking to! It’s living and loving, taking chances and following your heart, listening with your head and letting your feet guide your path! I love a good shag as much as anyone,” she said, earning a smirk from the goddess, “but it’s a means to an end, don’t you understand?”
“If you let it be,” Ishi dismissed, her demeanor disturbed. “Do you not see that I am the vessel of those passions?”
“I see that you cannot appreciate life beyond your next climax,’ conceded Pentandra. “Which is why it would be in your best interests to prepare your Maidens for their new lives . . . properly,” she added.
“You would have me betray my principles?” Ishi asked, aghast.
“No, I would appeal to those principles to motivate you to give them what they need in order to succeed - not tell them how they’re doomed to be miserable in their marriages, just because they are focused on their husbands, alone, and not on the next opportunity to pass by.”
“You are asking me to betray my principles!” Ishi said, angrily. “Have you no gratitude for what I have done in Vorone?”
“Oh, I do,” Pentandra assured her. “Don’t mistake me – you’ve been instrumental. You created five hundred attractive, well-educated courtesans, precisely the lure needed to bring three thousand brutish mercenaries under Anguin’s control. The ones who don’t marry a Maiden will be glad to enjoy the company of the others, I assure you. But for awhile, I think you’re going to find all of your whores are more interested in wedding vows than negotiating a fair price for their efforts.”
“Which will force them to surrender control of their lives to mere men,” she replied, bitterly. “What an utter waste!”
“A waste? I think not,” Pentandra said, soothingly. “We are a complimentary species, Goddess. Neither man nor woman can exist for long without the other. And while sex brings us together, other factors,” she said, laying a hand on her abdomen, and then her heart, “keep us together in the ways that give us both value. We want strong, smart, confident men who can provide and protect us. They want smart, attractive, loving women who cling to them and make a home worth coming to. Between us, we make babies,” she said, simply. “Babies, you might know, are important, in the long run.”
“All of that hard work, washed down the river with the offal!” the increasingly aging goddess said, shaking her head. “All of those hours teaching refinement . . . gone! Wasted on a single man, forgotten as a girlhood conceit, talents abandoned because wet nappies and dinner were more important!”
“Mayhap,” agreed Pentandra, reluctantly. “We all make sacrifices for what makes us happy, ultimately. Consider that your attempt to instruct your maidens in music, dance, and literacy has given Vorone the most literate whores in the west. It has also ensured that the next generation of Wilderlords will be more inclined to study than warfare. Or at least able to combine the two.
“Your pretty girls and those rough, tough men will produce a generation of valiant warriors and beautiful ladies,” she predicted. “Many of which stand a chance at being ennobled. All fiercely loyal to Duke Anguin and his eventual bride. A new race of Wilderlords, all because you blessed this town so . . . thoroughly.”
At that, Ishi’s demeanor changed again. “Oh, really?” she asked. “If you knew who Anguin’s future bride was, you would not be so sanguine!” she challenged.
“Perhaps,” Pentandra conceded, too afraid after her recent brushes with prophecy to inquire. “I don’t want to concern myself with prophecy any more than I already have to. But if you could find it in your heart - or whatever it is you use - to arrange the best matches for each of your girls – and anyone else in Vorone, for that matter – then I would count it as a great service to the duchy. A . . . parting blessing from Ishi, if you will.”
“And what happens to my poor avatar, when I am driven from here?” she asked, nastily. The divine glow already seemed to be fading from her skin.
“Minalan has pledged to build you a temple,” Pentandra reminded her. “I shall ensure that Baroness Amandice is installed as its Abbess,” she pledged. “I’ll even throw in a stipend from the duchy,” she added. “It will be the largest of your temples in the Wilderlands. Eventually you can teach every Wilderlord lady in the north what to do on her wedding night.
“But one way or the other, Ishi, it’s time for you to go,” Pentandra said, more forcefully. “The blessings of the gods are nice, but after a few months, I’ll be honest: dealing with you lot every day is maddening.”
Chapter Forty-Nine
The Arcane Council of Vorone
It was late evening as Pentandra led her apprentice through the dark streets of Vorone once again toward an important meeting. Pentandra made do with magesight, not wanting to attract attention with a magelight, while Alurra relied upon the vision (and other senses) of the bats and nightwebs that darted across the rooftops of Vorone in late summer and early autumn.
Not that Pentandra was worried about thieves or brigands - any thug who tried to rob them would be in for a terrible surprise – she merely did not want to attract anything that might delay her. The Rat Crew was long gone, now, with only a tiny remnant of the once-powerful organization left in the dwindling refugee camps. Even the Woodsmen had stopped patrolling the night, and it had been most of a season since the Wood Owls had raided anyplace. Masks had gone out of fashion in Vorone again, this season
.
As they hurried through the town she could not help but feel a sense of pride about what she had helped accomplish.
More than her brushes with organized crime and the undead, wayward goddesses and petty feuds among courtiers, she appreciated that the once-filthy streets were clean once again. Vacant lots were being re-built, and the markets were full and bustling on market days. Certainly, the esteem invested in the Duke and his fine gentlemen was important, but considering how sick the town had been only months before, this was real, undeniable progress.
Even the sewers were clean, now, she reflected as she crossed one of the channels running through the center of the street. Just months ago it would have been clogged with refuse and offal. Now it was swept twice a day by laborers drafted from the camps, paid a penny, a pie, and a loaf to take home, before the tapman turned on the aqueduct that washed away the litter with river water every night. Not only had the streets become cleaner from the daily bustle of town life, the project allowed the destitute to feed themselves and their families without becoming dependent on the abbeys.
The palace was responsible for much of that, she knew. She recalled Sister Saltia’s report at one of the endless meetings of the court a few days before, indicating that over twenty-two thousand ounces of gold had been spent on the restoration so far.
With the secret loan guarantees that Minalan had made on behalf of the Arcane Orders, that kept them comfortably away from outright bankruptcy, but it was still a hefty price. Revenues from the town had grown, and tribute from the local barons had started to come in with far more regularity. But there was still a powerful draw on the treasury that could not be sustained indefinitely.
Fees for trade and tariffs on goods carted in from Castal brought coin into the treasury . . . but Pentandra’s growing smuggling operation with her cousin Planus brought much more, she knew.
Thanks to judicious (and quiet) use of a pair of Supply Rods, she and Planus were exchanging an ever-expanding array of high-tariff goods from southern Remere – the commercial hub of the Five Duchies, if one was to believe the Remeran trading houses – with a number of high-quality raw materials from the Alshari Wilderlands.
The highly sought-after Alshari Hematite ore was central to the trade, as the shipwrights in the ports preferred it to all other and were less concerned than most with where it originated. With that kind of quiet market to feed, Pentandra had virtually emptied the duchy’s storehouses of ore accumulated over the years.
But the illicit trade had not stopped there. Alshari furs were highly taxed and much sought in Remere and the Castali Riverlands. Hardwoods that grew common around Vorone also had markets around the coasts, where fine timber was rare. In recent weeks he had expanded his contacts to include cabinet makers and luthiers who would pay a high premium for the right wood.
And in return, he sent her plenty of luxuries that would have been obscenely expensive, had proper tariffs been paid. The office’s buttery was stocked with the finest Cormeeran wines, among other great vintages, and she had a quietly booming trade with a dressmaker in town who paid her good prices on the bolts of exotic textiles from Remere Pentandra brought to her every week. In exchange, she not only made a handsome profit, she had the complete attention of an excellent seamstress at any time.
She felt guilty about the trade, of course. What she was doing was illegal, depriving dozens of feudal lords of their tiny piece of the profit such goods usually generated as they made their way farther and farther from their point of origin. But Pentandra didn’t much care. The booming trade in illicit ore and timber had given her a cash flow, access to markets and goods at a discount, all things she could support.
But she still felt guilty about it . . . so she didn’t tell anyone about it. Not even Minalan. Not even Arborn. It was her and Planus’ little secret, and one that had great potential for the future.
As it was, the trade had allowed her to quietly liquidate useless ore and contribute nearly four thousand ounces of gold to the treasury. She had a third of that tucked away for her own use, should she need it. One of the great advantages to smuggling through arcane means was the lack of bookkeeping involved.
But Sister Saltia and even Viscountess Threanas had praised her for the deed despite their adherence to proper financial procedure. It had solved several problems and kept the duchy afloat. That Pentandra had traded on her skills to also convince His Grace to fund programs like the street sweepers and nightly cleansing of the sewers was less known. There was a lot going on in Vorone, now, and compared to the other expenditures draining the treasury, the few ounces of silver a week it cost to keep her from dragging her hem through raw sewage every day seemed negligible.
Much of those expenditures had been investments in the town, itself, everything from the new walls to clearing the site of the old garrison for the new keep Carmella was to build. Paying off the palace’s debt with local merchants and purchasing new supplies contributed handsomely to the Market ward’s economic recovery, as had access to capital.
She saw someone familiar crossing the street ahead of her, toward the Scribe’s Ward. Lieutenant Randaw, once of the town watch, now back with the Palace Guard, Pentandra knew. He’d been promoted after the incident with the draugen in the palace. The man barely looked as he had at Yule. He stood taller, in a new surcoat with the guards’ arms on it. He was escorting a young woman – and for a moment, Pentandra thought it was one of the Maidens.
Instead she saw the casual familiarity the man had with the girl, and realized that it was his daughter, dressed in finery. Likely going to attend one of the autumnal balls in the Scrolls ward, she guessed. Vorone would be lucky to keep the man, she knew – he could earn a lot as an estate manager for one of the new lords inhabiting the Wilderlands.
A great deal of coin had gone to the barons to shore up their support and loyalty. Plenty had gone into equipping and outfitting and paying the 3rd Commando, who were starting to integrate into Voroni society as they took over duties from both garrison and guard. Much more had gone toward re-establishing lost fiefs, bringing domains in the spacious east of the Wilderlands back into productive use.
But some had been buying bread and bean pies, and paying a penny a day, to men who had no place else to go and no better opportunity.
That had been her idea. Now those crews were regularly scoured for trustworthy labor by the bosses in town. The refugees, so long denied the opportunity to even enter the town, had often gone on to find even more lucrative employ on construction sites or with merchants who suddenly had more business than in years.
The guard and the garrison were recruiting, as their officers retired or took positions with lords headed for the eastern bank to seek their fortunes on lands they had not laid eyes on. The civil service was recruiting, as more inspectors and clerks were required. And the victualers were purchasing large amounts at market just to accommodate the steady flow of soldiers and artisans who had coin enough in their purses to celebrate their good fortunes.
All in all, she was proud of the work she helped do in Vorone. Even her mother had to grudgingly admit that she seemed to know what she was doing some of the time . . . and that was worth more to her, she knew with certainty, than praise from a goddess.
“Are we there yet?” Alurra burst out, irritated, as they trudged along.
“You know very well how long it takes to get there,” Pentandra chided. “Lucky, have you been feeding this girl poor information?” she asked the crow. Despite her initial reluctance at seeing the thing as anything but a living instrument for the girl, she had slowly come to realize that the stupid bird actually had the barest hint of a personality.
“He wants to fly there, already, and be done with this stupid walking. It’s night time! Time to sleep!” she mocked her bird. “What are you crazy humans doing now?”
“Going to meet the Spellmonger, if you must know, Lucky,” Pentandra replied. “Special meeting. Very secret. Only high-ranking magi, their apprentices, a
nd select fowl are permitted.”
“Sounds intriguing,” Alurra yawned. “Why can’t the Spellmonger have a breakfast meeting?”
“He usually has a reason for what he does,” she said, with false confidence. In fact, since Alya had lost her mind, Minalan’s behavior was growing more and more suspect. Banamor, Dranus the Sevendori court wizard, and even Olmeg, Minalan’s Greenwarden, had contacted her separately about their concerns. There were many people worried about him, Pentandra at the top of the list. “Ostensibly, we’re discussing the upcoming Sixth Annual Spellmonger’s Trial, and what obstacles we’ll throw at the participants this year.”
“But you’re lying about that,” Alurra prompted in her blunt, matter-of-fact style. Pentandra swore she would beat an appreciation for subtlety into the girl if it was the last thing she did. “What are you really discussing?”
“I don’t know, precisely,” Pentandra admitted. “All I know is that Tyndal and Rondal want to address . . . call it the Inner Council of Magi, those of us who were at Boval Vale during the siege. It has been awhile since we’ve met in person, for that purpose, but it’s about time. I have much to tell them about the Alka Alon, for instance, and the capabilities of Korbal’s new slaves.”
Court Wizard: Book Eight Of The Spellmonger Series Page 99