by Dave Duncan
"It discourages anyone from backing out of the contract is what he means," the imperor said. "But it is not improper, Highness."
And if the imperor said so, then it was so.
"And it is the Gods' command!" Inos beamed triumphantly. "Trust in love, Aunt!"
The spectators were beyond being surprised by anything now, but Kadolan sensed a bright mood of amusement and jubilation rippling out from that blissful smile on Inos's face. It showed in the answering smiles and quiet shrugs, overriding the chill and fatigue. The imperium was restored, the war canceled, the raider dead, the succession secure . . . Why not a wedding?
"If your Majesty says so, then I certainly have no objection," Kadolan said. She had no right to object anyway. Inos was of age now, and a queen. Suddenly Kade felt discouragingly old. Her task was finished. With Inosolan married to a sorcerer . . .
"Very well!" Emshandar said. He chuckled and heaved himself more upright on his throne. "From what Master Rap told me earlier this evening, I do not think he will have any objections whatsoever. But I do wish you would produce the bridegroom!"
Plop!
Everyone jumped as Master Rap appeared in their midst, but he was only what he had been before, a tangle-haired, oversized faun in leather work clothes. Whatever he had been doing had taken a toll, though; for a moment he just stood, slumped, dejected. Then with an obvious effort, he turned and peered blearily up at the imperor.
"If you know of any out-of-work sorcerers. Sire," he muttered, "there is a vacant palace to the west."
The onlookers flinched, but Emshandar nodded approvingly. "You have done noble work this day. Sorcerer. For me, and for all Pandemia. I think few will mourn Zinixo."
Rap had discovered Inos standing beside him. He smiled wanly at her. He murmured, "Thanks!" almost inaudibly.
"I only wish," Emshandar said, a little more loudly, "that you would accept the Red Throne yourself!"
"Me?" Rap rubbed his eyes. "No, not me." He went back to studying Inos's radiant smile, almost as if it puzzled him. The imperor frowned at being so peremptorily refused.
"Sire?" Inos said impatiently.
"Mm? Oh . . . Very well!" The old man rose unsteadily, leaving the sword and buckler on the throne. He stepped down to join the others, wavering a little; but when he straightened he was taller than anyone there except Rap. "How does it go? Are there any here among you present who know cause why this man and this woman — Shandie!"
The little prince had hurtled in from the darkness and wrapped himself around Master Rap's legs like a blanket. "Rap! Rap! You're all right, Rap?"
The sorcerer laughed and patted his shoulder. "Yes, I'm fine! You're all right?"
The prince nodded vigorously. "Yes! Yes, I'm all right!"
The imperor said, "Shandie!" again, menacingly.
Rap tousled the boy's hair. "Sorry, Sire! You were saying?"
They were all so weary, Kadolan thought. They should all be in bed, and especially that exhausted old imperor. Master Rap also was as limp and haggard as if he had not slept in days. Only Inos seemed to have recovered completely, and she looked as if she were floating.
"Anyone who knows cause . . ." The imperor scowled. "Oh, never mind that bit. Do you, Rap, take this . . ."
"You like horses, Shandie," Rap said. "Maybe you an' me can go for a ride tomorrow, huh?"
The boy's reply was drowned in a cry of objection from Inos and a roar from the imperor: "as your wife?"
"Wife?" Rap said faintly. "Wife?" Then he seemed to register the grouping — Inos at his side, and Senator Epoxague beyond her, as honorary father of the bride . . . Kade at her back and the imperor in front. Marshal Ithy had appointed himself best man, beside Rap.
He stared at Inos as if he had never seen her before. Certainly he could have never seen her look happier.
Kadolan sensed that this awful day was about to produce another of its sickening reversals.
"Wife?" he whispered. He paled. "Wife? Oh, Inos! No! Not now!"
She started as though he had slapped her. "What? But, Rap, Azak's gone! I'm free now! I love you, and I know you love —"
"No! Inos! I can't!" He recoiled in horror, bumping into Marshal Ithy without seeming even to notice him. "We mustn't!"
"Why not?" she cried angrily.
He was shaking his head. "Because . . . because . . . The words . . ."
"I don't care if you're a sorcerer, you dummy!"
"But . . . that's it! I'm not! I'm . . . I'm . . . Oh, Gods! No! No! No!"
Master Rap spun on his heel and raced off into the darkness, following the path Azak had taken. The sound of his footsteps faded into silence.
Inos turned to Kadolan with a wail. "Aunt? What happened? What's wrong?"
"I don't know, dear! I don't know!"
Obviously something was wrong, though. Very wrong. It had to be more than Master Rap's obvious dislike of weddings.
2
I loved a young man,
Young man, Oh . . .
I loved a young man,
Long ago . . .
I gave him gold, and rubies, too,
I gave my all, his heart to woo.
Young man, young man, young man. Oh . . .
Long ago . . .
The weather had changed, as if to acknowledge the imperor's return. Late-afternoon sunshine made a brave effort to gladden the palace gardens, where a last few battered roses were a lament to lost summer. The branches above them were bare, and sodden heaps of yellow leaves lay on the damp earth by the little boxwood hedges. It was not winter yet.
Inos's voice floated out through the windows of the music room. Her fingers raced over the keys of the spinet, wringing skeins of melody from them in complex arpeggios and glissades and counterpoint.
Jalon, weep your eyes out!
She stopped with an ear-stabbing discord and spun around on the stool. An audience of about thirty men stood there with their stupid mouths agape — secretaries, flunkies, even legionaries. She slammed down the lid and jumped to her feet. Quailing before her anger, they started to back away, then all turned tail and stampeded out of the room.
Idiots!
It was two days since she had become an adept.
It was already beginning to pall. She could ride anything in the palace stables. Sketching had always been one of her talents, and now she could dash off a likeness in half a dozen strokes. Poetry, needlework . . . no problem. She had even attempted a little archery, and there was certainly nothing to that anymore. She had extracted a bushel-basketful of military secrets out of Marshal Ithy without him even realizing, and the previous night she had danced that brainless (but rather cute) young Tiffy to utter exhaustion.
There was nothing to anything any more!
But where in the names of all the Gods was Rap?
Slipping her feet back into the shoes she had recently kicked off, Inos set her jaw firmly and departed in search of the imperor.
Finding the antechamber was easy. Getting past it was not, even for an adept — there were just too many heralds and footmen and chamberlains. By the time she had reduced the sixth or eighth to sweating, blushing, stammering cooperation, the first was starting to recover. Trouble was, they might lose their heads if they admitted her without permission, and the fear of death was a powerful antidote to charm.
Eventually she yielded to their terror-filled pleas, and sat down alongside the other forty or so men and women patiently waiting. She started up a conversation with the mousy bureaucrat next to her and discovered he knew nothing at all that she would ever wish to know. He was concerned about a problem with public water supply in some Gods-forgotten little town in North Pithmot, and that was about the extent of his existence. He expected to linger in the antechamber for another month at least before being admitted to the Imperial presence.
Inos certainly did not. She had a kingdom to rescue. She had a lover to find. After all that she had endured since leaving Arakkaran, she was not going to settle for being an o
rnament in a waiting room.
However, a senior herald soon appeared in a tabard so laden with gold thread that it must have weighed a hundredweight.
"His Imperial Majesty regrets that he can receive no more of you today and bids you return on the morrow . . ."
Nobody moved.
The herald consulted his slate. "Except for the following . . ."
He pursed his lips, turned the slate over, then lowered it. ". . . her Majesty Queen Insolan, her Highness Princess Kadolan, or Doctor Sagorn."
Inos rose and glanced around, but she would certainly have noticed either of the others, had they been there. She advanced to the door as everyone else began gathering up briefs and petitions and reports, preparing to depart.
She had expected the imperor to be in the next chamber, but she was conducted through several grand rooms and passages. There were other doors, too, and probably important personages entered through those, bypassing the rabble.
However, when she finally reached the Presence, the surroundings were flattering enough — a small private sitting room, with big windows looking out at soggy, depressing winter garden scenery, but a small fire burning, and only four chairs. Emshandar shook his head as she was about to perform a formal court curtsy, waving her to a chair. The flunkies departed, closing the door, and he moved to a table bearing crystal and wine.
Despite her impatience, she must observe the formalities — Inos sat down and tried to compose herself.
The portraits on the wall would be his children, Orosea and Emthoro, and Inos recognized the work of Jio'sys, who was well represented in the palace. Even from her seat, she could scan the names of the many books stacked on the high shelves: law, history, economics, dull stuff. Two words of power had greatly increased the acuity of her senses, although she had uncovered no occult abilities in herself so far. The rugs were authentic Zogonian wool and the smaller porcelain figurines on the mantel were authentic Kerithian. The big one was a fake, though.
The imperor looked weary, but he must have had a busy day, and he was visibly stronger than he had been when she had last seen him, in the Rotunda. He was swathed in a bulky robe with ermine trim, and she could guess that he had just changed out of something much more formal. His white hair was sparse, his face still a vellum-upholstered skull, but his glance was steady and very penetrating. As he settled into a chair and raised a crystal goblet to her in a toast, she suddenly recalled Sagorn in her father's study, so long ago. He did look a tiny bit like Sagorn, as much as imp, even an emaciated, raw-boned imp, could ever resemble a jotunn. Perhaps the memory came also from the song she had been singing, or the bouquet of the wine.
"Magnificent, Sire! Elvish, of course?"
He raised a frosty eyebrow. "You can't do better than that?"
She sniffed again, and held it to the light. "Valdoquiff. The fifty-three?"
He chuckled. "The forty-seven."
She felt herself blush at his amusement. "I don't think I have met the forty-seven before!"
"So you couldn't know it. But Valdoquiff, certainly. You have been exercising your talents, young lady! I have had reports of some of your exploits."
Of course the palace was always a warren of rumors, and she would be a source of wonder. Her recent impromptu concert was probably the talk of the court already.
The old man's eyes twinkled. "And your dear aunt is recovered?"
"Oh, quite recovered, thank you. She is socializing to excess. You may anticipate a severe tea famine in the capital shortly. And your Majesty's honored self, it I may presume to ask?"
"Oh, I'm well! I grow stronger with every meal. I'm also having a marvelous time shifting my last ten years' mistakes onto Ythbane's reputation. The damage that man did in a few short weeks!" He chuckled and sipped his wine, regarding her acutely. "Beautiful young maidens do not come calling on old men from choice. How may I help you?"
"Sire . . . Have you seen Rap?"
He nodded. "He's been spending quite a bit of time with my grandson. He's done wonders for the boy already."
Inos bit her lip. Shandie indeed!
"Do you happen to know where I might find him? Rap, I mean."
The long Imperial upper lip stretched to forestall a smile. "Oh, yes. He said he was going to Faerie."
"Faerie?"
Now the smile broke free. "He had some urgent business there, he said."
He had some urgent business right here in Hub that he should have attended to first! She set her teeth.
The imperor coughed discreetly. "That is confidential, though. He asked me not to mention it to anyone, except you when you came."
Worse! If Rap had been foreseeing her movements, then it was no wonder he could avoid her. How dare he! How could he? Why?
"Have you seen your distant cousin, the duke?" Emshandar inquired.
Inos shivered. "This morning. He was awake . . . but he isn't really there. I gather Rap had seen him before I did. He's like a child — Angilki is. The doctors seem puzzled."
"Rap isn't. He repaired the damage, he said, and it was definitely a sorcerous wound. But he can't replace the memories that were lost."
Why had Rap not reported this to Inos before he told the imperor? Sorcerer or not, when she got hold of that young man, she was going to pin his ears back so fast his tattoos would pop off.
"I have some more sad news for you," the old man said. "I sent a note to your quarters, but since you are here . . . The duke's mother, the dowager duchess, has passed away."
"That is not sad news!" Inos snapped. "She was responsible for all of my troubles. A lot of them, anyhow."
"Oh? Well, she was not a close relative, I know, but a little seemly grief might be good politics."
Inos apologized, angry at her clumsiness. The cavernous old eyes were never leaving her face, and she realized that Emshandar's reputation as a shrewd mover of men might be well deserved.
"It leaves Kinvale in a strange position," he said, and let her work out the implications. The duke was now incompetent, his daughters underage.
"Daughters!"
"Yes. However, Kinvale happens to be one of a very few dower fiefdoms — the title can pass through the female line. The only question, therefore, is whom I appoint as guardian for our mutual cousins until the new duchess can succeed."
Inos parried the hidden question, because she felt that Kade should answer it herself; it had also brought her mind back to her own future.
But the imperor was still 'way out in front of her. "We have had some word of Krasnegar." He waved sadly at a high-piled table that probably represented his evening.
"The road is open again?"
"No, indeed! We are holding the pass itself, but even the XIIth Legion has failed to retake Pondague, or where Pondague used to be. The little greenies fight for every tree." The old soldier shook his head disbelievingly. "Even the XIIth! My old outfit!"
If not by road . . . But of course it was only in Krasnegar itself that harbors closed a few weeks after midsummer. The ships then must sail back to the Impire, and reports extracted from the captains would take more weeks to reach Hub. The timing was reasonable.
"And how is Krasnegar, Sire?"
"Bad." He heaved himself out of his chair and went to search the heaped table. "Right after I pulled the troops out, a jotunn by the name of Greastax arrived with a longship full of the usual scoundrels. He claims to be Kalkor's brother, holding the realm in his name. Half brother, I expect. Ah, here it is. This is a summary of what we know."
He handed her a booklet of eight or ten sheets in a leather binding. The hand was neat and professional, but behind the bloodless bureaucratic prose was tragedy. She scanned through it swiftly and passed it back, shocked to the depths of her soul. "Thank you . . . Sire?"
The imperor was chuckling as he returned to his chair. "You're not quite as speedy as Master Rap, but then he didn't need to turn the pages."
Now she was in no mood to be teased, nor even to humor old imperors. "That news is
months old! How many more deaths and rapes since then?"
Emshandar stared at her over the rim of his wineglass for several bleak seconds. "The Gods know. The raping may have been reduced by the time element. Last spring . . . Those troops were the worst in our army. I would never use trash like that Pondague detachment for anything but garrison duty. The killing . . . likewise! Those who might resist have already done so, and only the cowed remain. But what about food supply?"
"It is always touch and go," she muttered, mulling over what she had just read. The trade had been poor. At least two ships had returned with their cargoes intact, rather than deal with the bullying jotnar overlords, and the imps had already looted all the money and valuables from the city. She wondered if Foronod would have managed to accomplish his usual harvest miracle with a demoralized or depleted workforce. Anything that impaired the harvest threatened famine by spring, in any year.
"I must go!" she said. "Soon!"
The skeletal old man shook his head sadly. He did not need to speak, because a moment's thought reduced what she had said to obvious nonsense. She could do nothing. Even the Impire's crack troops could not penetrate the taiga now, and the seas were frozen until summer.
Only Rap.
"He read all that?" she asked.
"Yes. Plus some earlier reports on Krasnegar, which will interest you also. Do you know, there, was not one reference to Krasnegar in the Imperial archives? Inisso did a fine job of making it immemorable." A gentle smile eased the severity of the wasted face, but she realized that he was hiding a great weariness. She should go and let him rest.
"Inisso died centuries ago!"
"I know. But when the news broke, I had no recollection of ever having heard of a place called Krasnegar. I demanded files, reports . . . anything! There was nothing. So I did what imperors usually do in emergencies — I asked the appropriate warden. Needless to say, her ravings told me very little."
Inos evaded the unspoken invitation to comment. Bright Water would have been on the side of the goblins, not the rampaging imp army that had started the troubles.