Stillbright

by Daniel M Ford

  If they don’t see him, they can’t ask you about him? Devious of you. Her voice echoed with approval in his mind. The boy isn’t going to stay hidden, though.

  Try.

  Allystaire set a slow pace for the rest of them, putting out of his mind the inane small talk ensuing between Mol and Cerisia, though a part of him was briefly amazed, and not for the first time, at how frighteningly fast the girl had grown up. Still, most of his thoughts were circling around the six dangerous armed men he was leading straight into Thornhurst.

  * * *

  Allystaire burst into his tent to find Torvul, Gideon, Ivar, and Renard all waiting for him. The sounds of men at work drifted in, as Cerisia’s guards and servants were erecting their pavilions.

  “Mislike them being this close to Her Temple,” Torvul said, through sourly twisted lips.

  “No other space for them. Besides, this way we can keep an eye on them.”

  “Why’d we even let ‘em in?” Torvul lifted a hand to gesture angrily and ineffectually at the air. “No good can come of this.”

  “Mol thinks it might,” Allystaire replied. “We can argue later.” His eyes flicked to Gideon, and he said, “I thought Idgen Marte told you to get out of sight.”

  “She did,” he said. “I came here.”

  Allystaire sighed. “We will manage.” Renard and Ivar lingered a few paces away, and he waved them closer. “The priestess brought guards, six of them, and two servants, or demi-priests or something. I mislike the look of the guards. Not the fat fools one usually finds in temples.” He focused on Ivar, catching the woman’s weary, indifferent-seeming brown eyes, which Allystaire well knew to be a ruse. “I want the guards watched, all of them. If one of them wanders off, I want to know where he goes, what he does. I want to know what they talk about, who loses what at dice, how much they drink, what they eat. From where do they hail, why do they think they are here. Everything. Did I miss anything?”

  Ivar grinned rather gruesomely. “Be wantin’ to know when one takes a shit, m’lord?”

  “If it seems relevant,” Allystaire replied. “Do not worry about letting them see you. Or at least one of you. I do not want them to think they have a free hand.”

  “Got it. How many men d’ya want me t’put on it?”

  Allystaire clenched a fist and shut his eyes, doing quick calculations. “Can you spare three?”

  “I can. It’ll slow down the earthworks and cuttin’ timber.”

  “I will find a few more men from the village. Good farmer stock here; we all know how to dig,” Renard put in.

  “We do not have enough men no matter how many hands we round up,” Allystaire said. “Yet we must look at the threat within, now, as well as that without.” He looked to Renard then. “Any word from Keegan and his band? I lost track of them since we returned.”

  “Camping out in the wooded hills to the north and east,” Renard said. “Asked for some supplies, clothes, a few simple tools we could spare—hand axes and simple knives, no real weapons. Said he’d come in and talk to you when he felt ready.”

  “If you know where he is and can get a man out there, I would love to speak to him,” Allystaire replied. Then, he suddenly rapped his fist against the table. “Belay that. Tell Idgen Marte where he is. She can get there faster, and with no one the wiser.”

  Renard nodded and stood up straight, barely, Allystaire noted, refraining from clicking his heels. “Aye.”

  Allystaire nodded. “Off you go, then.” He paused for a moment, and added, “Thank you.”

  Both Ivar and Renard strode out into the bright autumn sun, tent flaps swinging in their wake.

  “Mol is going to be talking with the priestess. There may be a tour of the Temple. I still do not know why they are here,” Allystaire said, turning to Torvul. “I want you to do as much of the talking in my place as possible.”

  “Hardly a bad decision, but not how you often think,” Torvul noted. “Why?”

  “She knew to ask me questions. Not Idgen Marte, and not Mol. She knew,” Allystaire said, “or strongly suspected. I do not like what that implies.”

  “What does it imply?” Gideon’s face turned between the pair of them.

  “That she knows that I cannot or will not lie to her. Where she would have heard that, or from whom, I do not know, and the things we do not know about a potential enemy are the most dangerous.”

  “Why must she be a potential enemy? Why must two faiths be at odds?”

  Allystaire sighed. “Gideon, do not mistake me. I do not want to be her enemy, or her Goddess’s. Yet there were moments, signs, in my short meeting with her that tell me I probably will be. I dislike the fact, but I have learned to listen to my instincts.”

  “If you treat everyone like an enemy, everyone will become an enemy,” Gideon stubbornly insisted, frowning.

  “If they came in peace, they will leave unharmed and with my good wishes. Yet I ask you to think on whether it is seemly for a priestess to wear a mask made of more gold than all of the people of this village will see in all their lifetimes put together. When I come back—and it may be some turns, so I will have Idgen Marte try to bring you food, or anything else you might like—I want you to tell me whether you think that wealth has come to her clean, or if blood stuck to it somewhere in its provenance.”

  Gideon nodded, the distant look on his face telling Allystaire that he was already thinking on the issue. He settled into one of the camp chairs and rested his elbows on his thighs, hands steepling in front of his face. Allystaire nodded at Torvul and then at the tent flap, and the two of them exited into the daylight.

  The priestess’s guards set up a camp that Allystaire found entirely too professional for his taste, with clear lines of sight, and their own shelters circled around her much larger tent. They’d even erected a picket line for their mounts, and two of them were brushing down the animals, two unpacked the saddles and baggage, and the remaining two stood watchfully to the side.

  “That stretches the definition of tent, I’d say,” Torvul said, jerking his chin towards the rather ostentatious pavilion that had already been pulled into place and staked down. It alternated panels of white and gold, and stitched upon it were the symbols of Fortune—the Ever-Turning Wheel, and the Goddess in various poses, from reclining amidst a fold of cloth to judging two men, each standing in one upraised palm.

  “Needs everyone to know that she is here, and that gold and silver drip from her fingers,” Allystaire said.

  “What’ve you got against Fortune, anyway?”

  “If She is meant to spread the wealth of the world among men, why does most of it stay with the ruthless and murderous?”

  “Maybe they pray to her the most,” Torvul suggested. “Your northern faiths don’t make a lot of sense t’me and I’ve had fourscore years t’get used t’them.”

  Allystaire merely grunted. Mol appeared to be leading Cerisia up the steps of the Temple, and he and Torvul quickened their step in order to join them.

  “My, this is impressive,” Cerisia was saying to the girl as Mol pulled open the heavy doors on smoothly oiled hinges. “To have built a temple so quickly, and with so much glass. Certainly Fortune has been smiling upon your village.”

  “Fortune has had nothing to do with it,” Allystaire was saying, and rather sharply, before he even realized the words were leaving his lips.

  He felt as much as saw Mol turn to him, her eyes wide and half-warning, half-imploring him to be quiet.

  “Well,” the priestess said, “I don’t mean to stir up any theological debates. Not unless we’ve scribes present to record our words for posterity. We can deal with that later.”

  “Before we enter,” Mol said, “I should note that no man or woman comes into this Temple masked or shadowed, obscured or disguised,” sliding, as she spoke, to stand in the very doorway of the Temple, managing to pro
mote a kind of presence that seemed to block the entry as well as Allystaire could have. “The Mother will see your face as you approach Her altar. And so will I.”

  “This is part of my formal regalia, and as I am here as an official emissary of my Church.”

  “I am afraid on this point I will not budge,” Mol said, her voice clamping down like iron. “If you wish to enter this Temple, which is under my care and guidance as the Voice of the Mother, you will do us all this courtesy. Otherwise this Temple is closed to you.” Torvul smoothly stepped around her to stand, almost nonchalantly, next to Mol.

  Allystaire resisted the urge to mount the next step or two so that he stood right behind the Archioness, looming behind her and sandwiching her between potential foes; instead he remained a respectful few paces behind.

  Cerisia delicately pushed back her foxfur hood with her lambskin gloved hands. The mass of dark hair upon her head was intricately pinned up with a Baron’s ransom of gem-studded pins and combs. Deftly, she untied strong silk bands that held her mask in place, cradling it in her hands. She nodded, almost imperceptibly, to Mol and Torvul, then turned to face Allystaire.

  She was, he realized, roughly of an age with him, though she wore her years considerably better. If there were lines of age or care around her eyes or mouth he would’ve had to look close and long to find them, and he wouldn’t have minded. She was handsome, he briefly thought, rather than beautiful, but something about her drew the eye, and full red lips curving in a faint smile saw him rethinking the label he’d assigned. Her eyes were a pale green, almost a match for the translucent topaz that were fitted into her mask. Her smile and her eyes lingered just a shade too long on him, and he felt his cheeks tightening in sudden and inexplicable anger at her brief scrutiny.

  “There,” she said, turning back to Mol. “I have acceded to your request. May we proceed now?”

  The girl nodded rather solemnly, then guided, for the first time, a priestess of another faith into the Mother’s Temple. Torvul stumped along beside her, and Allystaire slowly brought up the rear.

  “How was so much accomplished so quickly? If I understand properly, this building was raised in a matter of months, and the glass—”

  “Was donated by a glazier,” Mol replied. “And many hands took to the building of this place. We had a steady stream of visitors through late summer and early autumn, and all took the opportunity to work.”

  “Donated? Why, even the Temple of Fortune in Londray acquired its glass at considerable cost. Surely something was exchanged.”

  “Aye,” Allystaire spoke up. “The man was knifed in some foolish tavern brawl he was no part of, up in Birchvale. I was there and I cured him of a wound that might have meant his life.”

  “How?” The Archioness turned to him and fixed him with the look that suggested that his answer to her question could possibly be the most riveting thing she would hear today, her eyes wide, but not too wide, leaning almost imperceptibly forward.

  “A Gift from the Mother,” Allystaire replied.

  Her lips parted lightly, her eyes widened. Allystaire knew he was meant to read surprise and curiosity. “I shall have to see it.”

  Before he could reply she turned and approached the oval of the altar, gasping faintly. “Such fine stonework.” She came closer to it, brushing past Torvul and Mol, reaching out as if to touch it, though stopping short.

  “Surely this must be dwarfish craftsmanship,” she said.

  The dwarf chuckled. “No. Even my kin could not work stone as cunningly as She who built this.”

  “She?”

  “Yes,” Mol replied in Torvul’s stead. “The altar was raised by the Mother acting through Her mortal agents, of which we are three.”

  Cerisia smiled, fetchingly, but her tone grated. “It is important for these founding myths to be established early, yes?”

  Allystaire felt a surge of anger, but Mol’s large brown eyes swung instantly to him, and he heard her voice. Keep still, Arm. She is trying to provoke us. Do not give her this.

  “If you will,” Mol said out loud, solicitous deference briefly coloring her words and face. “The stages of the altar’s raising were witnessed by many of the folk of Thornhurst.”

  “Of course,” the priestess replied, taking a moment to swipe an imaginary blot off her mask with the edge of her fox-fur.

  “You might inspect it for the seams where stones were polished to look as one, or for the tell-tale marks of tools,” Torvul replied, “if you were inclined. But you won’t find them.”

  Allystaire felt himself counting and recounting the men and resources he had on hand, picking at the problems festering in his mind, at the puzzle of these servants of Fortune. He didn’t notice Cerisia speaking to him till she repeated a question.

  He shook away the occupying thoughts and turned his eyes on her. “My deepest apologies, Archioness,” he said, reaching for his best manners. “I am afraid I was preoccupied. Please do pardon my rude inattention.”

  She smiled, winningly. She seemed to do everything winningly, so far as Allystaire could tell. “You do have manners after all. Tell me, Allystaire, Arm of the Mother, how you learned them? Your accent is not…” She waved a patronizing glove at the small stone-and-glass temple, “local.”

  Allystaire cleared his throat, buying time to think of a true answer. “I learned my manners from my father, Archioness.” He tried to smile. “Surely that was not the question that I missed?”

  “No,” she said, her smile’s brightness dimming. “If there are five of you—I see five pillars on this altar, after all—where are the other two?”

  “Working, no doubt,” Allystaire replied. “There is much to do and few enough hands.” Before she could open her mouth to ask further questions, he seized the initiative. “I am sure that Mol, as the Mother’s Voice, could do more to answer your questions than I could.”

  Her smile fully bloomed again, bright and welcoming as a roaring fire on a winter night. She almost spoke, but whatever the words were, she tamped them down and turned back to Mol.

  The dwarf’s voice rolled and rumbled in Allystaire’s thoughts. Make your excuses and get out, before she comes up with more questions.

  “If you will all pardon me,” Allystaire said, “there is work being done that I must oversee.” He turned for the door, till Cerisia’s voice brought him up short.

  “Please do say that you will dine with me this evening.” She paused. “All of you, of course. I do look forward to meeting all five of the Mother’s servants.”

  Mol replied for him. “Some of us may, yes, though all of us have duties that will require our attention. These days, our evening meals tend to be taken standing up.”

  Allystaire ducked out through the Temple door and shut it behind him. Idgen Marte was lurking by the steps.

  “How d’ya feel,” she murmured.

  “Outmaneuvered. My left flank is crumbling and I have no reserves.”

  “We may have some reserves. I’m off to make contact with Keegan. What do you want me to tell him?”

  Allystaire took a deep breath. “The truth. We could use his help.”

  “What do I have t’ bargain with?”

  “Your womanly wiles?” Allystaire’s suggestion was immediately followed up with a hiss of pain, as Idgen Marte’s hand, too fast to follow as usual, thudded into his shoulder. “Remind him, if you could, of what obligations he may already have to us.”

  “No matter how it may soothe the conscience, a man can’t spend fulfilled obligations, and Deserter’s Brotherhood aren’t known for acting kindly to people needing help,” she pointed out.

  “Well, I am not known for acting kindly towards deserters. In his case, I have. My mind could yet change,” Allystaire said.

  “I think hard weight is more likely to get us somewhere.”

  “Oh? What of the saving of
their lives? What of the food and supplies and tools they have already been given? We have treated them as guests, and asked nothing in return, left them to their own, as they wished—”

  She raised a hand. “Fine. Point taken. Don’t blame me if they tell us all to go freeze and go for banditry before winter sets in.”

  “I will not have bandits base themselves under our nose. I will fit them for ropes if they take so much as a bent copper half at knifepoint.”

  “I’ll leave that part out,” she said, and turned to leave, then paused. “And Allystaire, that priestess is here for you. In more ways than one.”

  He snorted, lip curling in disdain. “Then she will leave disappointed.”

  Idgen Marte nodded, satisfied, and soon slipped out of his sight.

  * * *

  Allystaire passed the next few turns by walking from one end of the village to the other, inspecting the progress, or the lack of progress, being made on the village’s defenses. He offered rather futile words of encouragement and briefly took up a shovel before restlessness drove him back towards the Temple and his tent. He found Idgen Marte and Torvul waiting within, along with Gideon, who was reclining on Allystaire’s cot, reading.

  “Well?” Allystaire asked.

  “Archioness Cerisia has retired to her pavilion for a midday respite,” Torvul said, mockingly pompous, drawing himself up with the air of a herald or a declaiming bard. “Apparently being so close to the soil is cause for exhaustion.”

  “Good. Gives us time to react. Where is Mol?”

  “Praying,” the dwarf answered him. “Asking Her Ladyship for guidance.”

  “We should probably all do so, if we can find the time,” Idgen Marte offered.

  “Aye, we should. Remind me this evening.” Allystaire paused. “Before sunset. Now—did you find Keegan?”

  “Aye. And he’s eager to speak with you. None too eager to come near the village in daylight, though. Said he’ll come to you tonight. There was something about making a call like a nightjar to let you know it was him, and how, since nightjars are flown south by now there’d be no mistaking it, but…”