by Carol Berg
“My lady! My apologies. I—It’s just—I didn’t—I thought—” The man’s mouth opened and closed like a fish’s.
“I’m sorry for startling you. You needn’t be afraid. It’s not unlawful to speak with me. I’m on the king’s parole, not a fugitive.”
“No. No. I just assumed…”
“I’m not a ghost either.”
He pulled a handkerchief from his coat pocket and blotted the drips running down his face. “Just surprised. Amazed. It’s so quiet down here. No one comes. And it’s been so long. What’s brought you here, my lady?”
“I’m visiting the city, and I was curious to see what had become of the collection. I’m happy to find it in your care.”
His color deepened to scarlet. “Oh, my lady, to call this care! I’m the only one left, you see. There’s no money to do the things we did. And the collection… pffft. Waging war in Iskeran is terribly expensive, I suppose. Anything that can be sold has been sold. All the bronzes melted down, and the silver. What gems were left in their settings dug out. Even the swords and armor taken away to use or to melt. Paper and stone are all that’s left, and much of that was destroyed after—” His eyes darted toward me fearfully.
“Yes, they would have done that. But you’re still employed. Who’s the commissioner, then?”
He leaned close and dropped his voice. “No one. None dared show interest in the post. I’m still secretary, but to Commissioner Nobody. I’m not sorry for that. I can stay down here and do what I can. They just brought this lot from Kerotea. All rubbish save the horse and this box.” Sitting on the workbench was a cube-shaped case of cracked and peeling leather, bound in corroded brass. “I’m working to get the hinge pins out so as to get it open, careful as Master Ka—the commissioner—taught me.”
Heaving a great breath, Racine climbed to his feet, straightened his back, and gave me a gracious hand up off the floor. Though no longer rattled, he was not yet easy. He opened his mouth to begin several times, and then blurted out quite suddenly, “I never thought to see you again, my lady.”
“I’m sure you didn’t. I never thought to be here again.” The unexpected encounter with Karon’s old assistant made me hope the fanciful story I had concocted to get me into the vaults might be unnecessary. Racine clearly wanted to talk. I let him.
As he offered me his stool that was the only seating in the tiny room, he drew up his brow. “I’ve often thought— wished—I could go back and change some things.”
“Who among us has not?” I perched awkwardly on the tall stool.
“I should have spoken.” He paused, his eyes unfocused as if he were looking inside himself, before reaching out to meet my gaze. “No one but you spoke for him. I should have done. All Reagor’s prattling, those stupid, impossible lies about flying boxes and living mummies, and no one said anything to dispute him. But I was afraid.”
“For good reason. It would have made no difference, Racine. You would have died for it.”
“But it wasn’t right. At first”—he averted his eyes, his color deepening again—“I was glad he was found out, afraid that because I’d been close, he’d done something to me… and I hated him for that. I hated him for deceiving me and making me so afraid. But at the trial, I listened to what you said, and it made such plain sense. And I saw what they’d done to him, and I thought how he was a good man, just and fair, and teaching me, trusting me. I couldn’t believe the wicked things they said about him. I thought someone should speak up, but I couldn’t. All these years and I still haven’t got my nerve up even to say his name here in the dark, where there’s no one to hear it.”
“Thank you for telling me, Racine. You mustn’t feel guilty. The Holy Twins themselves could have spoken for him, and nothing would have been any different. But you’ve just made life very much easier for me!”
Racine screwed his features into such a morosely puzzled knot that I almost laughed. “I had another purpose for my visit. Regarding the collection. And I was afraid I’d find no one here that I knew. Or that if there was someone I knew, they’d spit on me and chase me away.”
Racine put on his most businesslike face and bowed to me. “It has been quite a long time since I’ve had a request that was not in the vein of ‘remove this useless refuse from my sight,” or “don’t you have anything of real value?” It would be a pleasure to assist you, madam. And I give you my most solemn word not to spit.“ He waved his hand to encompass his cramped domain. ”What is your pleasure? A review of all we have left? Not much. An examination of your most efficient cataloging directories? Out of date, but still useful. Perhaps an extensive tour of our workrooms that extend from this wall here all the way to that one right there, a whole two paces longer than my armspan?“
“I wanted to find something. Something we catalogued that I would give a great deal to see. If I could get into the southwest vault…”
Racine’s smile wilted, and my spirits with it. “The southwest vault? Would it were another. We had to abandon the southwest vault, as it was wanted for something else. I moved as much of the contents as I could, but they didn’t give me much time. A good deal of it was burned. What was it you were looking for?”
“A leather trunk. Very old. It was in one corner, buried under a pile of rolled carpets.”
He tapped his long fingers on his cheek. “I don’t know. It doesn’t sound familiar. You say it was catalogued? I’ve tried to mark all those things that came from the southwest vault with their new location.”
“It had a number, but it would not have appeared on your list.”
“Well, then, we must have a look. Most of the things I salvaged went into the northwest vault.” Racine rummaged among the rubble on his table until he found a large ring of keys and a tired brown leather ledger. He took his lamp from its bracket on the wall and escorted me into the passageway, locking the door carefully behind him. He hesitated a moment, then said, “Would it suit you better if we were to be discreet about our journeying, my lady?”
“As a matter of fact, though everything I told you about my status is true, I would prefer that my visit be unnoticed. I promise you—”
He raised one hand. “No promises are necessary. This way.”
He led me down the sloping passage into the labyrinth of tunnels. A quarter of an hour’s brisk walking brought us to an iron gate, soon opened by one of Racine’s keys. Faint rustling and murmuring floated from the yawning mouths of the side passages. I swallowed hard and kept my eyes on Racine’s back. The lamp wasn’t nearly bright enough. The path angled upward toward another gate and through a wooden door.
To stand in the midst of the jumbled vault was like going backward in time, yet a single glimpse told me how depleted the collection was. The paintings, stacked so carefully, were of poor quality, the statuary mostly broken. A primitive idol in the shape of a raven-headed man looked blindly on the rest, the jewels pried from its eye sockets, its splendid belt, collar, and staff pockmarked by gouges and gaps where silver inlay and even the tiniest chips of gems had been removed. Racine led me to the corner where he had stored those artifacts rescued from the southwest vault, and we rooted through stack after stack of boxes and crates. I couldn’t think what I would do if the trunk wasn’t here. After two futile hours, I concluded I might have to make those plans.
Racine ran his finger down the pages of his ledger. “I just don’t know. If it wasn’t in the original list… Where else could I have put it? You said it was under rolls of carpets.” He thumbed through the wrinkled pages, slowly and deliberately, squinting at the crabbed writing that filled each one until I thought I might have to grab the book from him or scream. But then he tapped his finger on one page, and said, “One more possibility. I had them put a number of carpets in that niche behind the last row of pillars. It’s a little drier there than most of the vault. If your trunk isn’t there, then it must have been destroyed.”
I held my breath as he hung the lamp on a bracket in the niche beyond the pilla
rs. On a raised floor a stack of carpets rose higher than my head. I took one side and Racine took the other, and we pulled one after another off the stack. No irregularity in the stack indicated the presence of anything so awkward as a trunk. Foolish to expect that workmen would have installed it here in the same way as they had found it. But when we had were almost to the bottom of the pile, Racine gave a shout. “Ouch! Serpents’ feet! Excuse me… what—? My lady, please come.”“
I clambered over the mountain of carpets to the other side. Racine sat on a dusty roll of wool, nursing a great bleeding gouge in his leg. “Look back there,” he said, pointing into the dark corner of the niche. “I backed into something when we were shifting that last one out of the way.”
I held the lamp high, and there in the corner, as if patiently awaiting my attention, was the trunk. “That’s it!” Avoiding the sharp metal edge that had attracted Racine’s notice so dramatically, I pulled the trunk from the corner. Holding my breath, I unlatched the hasp, opened the lid, and reached down into the dusty contents until I felt the smooth edge of the rosewood box. I looked up at Racine, my face hot with excitement.
I started to speak, but the man raised his hand in caution. “Perhaps it would be better if you say nothing. I think I’ll go and stack up these carpets that have so carelessly fallen upon themselves, and when you are finished with your sentimental tour of the collection, we’ll go. And, of course, there will be nothing in your hands when we depart.”
I smiled at him. “You are wiser than you give yourself credit for, sir. I’ll look around a bit while you stack your carpets, and then I will be ready to leave—with nothing in my hands.”
While Racine turned his back, I opened the box and looked on the precious things I had last seen in Karon’s hand. I removed the tattered journal, carefully wrapped it in a strip of gauzy fabric from the trunk, and slipped it into my pocket. Then I returned the box to the trunk and pushed the trunk back into the corner.
I found Racine diligently laboring to get the carpets back under his discipline, and I lifted one end of a heavy roll. “I’ve seen all I need to see. Whenever you’re ready, I’d be happy to go.”
Racine nodded and said, “Let’s be off then. I remember that the dust caused you much distress in years gone by. I can finish this later.”
The secretary led me along his underground paths, back to the door that led into the sunlight. I offered him my hand. “Thank you. I’ll not forget.”
“A small thing. Nice to have someone take an interest. Someday—”
“I’ll come back and tell you all.”
CHAPTER 25
If only the deciphering of the journal’s secret could be as simple as its retrieval, I thought as I hurried toward the service gate. Surely D’Natheil or Baglos would have some insight into the puzzle of the map.
The day was warm and bright. The palace courtyards swarmed with servants and soldiers, carters and gardeners, bustling about to satisfy the needs and whims of the favored populace that resided within the walls. A few more steps and I would be out of the palace confines and on my way back to the small, hot room in the Street of Cloth Merchants, where the Prince and the Dulcé awaited me.
“Excuse me, madam.”
I tried to ignore the well-dressed man who matched his steps to my gait. The journal tucked into my pocket felt heavy and obvious. My cheeks burned.
“A word, please, if you will.”
A quick glance confirmed that he was addressing me. The gentleman who matched his pace to mine, trying to bow as he walked, appeared to be about my own age, the very model of a lesser courtier seeking to advance himself. His elegant attire was expensive, but in no way ostentatious, and his grooming was impeccable, though his light hair was precariously scant and the body squeezed into the dark blue breeches, ruffled shirt, and silk waistcoat precariously soft.
Cursing my ill luck, I dipped my knee and cast my eyes to the gravel path. “Is it me you want, my lord?”
“Indeed, my lady. Lady Seriana of Comigor, is it not?” A practiced eye assessed everything from my short ragged hair to my heavy, shapeless boots, even as he ducked his head.
“Do I look to be one with such a lofty title, sir?”
“You were recognized when you entered the gates, my lady, and I was sent to await your return here. Your brother would have a word with you.”
“I make no claim to any brother.”
“Please, please, madam”—he fluttered his eyelids and raised a deprecating hand—“I am acquainted with your reputation for verbal agility, and I will cheerfully concede you victory from the beginning. I dislike games of all kinds, almost as much as I dislike coercion. I would much rather you come freely. The duke would very much like to see you and will not permit me to accept a refusal.” His eager courtesy set my teeth grinding.
I started toward the gates again. No point in further pretense. “To what method of coercion will you so regrettably resort when I say I have no intention of calling on the murderous son of my parents? Rope? Chains? Your oh-so-tastefully modest sword? Or perhaps you will just call for guards?”
The man kept pace with me, entirely unruffled, his hands clasped behind his back. We might have been conversing about an upcoming dinner party. “I make no claim to understand the depth of estrangement between you and the duke, madam. I am new to his service. But it is my impression that His Grace’s request, though insistent, does not stem from animosity. He says that once you hear him out, you may be on your way. Will you not take a moment to alleviate your own curiosity, if not to satisfy His Grace’s wish?”
An insightful gentleman indeed. Not at all like Tomas’s usual associates. No sardonic glint in his eye as there would have been in Darzid’s. Where was that snake?
My companion nicked a finger, and three guards in bright red livery appeared, hovering about us like bright hummingbirds around a particularly succulent flower. They kept a discreet distance, but they blocked every direction save the one in which my companion gestured. “This way, madam.”
“So you choose the last of my scenarios. The cowardly one.”
“Pragmatic. Better for all. My name, by the way, is Garlos.”
When I stepped through the palace door, the years and the walls closed in on me. I wished fervently to close my eyes and transport myself to the hard, splintered bench in front of Jonah’s cottage. How much better to breathe the sweet air of the valley, rather than the stifling, three-hundred-year-old deadness of this place.
Garlos led me through the echoing warren of bare walls, steep stairs, and creaking floorboards that were the servants’ passages. A quarter of an hour later, we stepped through a discreetly placed door into long, wide gallery. The paneled walls were hung with weaponry: a shield of burnished bronze as tall as a man, blazoned with the rising sun of Annadis, a saber with a ruby-studded hilt, halberds, pikes, and a wicked-looking pick-like ax with a long head set square to the haft, curved and blunt on its top edge, pointed on its outer edge and sharp as a dagger on its lower. The lamplit alcoves sheltered heroic statuary and gem-studded armor. A turning led us into a portrait gallery in which twenty generations of princes and queens, kings and generals simpered, frowned, or stared from the walls, enough gold in each man-high frame to ransom a city. Thick red carpet muted the sound of our passing.
We stopped before an elaborately carved door, and while I cooled my heels beside the statue of a naked warrior, Garlos tapped quietly and slipped in. I pretended to study the statue. The stares of passing courtiers and servants were more intimately humiliating than my yearly appearance in the Great Hall. The interval until Garlos opened the door and summoned me inside seemed far longer than it was.
It was the custom for the king to present his champion with an expensive gift each time the swordsman took a challenge for him and returned victorious. From the look of it, Evard had not lacked for challenges, nor Tom as for victories.
Upon a hectare of priceless Isker carpet stood a wide desk of the rarest gaonwood, the sh
een of its finish displaying the intricate perfection of its twisting grain. A mantelpiece of rosy Syllean marble was a fitting centerpiece to an impeccably selected collection of ancient swords. Fine leather chairs were grouped about the hearth. Another wall housed a library worthy of the University itself, the diamond-paned doors of the bookcases displaying what must have been a thousand volumes bound in perfectly matched red leather, tooled with gold. Not one of the books looked as if it had ever been opened.
To complete the decor was the Duke of Comigor himself, a masterpiece of skin-tight, dark blue breeches and full-sleeved blue satin doublet, trimmed liberally in gold lace and belted with a jewel-studded green sash. He stood with his back to me, gazing out of the glass-paned doors that led onto his private balcony. So favored an apartment would surely overlook the royal family’s private gardens.
The door closed behind my escorts, leaving the two of us alone, but Tomas did not acknowledge my presence. Well, two could play. I stood unspeaking just where Garlos had left me, my hands folded primly.
But when Tomas turned around at last, the face I saw was not the one I expected. Pride was there, but no hatred.
His eyes were not scornful, but cloudy and troubled. “What are you doing here?” he said.
Perhaps I was mistaken. “None of your business.”
“Don’t start this again, Seri.”
“Pardon me, Your Grace. I am here because the Duke of Comigor, the Champion of Leire, has summoned me. I was given no choice in the matter.”
He clenched his fists. “Hand of Annadis, why can we not hold a reasonable conversation? You pride yourself so on rational behavior.”
“Tell me, Your Grace, how does one hold a rational conversation with a murderer? It’s a behavior I was never taught. Must I curtsy or is complete obeisance proper?”
Tomas reddened. “I saved your life—” Before the words left his tongue, he tried to recall them. “Oh, confound it all. We can’t get bogged down in the past. Let’s start again and try to be civil.” He took a breath. “Will you sit down? Can I send for wine? Something to eat?”