The “gown” was no help either. Except that it wasn’t white, as he’d thought. It was yellow, the yellow of very old linen sheets that had been used hardly, and washed but never bleached. The crude corset-belt was of more canvas, black this time. The “gown” was nothing more than a T-shape sewn of three rectangles of cloth—which could have suggested a man, but the stitches were neat and the neck, wrists, and bottom were hemmed, suggesting a woman.
Unless, of course, the gown had been in use as a sort of bedgown, and the Poison Pen had just bought it on the second-hand market.
They had quite a pile of evidence by this time. The only problem was that it led nowhere.
He had just about given up on seeing Teo, when the bell over the door jangled, and the man himself came in.
Now, there was a reason why Mags had waited to see Teo, and it had nothing to do with the fact that he liked the man—no, he’d been testing Teo, leaking certain things to him to see what came of them, and every single time, Teo had proven himself worthy of trust.
Lord Jorthun and Nikolas had already run their own checks on him, and Teo had emerged clean, or at least, as clean as anyone in his profession could be. There were some items of “excess force” bandied about in certain circles, and it could not be denied that there had been broken bones in Teo’s vicinity—but those all dated from the time he’d been employed to keep order in a tavern, and given the clientele of that particular tavern, neither Jorthun nor Nikolas were inclined to hold this against the man.
So, it was time to take the final step.
“’Ello, ye old barstid,” Mags said genially. “Wotcher got fer me?”
Teo’s face broke out in a smile. “I was beginnin’ t’wonder if the ol’ man decided t’ give ye a rise.”
“Well,” Mags said, pleased at such an apt opening. “Come back’o shop. There’s somethin’ to that notion. An’ it means a bit of change fer you.”
He unlocked the door that divided the shop itself from the counter and the part where real valuables were kept, and let Teo in. Now the man’s scarred face was a mask of curiosity. “Change fer me? Harkon, I ain’t quittin’ ol’ Derrel t’ come work this shop! I ain’t no good at figgerin’, an’ Derrel pays me good. I reckon—”
“Ye ain’t gonna need t’quit,” Mags interrupted him. “Fust, com git yer grub, cause I want ye inna good mood.”
Mags waved at an upturned keg, the top softened with a folded rug, and a wooden trencher of bread, cheese, and more of the sausage rolls he’d bought that morning. Nothing loath, Teo tucked into them, as Mags pulled him a beer from another, full keg on one of the shelves full of things people had pawned. He handed Teo the mug, and let Teo eat in silence, until there was a tap on the rear door that was triple-padlocked, and which seldom was opened. He unlocked all three locks, and let the door swing wide.
Amily stood there in her working Whites, Rolan peering over her shoulder from the tiny yard behind her.
Teo gaped, mug halfway to his lips, forgotten.
Then, as if he had suddenly remembered long-forgotten manners, he scrambled to his feet, nearly upsetting the keg he was sitting on. “Milady Herald, m’um,” he stammered, looking at his hands in the next moment, as if trying to figure out what he should do with the mug and cheese he was holding.
“Eh, don’t stand on no ceremony, ye ol barstid,” Mags said genially. “This’s m’wife, Amily.”
“So I am,” Amily corroborated. She looked about herself. “What an extraordinary collection of things. . . .”
“But you—” spluttered Teo. “But she—”
“Aye, she’s Willy th’ Weasel’s girl. An’ Willy’s a Herald, too,” Mags continued, grinning at Teo’s reaction. “Fer that matter, so’m I.”
Now completely gobsmacked, Teo did the only thing he could do. He sat down heavily. “Kernos’ Balls!” he managed, then reddened. “Beggin’ yer pardon, milady—”
“I’ve heard worse. Usually from Mags, although my father once came out with a string of curses the like of which I’d never heard before. I had to look some of them up.” She offered her hand to Teo. “I’ve heard a lot about you, and I am very happy to finally meet you.”
He took it, gingerly, as if he was afraid he’d break or soil it. Then—because he was a great deal smarter than he looked, the truth suddenly dawned on him. “Kernos’ Balls!” he said again. “I bin workin’ fer th’ bloody Heralds!”
“Got it in one,” Mags replied, pleased. “An’ that’s the change I wanted ter talk t’ye about. Ye wanta keep doin’ thet?”
“Uh—” Teo looked from Mags to Amily and back again. “Aye?”
“Thought ye’d say thet.” Mags grinned even more broadly. “Well, thet means a rise in yer pay.”
Teo brightened. Then looked bewildered again. “Who knows all this?”
“Auntie Minda, an’ the littles. They’re my gang. Willy gots his own—Jem an’ Eller an’ Sam an’ Luke what works ’ere. Others, too, but tha’s the ones ye’d know.” Mags told him.
“My father has his gang of fellows that do what you’ve been doing—tell him what’s going on. Sometimes they look into things for him, and sometimes they help him. The littles can bring Harkon everything they hear, and it’s quite a lot, but what they can’t do is help him or look into things where only a man-grown can go,” Amily said, in a completely matter-of-fact voice. Mags was very proud of her performance. She was handling this in exactly the right way, saying exactly the right things. “That’s why Harkon decided to see if you’d work out. You’re the first adult besides Minda he’s trusted.”
“Bloody hell . . .” Teo looked at his cheese as if he had no idea where it had come from, and took a bite of it. “T’think, all this time . . . I knew ye was a right’un, Harkon, but I didn’ reck how much of a right’un ye was.” He peered up at Mags. “I’m damn sure yer name ain’t Harkon. So what is it?”
“Herald Mags.” Mags wondered if he’d recognize it.
He did. “Oh aye, the feller what did that bit’a good work wi’ that halfwit o’er where them gaggle’o washerwomen is.” He nodded, as if satisfied. “Good piece’o work that was.”
“Some day I’ll tell ye th’ rest of it,” Mags chuckled. “Fer now, there’s summat I want ye t’keep yer ear out for, special.”
He went on to describe the letters sent by the Poison Pen. Teo listened with his brows creased, but shook his head doubtfully. “Ain’t nothin’ like that I heerd about,” he replied. “An’—I dunno Hark—Mags—”
“Keep callin’ me Harkon,” Mags urged him. “I druther that other name was’t put about.”
“Aye, Harkon. Well, that ain’t the sorta thing wimmin talks about wi’ a man, ye ken. I dunno how I’d get wind of’t.”
Mags just waved the objection off. “Mebbe now that ye know t’listen, ye’ll hear summat. Now, ’bout that rise in pay. . . .”
Teo objected to the generous boost in what Mags was giving him, but they both knew it was objection for form’s sake. The reality was his eyes lit up, and Mags could tell he was already calculating how soon he could move from his current garret room—freezing in winter and broiling in summer—to something a bit more comfortable.
“Now ye know,” Mags concluded, when the appropriate posturing had concluded, “Rise in pay means when I needs backin’ up, thet backup’s you.”
“Figgered,” Teo replied, raising his mug in a half-toast and finishing the contents off. “How ye gonna lemme know?”
“I’ll collect ye afore hand.” Mags made to take Teo’s mug, but Teo held his hand over the top of it.
“An’ iffen ye get inter trouble when ye didn’t reckon on needin’ backin up?” Teo’s right eyebrow rose.
Mags nodded at Rolan, whose head was still in the door, watching and listening with acute interest. “I got one’a those.”
“Huh.” Teo eyed the Compani
on, who eyed Teo right back. “Reckon that’d do.”
There was a little more back-and-forth between the two of them, as Mags fully outlined what he needed from Teo, and Teo agreed to all of it.
Finally Teo heaved himself up off of his keg, and made an awkward little bow to the Amily. “Well. I still got m’other job,” he said, with an apologetic grimace.
“And ye ain’t gonna do me no good iffen ye lose it,” Mags agreed. He held out his hand, and Teo clasped it. “Reckon we’re gonna do some good work t’gether.”
“Fr’m yer mouth t’ Kernos’ ear,” Teo replied, and sketched a salute to Amily. “Please ter metcher, milady. I know m’way out.”
And with that, he ushered himself out of the back room, through the locked door, into the main part of the shop. The bell over the door jangled, and he was gone.
“Thanks fer comin’ by an’ helpin’ me out, love,” Mags said, reaching for Amily, pulling her to him, and kissing her heartily.
“It was no problem, the King let me off this morning.” She made a little shooing motion, and Rolan backed up so she could close the door. “Sometimes I really get . . . irritated that so many people think Father is still King’s Own but there are times like this when it’s helpful.”
“Enjoy it while ye can, love.” He realized what he had implied when her eyes widened, and shook his head. “Nah, think of all the Trainees, ’member what I tol’ ye, thet to them, you’re King’s Own. It’ll happen, soon or late. Yer Pa knows, an’ he’s steppin’ back, little by little. ’Ventually, time’ll come when he steps up, an’ whoever ’tis’ll be mad ’cause ’e ain’t got you. Guarantee.”
She didn’t say anything; she just lifted up on her toes and kissed his cheek.
He smiled and was about to pull her closer, when—
:Chosen, I hate to break into this tender moment, but the Prince needs you.:
“Kernos’ Balls!” Amily said.
The Abbess of the Sisters of Ardana sobbed on Amily’s shoulder as they stood on the edge of the room that had been designated as the Scriptorium. Outside, goats bleated and a rooster crowed, oblivious to the havoc inside. Amily patted the Abbess’s back soothingly, but Mags could tell from her own compressed lips and rigid back that she was furious.
Amily had every reason to be furious. She and the Abbess and Mags stood in the doorway of the ruins of the Scriptorium, a large, well-lit room in the old farmhouse that had once been the loom-room. It had been chosen for this important task because of its southern aspect, two fireplaces, and south-facing windows. Once chosen, the room had been converted into the spot where the real work of the Sisters of Ardana had been done: the study, translation, and copying of manuscripts.
Had been done. . . .
Because the room was . . . well, there was nothing left of it, or the work that had been going on inside it.
Manuscripts, both those being copied and the copies in progress, had been torn into confetti, and lay like ankle-deep snow across the floor of the entire room. Inks and paints had been splashed over the floor, the walls, even the ceiling. Pens and brushes had been snapped in half, or in four pieces, and metal pen-nibs had been split. Desks had not just been overturned, they, and their matching copying-stools, had been broken into kindling. Even the thin curtains, intended to screen out glare and let in light, had been torn from the windows and slashed to bits.
And scrawled on the wall, in letters hatefully familiar to Mags’ eyes, were three sentences. Woe to the woman who is not content to be a humble handmaiden, but seeks to exalt herself in learning above her teachers. Woe to the woman who leaves her proper place in the home and fills her mind with things she cannot understand. She shall be cast down into the dust, and eat the bread of abasement moistened with the tears of bitterness.
Well, there were tears all right. The Abbess wept for the manuscripts that had been entrusted to the Sisters to copy, and the destruction of what they had innocently thought was their inviolable home, as well as for all the work now lost. She cried for her Sisters, for all their work destroyed, for the fear she had seen in their eyes, for their faith in the goodness of people destroyed. And she shivered with terror at the realization that someone hated them this much.
She wasn’t alone. Three of the Sisters had been sent to their beds by the Healer who had been summoned when the first of them fainted, prostrated with terror. The rest, except for the Sister in charge of the Scriptorium, huddled in the chapel, which evidently seemed to them like the only safe place in the entire property, in various states of weeping and nerves. Looking at them made Mags feel savage. If, at this moment, he could have gotten his hands on the perpetrator of this—vandalism was not a strong enough word—the vandal would be having a very bad time of it.
They had had no warning of this. Everyone in this neighborhood loved having them there. Their congregants had been thrilled with the cart to transport them all. There had even been two local girls who had expressed an interest in becoming Novices, the first in decades. The livestock were thriving, and they had not only resigned themselves to losing their old home, they had decided this one was far superior to it.
Last night they had all gone into their new chapel—the converted barn—for midnight services. But when they had risen from their knees to go back to their cells and their beds, they discovered that the sturdy doors had been locked, from the outside. There was no way to reach the lock from the inside.
They were trapped.
There was no way out, not for mostly elderly ladies encumbered by bulky robes; the only windows that could open were high in the walls, too high for any of them to reach, even standing on furniture, not to mention that they would have had to somehow pull themselves up, clamber over the sills, and let themselves down on the other side. There was no other door. To their dismay, the building seemed to have been constructed perfectly to hold them all prisoner once the doors were locked.
Which did bring up the question, so far as Mags was concerned: who, besides the Abbess, had a copy of the key?
They had tried calling for help, but the walls were thick, and people around them were asleep, and there was enough distance between them and the next house that their high voices just faded away. They were exhausted and in a panic by the time the carter hired to drive their little cart and tend their mules arrived, heard them calling exhaustedly for help and let them out. Frantic to discover what had been stolen—because the only reason they could imagine for someone to imprison them like that was that the perpetrator intended to take his leisurely time ransacking the place—they stumbled into the Abbey. Then the damage lay bare before them. When they got to the Scriptorium, to their horror, they uncovered what seemed to be the real purpose behind the destruction.
The carter, being a quick-witted fellow, had already summoned the Watch. The Watch summoned a Herald, and the Herald reported the vandalism directly to the Prince. And that was how Amily and Mags had gotten involved.
Go sort things, Amily mouthed at Mags over the Abbess’s shoulder. Not at all unhappy about being dismissed, Mags left the hallway and his wife, and went out to join the Herald who’d first been summoned, and the Captain of the Watch.
By now they had been joined in the refectory, the room used for dining in most houses of religion, by the carter, Kyle Benson. Benson had taken charge of the rest of the servants and gone over the place room by room once the Watch and the Herald had gotten a good look at things, looking for items that might have been stolen. The Sisters had trusted him because the Prince had sent him, and had shown him where all the valuables were, “just in case.” Their trust had not been misplaced.
“. . . so nothing else is missing?” the Herald was saying as Mags approached.
“Nossir,” Kyle replied. “Everythin’s accounted for. Strongbox’s locked, an’ I took it to Sister Ivy, an’ she unlocked it an’ counted it. Siller vessels was where they shoulda been. It’s all there.�
� He was a big, stolid man, who spoke slowly and with deliberation, giving the impression he was stupid. He was anything but. “The whole place was overturned, like a tribe of imps went rampagin’ through, but nothin’ is missin’. Ruint’, but not missin’. Most of the food’s gonna need replacin’. Pantry an’ stores was turned out an’ broke into. It’s all been bust open and strewed on the floor an’ trampled. Fit for nought but pig food, so that’s what Jem’s been doin’, shovelin’ it up and takin’ it out t’pigs. On’y thing they left alone was the Sisters’ liddle rooms, like as not ’cause ain’t nothin’ in them but a clothes-chest an’ a bed, an’ that’s soon put t’rights.” He heaved an enormous sigh. “Who coulda done this? An’ why? Them Sisters wouldn’ offend a damn fly!”
Mags and the other Herald—another of the ones assigned permanently to the court system of Haven, a tough, balding old bird called Willowby—looked at each other and shrugged helplessly.
“I’ve got no notion, Benson,” Herald Willowby replied. “And I hate to impose on your good nature, but have you any guess as to what foodstuffs were spoiled and how much? I don’t think we’ll get much sense out of Sister Rose. Last I saw she’d been crying so much she was hiccuping.”
Kyle’s mouth twitched, as if he almost was going to smile, but his own anger at the situation was preventing him from doing so. “Oh aye, seein’ as I’m the one’s been fetchin’ it these sennights. I kin make out a list, an’ I reckon it’ll be close enough the Sisters will do fine until they’re fit to look things over an’ give ye somethin’ more exact.”
Closer to the Chest Page 17