Evil for Evil

by K. J. Parker

  “And the sulfur,” Miel said quietly. “It’s one of the ingredients for the glaze.”

  “Not even that.” Framain grinned sourly. “We’ve been using it as a kind of flux, to draw impurities out of the compound. I found a deposit of the stuff not far away, many years ago, but it’s all used up now. I told my daughter; apparently she got the idea that without it we couldn’t continue our work, but that’s not really true. There are better fluxes. It’s quite possible that using sulfur’s been holding us back, even.” He lifted his head. “But I’m sure you aren’t interested in technical details. I have an idea you’d already worked out our secret before you came here. What are you going to do?”

  Miel looked at him. “I don’t know,” he said.

  Framain shook his head. “It could well be that the Mezentines would give you safe conduct in return for it,” he said. “I confess, I’ve assumed so, ever since the start of this ridiculous war. I told myself that if the worst came to the worst and they happened to find us, or if we were betrayed, I could save myself and my daughter. To be honest, I’m not so sure. The clay makes good fabric, you need to know what you’re looking for in order to tell it apart from the real thing; but I’m sure you know how fussy they are about their precious specifications. It could be that using a different clay would count as a mortal sin, and they’d never countenance it. Or else it’d cost too much to mine it and cart it to make it worth their while; I really don’t know.”

  “I could stay here,” Miel said, “and join you.”

  There was a long silence. Eventually the girl said, “Doing what?”

  Framain turned his head and said, “Be quiet.”

  “But Father,” she said, “he’d be no use, he doesn’t know anything about it, and we can’t spare the time to teach him, he’s useless. He’d just get under our feet.”

  Framain looked Miel in the eye and grinned a rather sardonic apology. “My fault,” he said. “I taught her metallurgy when I should have been teaching her manners.”

  “She’s right,” Miel said. “I don’t know the first thing about making glazes. I don’t really know much about anything, apart from how to fight wars and manage an estate. But …” He pulled a sad, ridiculous face. “There must be something I can do to help, digging peat or shoveling clay or sweeping the floors. I probably wouldn’t do it very well, because I haven’t had much experience, but I could try. I’m no use to anybody else, myself included.”

  “That still doesn’t explain —” the girl started to say, but Framain shut her up with a gesture.

  “It’s entirely up to you,” he said. “Stay here, if you want to. There’s usually plenty of food, and no doubt you can find somewhere to sleep in the house. In fact, you can have it; we don’t use it very much, as you’ve probably gathered for yourself. And if you really feel that fetching and carrying and cleaning for us is what you want to do, I’m sure we can accommodate you. In fact, you could start by chipping the soot out of the furnace hearth. It needs doing, and I’ve been putting it off for months.”

  “Fine,” Miel said. “If that’d help.”

  “Father,” the girl said angrily, then fell silent.

  “That’s settled, then,” Framain said. “Though if I were you, I’d have something to eat and drink first, and change into some scruffy old clothes, if you’ve got any. It’s pretty filthy work, chipping soot.” He shrugged. “You can borrow some of my things, I’m sure they’ll fit you. Mahaud’ll find you something.”

  The girl scowled, then walked quickly past them both and out of the barn, slamming the door behind her. As soon as she was gone, Framain seemed to relax.

  “I find her very wearing sometimes,” he said, “but there you are. It’s natural enough, I’m sure, for fathers and daughters to get on each other’s nerves if they’re cooped up together for too long.” He paused, then looked at something on the opposite wall. “I assume she’s why you came back.”

  Miel didn’t reply.

  “In which case,” Framain went on, “you have my blessing; which, together with a tin cup full of water, is worth the cup. You have friends at Duke Valens’ court?”

  “Yes,” Miel said. “For now, anyway. My cousin Jarnac …”

  “Lines of supply,” Framain said carefully, “have been a concern to me over the years. We always used to buy our food from two local farmers — I believe they thought I was either an outlaw or a lunatic hermit of some kind, but I paid well, in cash. They moved out when the Mezentines took Civitas Eremiae; sensible fellows, I don’t blame them at all. Since then, I’ve bought supplies through the innkeeper at the Unswerving Loyalty, but that’s a very dangerous arrangement. If your Vadani friends or your followers in the resistance could supply us, it’d be a great weight off my mind. And then there are certain materials.” He straightened his back, like a man lifting a heavy weight. “Over the last month or so I’ve seriously considered giving up because of the difficulties the war has caused me; none of them insuperable on its own, but taken together …” He turned back and looked at Miel, as if trying to decide whether or not to buy him. “In return, you can have pretty much anything you want from me. It’s quite simple, really. If I succeed and find the formula, and start producing pottery in quantity, there’ll be so much money, we won’t know what to do with it. If we fail, what does any of it matter? In any case,” he went on, with a slight shrug, “I think I’m past the point where I care about wealth and getting back what I’ve lost. The life I wanted to recapture has gone forever, thanks to the war. It’d be nice to be a rich man, I’m sure, but all I really want to do is solve the glaze problem, just so I can say I’ve done it. As I think I told you, I’m quite resigned to the fact that I’m obsessed with this ridiculous business. Lying to yourself just makes everything so dreadfully tiresome, don’t you find?”

  Miel found looking at him made him feel uncomfortable. “I just want something to do,” he said. “And working here, helping you, would make a nice change from the war.”

  Framain considered him for a moment, then laughed. “Don’t be so sure,” he said. “When you’ve known her as long as I have, you’ll probably wish you were back in the cavalry.”

  Framain was right about one thing. Cleaning out the furnace hearth was a filthy job. Miel worked at it until the lamp ran low and started guttering, at which point he realized he was too tired to carry on anyway. He’d been attacking the dense crusts of soot as though they were the enemy of all mankind, chipping and flaking them away with an old blunt chisel Framain had given him, stopping every hour or so to sweep away the spoil. As far as he could tell, the job was going to take the rest of his life in any event; his first savage onslaught had hardly made an impression on it. Like fighting the Mezentines, he thought, as he slumped against the wall and caught his breath; you get rid of a whole sackful, and still there’s an infinite quantity left to do. Perhaps it was better that way. Leading the resistance, Framain’s fruitless search for the formula, hacking soot out of the hearth; people doing pointless, impossible things because they felt they had to, for reasons that didn’t stand up when you looked at them logically. It was pretty clear that Framain believed he was in love with the girl (Mahaud; a grim name, he’d always thought). It was entirely possible that he was right about that, but even then it was only part of the explanation. Somehow, he had no idea why, he felt at home here, in the secret house in the hidden combe in the middle of nowhere. For some reason, he felt it was the right place for him to be. As for Framain and his obsession, that was exactly right, too. Pottery, of all things; tableware. Plates, cups, vases, scent-bottles, little dishes and saucers — perfectly true, in the world he’d left behind (no idea whether it still existed), rich men like the Ducas had paid ludicrous prices for the stuff, not because they liked it or because it did a job better than wood or metal, but simply because of what it was. In the old world, it’d be like finding a vein of silver; just dig it out of the hillside and take it away and suddenly you’d be rich, and all your troubles would b
e over. A small thing like the world changing behind your back could easily be overlooked; and besides, what harm did fine pottery ever do anybody, compared with war and weapons, Vaatzes’ scorpions, politics and diplomacy and the destruction of great cities? A man whose business that sort of thing had been might well do worse than the pottery trade. You could go to sleep at night knowing that even if you succeeded, nobody was going to die as a result (but then he thought of the look on Framain’s face as he tried to decide whether or not to reach for the knife. Obsession is just another kind of love, after all).

  He picked up the lamp. It flickered alarmingly; he didn’t want to be stranded there in the dark all night. He went slowly and carefully, to make sure it didn’t go out. It’d be easier, he decided, if he was there because he was in love with Mahaud. There were precedents for that sort of thing, it was like the stories in books, whose heroes and heroines were generally dispossessed princes and princesses anyway, which made it all perfectly acceptable and in keeping with the established rules. If he’d fallen in love with the hermit wizard’s daughter, it’d be all right, he’d know why he was there and what he was supposed to be doing. In order to win her heart, he’d purify his soul by honest manual labor, purging himself of the gross and decadent superfluities of his privileged upbringing and still ending up with a suitable wife of good family. In the process, no doubt, he’d help the wizard complete his work, which would be a good thing — maybe they could use the pottery money to hire an army that’d drive the Mezentines out of Eremia; something like that.

  He crossed the yard. The door to the house was open. Framain and Mahaud slept in the hayloft above the barn, so as not to waste two minutes every morning getting to work; he had the house to himself. Earlier he’d found a bed, buried under a pile of old, damp sheets that looked and smelled as though they’d been used for straining something. He didn’t mind. He’d slept on the bare ground, in mud, among rocks; compared with what he’d been used to lately, this was luxury fit for the Ducas himself. He pinched out the lamp, lay back and tried to empty his mind, but he couldn’t help thinking about the scavengers, wondering if Jarnac had left any of them alive, and if so, what had become of them. To them, this place really would be luxury, as remote and incomprehensible as Fairyland.

  He forced them out of his mind, like a landlord evicting tenants, and fell asleep listening to the scuttling of mice.

  12

  “I had a letter from my man at the silver mine,” Valens said, making a point of not looking Ziani in the eye. “He says they’re finished there now, all sealed up. He says the men have been told the mine’s been put out of commission for good. I hope he was lying.”

  Ziani didn’t say anything, and Valens didn’t look at him.

  “Anyhow,” Valens went on, “the idea is, the first thing the Mezentines are likely to do is round up as many of the mineworkers as they can. Our people will tell them the mine’s useless, and with luck they’ll believe it and give up. Meanwhile, I’ve sent the men you trained to do the same at the smaller workings. Do you think they’ll be able to manage?”

  “I expect so,” Ziani said. “They seemed perfectly competent.”

  Valens shrugged; he was fairly sure that Ziani was watching him. “Doesn’t matter,” he said. “By our calculations, it won’t make business sense for the Republic to work the smaller mines, what with the overheads they’d be facing. One good thing about fighting a war against businessmen, we can do the same sums they do, which means we can more or less read their minds.”

  “The Republic won’t bother with them if they can’t make a profit,” Ziani said.

  “Which means the government won’t be able to kid the opposition into a full-scale occupation purely on commercial grounds,” Valens said. “I believe that surviving this war is very much about not fighting it, if that can be arranged. If there’s nothing here for them — no city to sack, no mines to take over, no people around to kill — where’d be the point? Of course,” he added, “that’s just my guess at how they think. I imagine Guild politics is a bit more complicated than I’m making out.”

  “I wouldn’t know,” Ziani said.

  Valens leaned forward, planting his elbows on the desk. “You’re too modest, I’m sure.”

  “Really.” Out of the corner of his eye, Valens saw Ziani turn his head away. “I believe what you and the others have been telling me about factions among the Guilds and so on, but most of it’s news to me. That sort of thing doesn’t tend to trickle down to the shop floor.”

  “Oh.” Valens rubbed his eyes. He was tired, and these days he found talking to the Mezentine rather trying. “Well, it’s the best intelligence we’ve got, so let’s hope it’s accurate. Now then. Moving on; literally, as well as figuratively. My wedding’s been brought forward a month, now that the mines have been sorted out. I want to be in a position to start the evacuation as soon as possible after that. You told me you had some ideas on the subject, but you were all coy and secretive about it.” Now he turned his head and looked Ziani in the eye. “If it’s going to need preparation and materials, I’d better know about it now.”

  “Fine,” Ziani said. His face was blank, and he didn’t move at all. “The thing is this. I’m no strategist, but as I understand it, your idea is to keep your people on the move, out of the way of the Mezentine soldiers.”

  “That’s right.”

  Ziani nodded slowly. “I can quite see the thinking behind it. Show them a clean pair of heels, they’ll soon get tired of chasing after you, spending money, with no victories to write dispatches home about. The opposition — that’s the term you were using, wasn’t it? — they’ll make capital out of the fact that nothing much seems to be happening and the bills keep rolling in, and either they’ll overthrow the people who are running the war or else force them to back down.”

  “You’re skeptical about that,” Valens said.

  Ziani smiled. “You’ve been teaching me things about how my country is run that I never knew before,” he said, “so who am I to tell you anything? But while I was involved with the defense of Civitas Eremiae, I did learn a bit about the Mezentine military. Bear in mind: the soldiers and the men commanding them aren’t my people. They’re foreigners, recruited a long way away across the sea. We have the same color skin, and my people originally came from there, but they’re nothing like us at all. They’re the ones who are in charge of running the war out here; they report to my people, who pay them, or decide to stop paying them.”

  “I see,” Valens replied. “But it’s still not their decision, ultimately.”

  Ziani shrugged. “If I was the commander of the army,” he said, “I’d want to get results, as quickly as possible, to justify my employment and make sure I got paid. I’m not a lawyer, but I bet you the mercenaries’ contracts aren’t just straightforward. There’ll be performance-related bonuses, or targets that have to be met, or financial penalties. We have them in all our other contracts with foreigners, all designed to keep them on their toes and make sure they do their best for us. I imagine it’s the same with the soldiers.”

  “No doubt,” Valens said. “What’s this got to do with the evacuation?”

  “Simple,” Ziani replied. “Don’t underestimate them; they’re motivated by the hope of making a lot of money and the fear of not getting paid. And they have a lot of cavalry.”

  Valens nodded slowly. “You’re saying they’ll come after us.”

  “And a cavalry division can move a hell of a lot faster than a convoy of wagons,” Ziani said. “Don’t imagine you can lose them in the mountains; they’ll track you, or they’ll get hold of stragglers or people who decided to take their chances and stay behind, and get what they want to know out of them. They’ll find out where you are, and their cavalry will come after you. Now,” he went on, frowning, “I know that your cavalry is very good indeed.”

  “Thank you,” Valens replied without expression.

  “It’s also a fact,” Ziani went on, “or at least I
believe it is, that there aren’t all that many of them. Now I’m sure every Vadani is worth ten Mezentines in a fight, but that’s not the point. You’re outnumbered; your cavalry can be drawn off by diversions while they attack the wagons. If they do that, they’ll have their quick, cheap victory, and you …” He shrugged. “I’m sorry, I don’t mean to be melodramatic. I’m sure this thought has crossed your mind too.”

  Valens’ turn not to say anything.

  “This,” Ziani said, and he seemed to grow a little, “is where I think I can help. My people will assume that if they can get past your cavalry, they can dig in to a soft target.”

  “They’d be right,” Valens said.

  Ziani smiled. “I borrowed a book from your library,” he said, “I hope you don’t mind. It was called The Art of War or something like that; actually, I think there was a mirror in the title. All the books in your library are called the mirror of something or other. I suppose it’s a convention. Anyway, not important. The book said, always attack your enemy’s strengths and invite him to attack your weaknesses. I reckoned that sounded pretty stupid until I thought about it. Really, it’s just simple common sense. He won’t expect you to attack where he’s strong, so you attack on your terms. Likewise, if you know where he’s going to attack you, because you’ve drawn him into it, you can be ready for him, with a few surprises. Now I come to think of it, that’s how the Ducas defended Civitas Eremiae.”