"Sir?" Anders raised a craggy brow.
"Who are we fighting, again?" Otto grinned sepulchrally as dawning understanding—and fear—crept across his hetman's face.
The dust cast up by the royal army crept closer over the next half hour as Otto scratched an abbreviated report, then sealed it in a hide tube and sent a messenger careening towards the vanguard. Occasionally he had one or another of his troops' pre-prepared positions light up the walls, or take careful aimed shots at the windows of the castle: The returning spasms of automatic fire were reassuringly solid, evidence that the enemy was not yet melting into shadows and mist that could reappear in his rear at any moment. Otto didn't waste his reprieve. His men were beginning to grumble about the amount of ditch-work he was making them dig, but his periodic rounds of the trenches and foxholes they were preparing kept the muttering under control. With a high, fine overcast to keep the sun off their necks, and no rain to bog them down, the weather wasn't giving them much to complain about—but if the witch-clan staged a breakout, or the king arrived to find the works incomplete, they'd have something to moan about for the rest of their lives, however short.
The shadows were beginning to lengthen across the apron in front of the castle (putting his snipers at a considerable disadvantage) when the first column of riders thundered up the valley floor and came to a stop by the guards. They didn't pause for long: After no small amount of shouting half a dozen of them walked on, mounts breathing heavily, towards the headquarters tent. Otto, who had been checking the second gun emplacement, steeled himself as he walked back downhill towards the group. He'd been expecting this moment, trying not to allow it to get in the way of his urgent defensive preparations for most of the day.
"Your Majesty." He bowed deeply, but without flourish.
"Otto." The golden boy's face was calm, but his eyes were stony. "Your tent, please. We will have words." The guards behind him sported strange black weapons, machine-pistols looted or stolen from the clan's dead.
"Yes, sire." He gestured towards the tent. "If you would follow me?"
"Certainly," Egon said, easily enough, but Otto had a hard time pretending to ignore the two guards who preceded them, or the two who took up stations beside the tent.
Inside the tent, the young king turned to face Otto. "What happened?" he asked. "In your own words."
"They counterattacked too early." Otto frowned. "We took the castle as planned. But we'd only been there for half a day when a witch—flying beneath a wing like a bat's—flew overhead. My men shot at him, but he got away. High up, high as an eagle. I redoubled my efforts to prepare the grounds, but only two hours later there was an explosion, then witch-troops everywhere. They came from inside the palace, as your majesty predicted, but they arrived before we were ready for them. Seven hours, I reckon, from our entry to their arrival."
"Seven hours . . ." Egon stared at Otto measuringly, although Otto couldn't guess whether it might be for a medal or a noose. "This flying witch. Describe what you saw."
Otto felt himself burst into chilly perspiration. "It made a buzzing noise, as of bees, only louder. . . ." He described the ultralight haltingly, its arrival from the southwest and subsequent departure after overflying the castle.
"And three hours later they arrived in force," Egon said musingly. "What of your force did you recover?"
The next ten minutes were the hardest examination of Otto's life, as he explained the precise disposition of his withdrawal. "In the end, we lost two of the machine guns, and we have but four gun barrels left. We have also expended all but four belts of ammunition," he finished. "Of men, eighteen dead and twenty-three wounded. The defensive positions are nearly complete, although I do not propose to defend them past dawn tomorrow—too much risk of the witches infiltrating our lines. My men are at your disposal, sire."
Egon glanced at the rough map of the surrounding area on Otto's camp chair. "Flying spies. Some sort of artillery—that's a new twist." He nodded to himself. "They are still bottled up in there?"
"Yes, sire." Otto nodded back, reflexively. "I've detailed my men to tell me at once if the witches stop replying to our probing fire. But so far they're sitting tight. It's almost as if they can't simply walk away."
For the first time, the young king's poker face relaxed. "Well." His lips quirked. "You've done no worse than aught of our commanders might. And that flying witch—yes." He nodded briskly. "Bravely done, Baron Neuhalle." Then he smiled, and Otto's blood ran cold at the look in the royal eyes. "Something you might not know about the witches is that they have to use their magic sparingly—should they walk through the paths of the dead too frequently, they fall ill and die. By your own word it is barely a day since they retook the palace. Normally that would be enough time to allow them to escape, but I have intelligence that suggests to me a new possibility. Your men did succeed in dropping the culvert and poisoning the well, I trust?" Unsure where this was leading, Otto nodded. "Good." The king clapped his hands. "Krentz. Fetch Sir Geraunt and Baron Rolfuss."
"Sire." One of the bodyguards bowed, then ducked through the tent door; the other visibly tensed, watching Otto alertly.
"Your Majesty?" Otto tried not to let his own tension show.
"We're going to take them." Egon's eyes twinkled. "Because, you see, they are not only under siege here. They may be able to walk through the realm of the dead, but the dead, I am informed, have taken a dislike to them. They won't be able to escape this time. All that remains to be established is how we may dig them out of that castle. And my other intelligence suggests a solution."
The house squatting behind the densely tree-clad hillside had seen better years, that much was clear: its wooden decking needed a fresh coat of paint, the shingled roof was silver and cracked behind the eaves, and the chain-link fence that surrounded the acre lot was rusted. But the padlock holding the gate closed was well-oiled, and as she followed Brill and her team of bright young adventurers up the front steps, Miriam spotted the discreet black dome of a CCTV camera lurking in the shadows of the verandah. That, at least, looked to be new and well-maintained.
"It's a safe house," Brill explained as she pushed buttons on an alarm system that was far fancier—and newer—than the building it was attached to. "We own a bunch of them, lease them out for short stays via a local Realtor, so there's a lot of turnover. There's always one free when we need it, and it doesn't look suspicious. We actually make money on the deal: We can buy the properties with spare capital and they're mostly going up."
Miriam glanced around as they entered the front hall. Dust tickled her nostrils; the husk of a dead beetle lay, legs upturned, in the middle of the floor. She wrinkled her nose. "What's the plan?"
"Oh, I just phoned the Realtor and told them I was a friend of the owner and we were taking it for two weeks." She held up a key. "There's some emergency gear stashed in the cellar, behind a false wall. Other than that, it's clean—the emergency gear's the kind of stuff a survival nut would have, nothing to attract special attention. The only real trouble we've ever had with these safe houses was when one of them was accidentally let to a meth dealer. We cleared them out good. The Sheriff's department like us." She said it with such evident satisfaction that Miriam shivered. For a meth dealer, setting up a clandestine lab in a Clan safe house was a bit like a fox setting up house in a grizzly's den. "You may want to take the front bedroom, milady. I'll get the air and hot water working and everyone else settled in, then we can talk."
Three hours later, Miriam felt a lot more human. Air conditioning! Proper showers! Toilets with lids and a handle you turned to flush, rather than yanking on a chain! It was almost like being home again. Brill had even, somehow, managed to find the time to scare up some clothes that fit her, so she didn't look totally weird. Well, Brill had been her lady-in-waiting for some months; as one of the odd jobs she did for the thin white duke—Miriam's uncle—knowing her measurements wasn't that odd. It was a shame she'd bleached her hair blond while she'd been on the run
, Miriam told herself; the colors Brill had picked didn't match her new look, and besides, her roots were starting to show.
But I'm home. So, what now?
She sat on the edge of the bed, one leg of a very new pair of jeans dangling, and stared at the window. So unlike the stony castle casement she'd spent weeks staring at in a state of desperation, under house arrest and facing a forced political marriage as a lesser evil to paying the price of her earlier mistakes, but it was still a window in a house guarded by the Clan's traditions and rules. The formal betrothal had gone adrift in a sea of flame and gunfire, as crown prince Egon took exception to the idea of a Clan heiress marrying his younger (and retarded) brother; then she'd been running through the confusing political underworld of New Britain, too fast to think. But now—
It all depends on what else has been going on since I left. She sighed and began to work her other foot down the pants leg. Is Mom okay? She paused again. Brill said something about being under attack over here. Is Paulie okay? Paulette, her sometime PA, was an outsider to all this—but stuck in Cambridge, if the Clan was being attacked from outside, she could be in big trouble. Guilt by association: Some within the Clan would see her as a tool tainted by Miriam's low stock, while whatever agency was going after the Clan would assume the worst. I've got to find out, Miriam decided, and stood up just as there was a tentative knock at the door.
"Come in," she called, hastily buttoning up.
The door opened and Brilliana looked in. "Milady?"
"I'm nearly done here." Miriam glanced around. "Where did I put my shoes?" Handmade leather ankle-boots from New Britain wouldn't look too out of place, and shoes were the one thing Brill hadn't been able to buy for her. "Eh." They were hiding under the dressing table.
"I think we need to talk," Brilliana observed.
"Yes." Miriam bent over and began working on her left foot. "What exactly has been going on since the, the banquet?" Her brain began to catch up with her earlier thoughts: "My mother—is she alright? What about the duke? My grandmother—"
"It's a mess," Brill said wryly. She perched on the stool by the table. "We're not sure exactly how long Egon had been planning it for, but he used Henryk's scheme"—the plan to forcibly marry Miriam into the Gruinmarkt's royal dynasty—"as leverage to get a bunch of the backwood peers behind him. He's declared the entire Clan outlaw and placed a price on our heads, and is promising half our estates to those nobles who back him. It's turned into a messy civil war and Angbard's had his hands tied trying to defend individual holdings instead of going after the pretender's army. While all that was going on, we've had some disturbing—well, a couple of couriers have gone missing over the past six months. Missing with no explanation, no hint of trouble. Not only did the bastard Matthias rat us out to the Drug Enforcement Agency, now there's some sort of secret government cross-agency committee trying to hunt us down. Everyone on this side has had to activate their emergency cover plans. And the really bad news is that this agency managed to sneak a couple of agents into the Gruinmarkt, which means it's serious."
"Yes, I know." Miriam sat up and took a deep breath. "I told you about meeting Mike, didn't I?" She'd once had a thing going with Mike Fleming. Odd, it seemed an awfully long time ago. "He got me out of the palace alive." She shrugged. "He was unexpectedly honest." Another deep breath. "Told me that if I wanted to join the federal witness protection program . . ."
The words hung in the air for a few seconds. Finally, Brilliana nodded. "We know. And it will count for much when it comes to the Council's attention, I think," she said slowly. A longer pause. "Olga and your mother have been talking to him. Trying to negotiate a, a temporary cease-fire. But things are really bad. They believe we've stolen a nuclear weapon, and they want it back."
"Jesus." Miriam shook her head. "Why would they think that?" She looked at Brill, aghast. "Hang on. They believe the Clan has stolen a nuke? Why? Why would they believe that? Has Angbard— He'd have to be mad! Tell me he hasn't?"
Brill looked uncomfortable. "Angbard hasn't stolen a nuke. But they leave them in undoppelgangered bunkers; is that not a temptation?"
"Tell me." Miriam shoved her hair back from her face. "Has someone in the Clan actually gone and stolen a nuclear weapon? How? I mean, I thought they were too big to carry—"
"Not one," Brill said, then bit her lip. "Six, we think. Maybe more. They're backpack devices, part of the inactive inventory—the CIA asked for them, originally."
Aghast, Miriam stared at her. "Is that why they're all over us?"
Brill nodded.
"Then who—"
"Oliver, Earl Hjorth, is the key-holder designated by the Clan committee."
"Jesus, why him?" The thought of what might happen if the feds discovered the Clan had haunted Miriam ever since she'd learned about her own ancestry; what they might do if they thought the extradimensional narcoterrorists had nuclear weapons didn't bear thinking about. And Baron Oliver was about the worst person she could think of to be holding them—an unregenerate backwoodsman and dyed-in-the-wool conservative faction member. "And they can get their own people into the Gruinmarkt, can't they."
"There's more bad news," Brill added after a moment.
"Why don't you come downstairs? Then Huw can deliver it himself."
Elena sprawled across the sofa in the living room, pulling an oiled cleaning cloth through the breech of her P90. "Find another channel, minion," she drawled without looking up. "I can't stand Friends."
"As you wish, my princess." Yul, hulking and fair-haired as any Viking warrior, carefully squeezed the remote. Advertisements and sitcoms strobed across the eviscerated guts of the machine pistol on the coffee table until he arrived at MTV. "Ah, that is better." Marilyn Manson strutted and howled through the last tour on earth; Elena pulled a face. "Manly music for martial—" an oily rag landed on his head.
"Children."
Elena glanced round, pulled a face. "He started it!"
"Sure." Huw stood in the doorway, trying not to smile. "Did you get the Internet working?"
"Something's wrong with it," Yul said apologetically.
"Ah, well." Huw shrugged and walked over to the armchair, where a laptop trailed bits of many-colored spaghetti towards the wall. "I'll sort it out. Got to report in." Expecting Yul or Elena to do anything technical had been a forlorn hope. Am I the only competent person around here? he wondered. Dumb question: While he'd been studying in schools and colleges in the United States under a false identity, Yul had been bringing joy to their backwoods father's heart, riding and hunting and being a traditional son on their country estate in the western marches of the Gruinmarkt; and Elena had been under the stifling constraints of a noble daughter, although she'd kicked up enough of a fuss that her parents had allowed her to escape into Clan Security, leaving them with one less dowry to worry about. Which left Huw as the guy who knew one end of an Internet router and a secure voice-over IP connection from another, and Yul and Elena as the armed muscle to watch over him when they weren't engaging in risky post-adolescent high-jinks—risky because the older generation weren't many years past fighting blood feuds over that sort of thing.
It took him a few minutes, some scrabbling with cables, and a reboot to get everything working properly, but Huw was setting up the encrypted link to the ClanSec e-mail hub and looking forward to checking in when he heard footsteps.
"Yes?" He glanced round. It was Miriam. She looked—not tired, exactly, but careworn. And something else.
"Brill tells me we need to talk," she said, then glanced across the room at the sofa.
"She said—"Huw's larynx froze for a few seconds as he stared at her. The first time he'd met her, gowned and bejeweled at a royal reception, she'd been turned out in the very mode of Gruinmarkt nobility; then earlier, when Lady Brilliana had so rudely yanked him (and Yul, and Elena) away from his survey, she'd been wearing an outlandish getup. Now she looked—at ease, he decided. This is her. She isn't acting a part. How interesting. "Ah. Well
, she did, did she?"
"She said." Miriam leaned on the back of his chair. "You've been exploring. Whatever that means." She sounded bored, but there was a glint in her eye.
"Uh, yeah." Huw leaned forward and shut the laptop's lid. "Why don't we go fix something to drink?" He glanced sidelong at Yul and Elena, who were sitting on the sofa, bickering amiably over the gun, their heads leaning together. "Somewhere quieter." The TV howled mournfully, recycling the sound track of a guitar in torment.
The kitchen was bland, basic, and undersupplied—they'd traveled light and hadn't had time to buy much more than a bunch of frozen pizzas—but there was coffee, and a carton of half-and-half, and a coffee maker. Huw busied himself filling it while Miriam searched the cupboards for mugs. "How did you go about it?" she asked, finally.
Huw took a deep breath. "Systematically. We haven't started de-convoluting the knotwork"—the two worlds to which the Clan's members could walk were distinguished by the use of a different knot that the world-walker had to concentrate on—"but I'm pretty sure we'll start finding others once we do. The fourth world we found—it's accessed from this one, if you use the Lee's knot. We couldn't get through to it in New England, but it worked down south; I think it may be in the middle of an ice age."
"Did you find anyone? People, I mean?"
The Revolution Business: Book Five of the Merchant Princes Page 5