Paragon Lost

by Dave Duncan

  She lay and shivered, listening to the storm and the clink of horseshoes, the clatter of her own teeth. “You swear?” she whispered.

  “I swear,” came the response at once.

  She scrambled in under the robes beside him. He was fully dressed, too, of course, and the bed was warm. It was not proper, but rules of protocol and demeanor hardly applied here.

  Last night she had bedded down with Olga. Olga, frozen solid now, her head almost cut off…Suddenly Tasha was sobbing, sobbing hysterically—shaking, fighting for breath. The swordsman wrapped strong arms around her and crushed her against him.

  “Let it come. This will help. Weep all you can.” He was warm and she was so cold. She wept. Every time she caught her breath he would say, “Weep more!” So she did. “Don’t fight it. Weep for all those useless deaths. Weep for fatherless children and women bereft. Weep!”

  “Boldness is a child of ignorance and baseness,” Arkell muttered, on Beaumont’s far side, “inferior to other parts.”

  • 2 •

  Next day the sun came out a few times, but the wind continued to hurl snow around, and the cold seemed more intense. Beaumont fed and watered the horses, which was an epic task in itself. He dug out one of the sleds, pushed it into the stable, and began loading it. He chopped wood, heated water for washing, cooked a warm meal. Tasha knew she should offer to help, but she had no experience at doing any of those things and was afraid her ignorance would make her a hindrance.

  Arkell showed no signs of improvement, babbling nonsense all the time and barely able to attend to his own toilet or feeding. Beaumont cared for him, too.

  When darkness fell, he spread out the bedding again.

  “The wind’s dropping. I hope we can leave here at dawn.”

  “I will go to Morkuta, no farther!”

  He did not answer. When he had the bedding ready, he removed Arkell’s boots for him.

  Arkell grinned, slack-jawed. “When any of the four pillars of government are mainly shaken or weakened, men had need to pray for fair weather.”

  “So say all of us, brother. Lie down there.”

  He had prepared only one bed, she noticed. She turned away from the fire so he would not see her blushes. He threw off his own boots and squirmed in beside his moronic friend.

  “…the despising of them many times checks them best.”

  “So it does,” Beaumont said. “Trust me, Tasha. I am the same man I was last night.”

  “I must trust you,” she grumbled, wriggling in beside him. “But I will go to Morkuta, no farther.”

  After a moment he said, “I value my neck and Arkell’s too much—and even yours, Your Grace. Your uncle is a madman and capable of anything. I can find the Dvono, and the Dvono will lead us to Dvonograd.”

  “Where the Border Patrol will catch you.”

  “Maybe. We came through Dvonograd, you know. Your noble brother had been waiting there for months for us. Did he by any chance make any friends there?”

  “Are you insane? There aren’t even boyars there, let alone anyone of princely rank.”

  “Pity. Consul Hakluyt was there, too. He made friends.” He waited in vain for a comment from her. “He made friends among the White Hats, lots of them. That’s just good business, you understand. He also made friends with the local smugglers—who are much the same people, or close relatives. The night I was there, he introduced me to both sorts.”

  “You are a trickster, aren’t you? A schemer.”

  “I try to look ahead. I do have money, Your Grace. Lord Wassail made sure I had funds, in case something like this happened. My acquaintances in Dvonograd will see us on our way west, and hopefully send some strong lads with us. A few days’ travel should bring us to Gneizow, and I have friends there, too, Isilondian knights. They will escort us after that. It really should not be that difficult…Your Majesty.”

  She sighed. “Very well. Whatever will my husband say?”

  “ ‘Welcome!’ I expect. And, ‘Did you have a nice trip?’ ”

  “You ought to be in line for a peerage if you can do this.”

  Beaumont rolled on his side, away from her. “I wouldn’t want a peerage, begging Your Grace’s pardon. It is my duty—to him, to you, and to my ward.”

  “By the civil law every man is bound to warrant the thing that he selleth or conveyeth, albeit there be no express warranty.”

  “Yes, brother. Go to sleep.”

  After a moment, Beaumont said, “Mostly duty to my ward. He knew he was dying. He was too old to go adventuring, but his king asked him, so it was his duty. He loved the King. Athelgar was like the son he never had. His dearest wish was to walk into the palace with you on his arm and watch Athelgar’s face light up when he saw you and realized that you really are as gorgeous as the portrait the Czar sent. That was what he wanted. He signed most of the letters of credit over to me and taught me the code that validates them. I have enough money to buy a peerage, Your Grace.”

  “That was not what I meant!”

  He did not answer.

  The storm rattled and wailed. Arkell mumbled. The horses chomped and stamped and staled loudly.

  “Did you really imitate Fedor’s writing?” she asked.

  “Mmph. Yes. Not well enough to fool his father, though.”

  “How did you know what his hand looks like?”

  “I found something to copy.”

  “What? He wrote me a letter once and it was a horrible scrawl, like a small child’s, wandering all over the page. Sophie…the Czarina said it was a unique document and ought to go into the state archives.”

  Whatever had happened to that? Maybe Sophie had kept it.

  Beaumont was starting to snore.

  He must have been busy for hours before he wakened her and the imbecile. He had prepared a simple meal, fed the horses, finished loading the sled, even put hot bricks in it. While she ate, he dealt with Arkell.

  “We’ll take the bedding with us,” he said, “because it’s warm. I’ll need help with the sled.”

  Stars burned with barely a twinkle in the terrible cold. The evil wind had gone elsewhere, leaving drifts almost head-high in places, but eventually Beaumont wrestled the sled and six horses out of the stockade, with some help from Tasha and none from the babbling Arkell. He harnessed three and tethered the rest behind as spares. The last thing he did was put a torch to the hall, returning its grisly collection of bodies to the elements.

  “No funeral service?” she asked when he came back out to the sled.

  “No time. Mostly I want to confuse the issue—who died and who didn’t. Make sure he stays covered up, will you please?”

  “Until I go crazy,” she said grumpily. He had seated her in the back with Arkell, who was admittedly a minor source of warmth, but a maddening traveling companion.

  Off they went. Her last sight of ghastly Mezersk was flames leaping high in the night and spilling redness on the snow.

  They made slow progress, winding between drifts too deep for horses and windswept gaps the sled could not cross. The sun rose reluctantly, giving light but no heat. They had lost the road by then, but that hardly mattered in a land so barren. Eventually they came to a gentle slope downward and Beaumont yelped in delight, gestured all around with his whip.

  “The Dvono!”

  That wide expanse of blank whiteness could be nothing else. The banks were patchy brown boundaries trailing off to north and south. Now the fugitives might make good time over the ice, provided they were not seen. If any of the men who had escaped the massacre had reached Morkuta, they would certainly have warned the White Hats or other troops in the area.

  “Which way is Morkuta?” she shouted as they drove down onto the ice.

  “Upstream or possibly downstream.”

  “The king judges by his judges and they are the speaking law!” Arkell struggled free of the rugs, letting in a torrent of icy air. He pointed to the north and leered witlessly at her.

  Had she not been
wearing a double layer of fur over her head, Tasha’s hair might have stood on end. “Which way is Dvonograd?”

  Out came his other arm, to point roughly southwest. “Faculties by which the foolish part of men’s minds is taken are most potent.”

  “Let’s get cosy again.” She replaced the covers. Perhaps Arkell was starting to come out of his daze. She dearly wished he would stop babbling.

  The sled whistled over the ice, drawn by the steaming horses, and eventually she realized that Arkell had been right—they had bypassed Morkuta. Had that been only a lucky guess?

  Fine though they were, the horses could not run forever. By the time the short day faded they were exhausted, almost staggering. Tasha was frozen to the bone. Arkell wept all the time, not understanding; his stubbled beard was caked with frozen tears.

  They had not met one living soul all day. Here and there blackened chimneys showed where houses had stood, and there were a few ruined jetties along the banks, but this part of Skyrria had died in the wars. The desolation was infinitely sad and she understood now why the Czar would not let foreigners see it.

  “Where will we spend the night?” she asked.

  Beaumont peered around at her. His eyes were red, slitted against the constant glare. “Somewhere near here there’s some deserted cottages on the left bank. They’re kept stocked, to be used by royal couriers and others. We should survive well enough overnight if they’re not full of streltsy.”

  Somebody had coached the foreigners well, but perhaps not well enough to locate an unfamiliar landmark in this ice haze and universal whiteness.

  “How will you find them?”

  “By chance,” he said without looking around again.

  “What’s it called, this place?”

  “Nelsevo.”

  “Arkell, where’s Nelsevo?”

  The madman just scowled at her and snuggled down in the covers.

  “Lackwit, where’s Nelsevo?” she yelled.

  Sulkily, Human Compass freed an arm and pointed back.

  “Turn around, Beaumont!” Tasha shouted. “You’ve gone past it.”

  • 3 •

  There were no streltsy lying in wait at Nelsevo. The following evening the fugitives reached Dvonograd and Beaumont made good on his promise, finding men there who remembered him and were willing to help. For a price, of course, but he had money and a sword to guard it. Tasha dared not start to hope, not yet.

  The day after that, she crossed the Dvono and thus left Skyrria. Their sled was escorted by six others bearing villainous-looking men who would doubtless sell her to a higher bidder, or rape her if they discovered she was a woman. The bitter wind that blew all that day would help cover their tracks, as Beau cheerfully pointed out. No White Hats came racing in pursuit and when she commented on that, he just laughed and gestured to the escort. “Why should they? They’re here already.”

  Every night she slept at his side and gradually the nightmares of Mezersk began to fade. The ruffian guards never seemed to notice that the “boy,” unlike themselves, did not treat the whole world as one gigantic urinal.

  Four or five days after that, Beau paid them off at a rough little fortified settlement named Gneizow, for there he had more trustworthy men waiting, a troop of Isilondians led by a gruff, stolid-seeming Sergeant Narenne. Tasha did not know their language or they hers, but their loyalty was to their lord, not just to gold, and she found that knowledge comforting. Although they paid very little attention to her, she soon realized that they had guessed who, or at least what, she was. They usually remembered to turn their backs when they made yellow patches on the snow—and also when she had to, which mattered more.

  Not everything went smoothly. Winter could be deadly in Dolorth and Fitain, too, and the terrain harder. They boarded in peasants’ sheds, mostly, or wayside hostelries when there were any. In those the Isilondians set watches all night. Three times Beau had to push her under the table and draw his sword—the fights were never about her, just drunken brawls over gambling or foreigners making eyes at local women, but blood was spilled and once a young man died.

  Sometimes wolves, two-legged or four-legged, left tracks around their path, but none dared show teeth. Midwinter came and went. Days grew longer and the countryside more settled.

  Like all travelers, they were plagued by vermin and the flux. Tasha succumbed to sickness no more than the toughest of them, even Beau, but when she did, he halted the expedition and patiently nursed her back to health.

  Eventually the going became impossible for sleds, so they switched to horseback. That slowed them a lot. Lackwit had to be carried in a litter or a cart, for he fell off at any pace above a walk and screamed hysterically if Beau tried lashing him to the saddle. Spring came early by Skyrrian standards; rivers flooded, roads turned to quagmire, insects swarmed. But one fine day at a guardhouse beside a bridge, Beau paid off some officials and escorted Tasha across the river into Isilond.

  “There should be a decent elementary here,” he told her, riding at her side. “Your husband gave my ward strict instructions that only Chivian conjurers are competent to enchant you in Chivian, but I can’t see that it would hurt to provide you with Isilondian. Then you’ll have someone else to talk to besides me.”

  He was enough, but she did not say so. She pointed at the little town ahead. “What quaint buildings!”

  “Your Grace?”

  “You should call me Timofei—sir.” She grinned and stuck her tongue out at him.

  He remained solemn. Hooves drummed a dirge on the timbers. “We cannot be overheard at the moment, Your Grace. If I may presume to advise Your Majesty…Another day or so will bring us to Vaanen. Even if Orson himself isn’t home, his mother the Dowager Marquise will be. So Narenne says. Blue blood doesn’t come any bluer than theirs. I do believe it would be safe now for you to bury Timofei and become Queen Tasha.”

  “No!” she cried. She didn’t want that. She had not admitted it before, even to herself, but thoughts of Chivial and a throne and a strange man’s bed terrified her.

  “Why ever not, Your Grace?” he asked, frowning.

  “Oh…Riding sidesaddle, or in a coach with Lackwit? I’d never realized how much more sheer freedom men have. They don’t have to worry all the time about…well, about other men. I’ll feel safer if we just carry on the way we are.” Being a boy. Being anonymous. When she became Queen of Chivial, she would have to stop sleeping with Beau.

  • 4 •

  There was something magical about Laville in the spring, unfortunately. It magically attracted pests, and Chivian pests in particular. At the crack of Thirdmoon the Chivian rich and fatuous flocked south to Laville, and it seemed the worst of them were those who brought letters of introduction to the Chivian Ambassador. This was why Lord and Lady Hedgebury were currently entertaining Baron and Baroness Gall- mouth.

  Their name was actually Gelmouth, but Hedgebury had to think about something while they talked. If he let that Gallmouth slip out, Agnes would turn purple and never forgive him.

  The Galemouths talked in shifts. Before lunch, the Baron had described his new mews down to the last bird dropping and then given a long dissertation on the finer points of cockfighting. During lunch he was too busy stuffing himself with the free food to say a word but his scraggy wife took over the monologue, recounting the exploits of their excessively cute grandchildren in lethal detail. Agnes, who had not seen her own brood of cute grandchildren for almost a year, listened with a waxy smile. By the second course, the increasingly loud Baroness had progressed into palace gossip, slandering people the Hedgeburys neither knew nor wished to know.

  Apart from ringing mental changes on his guests’ name, the Ambassador just nibbled and sipped and thought of all the more interesting things he might be doing. He could be riding his new roan gelding on Montmoulin, for example. He could be strumming on that fascinating antique Ritizzian lute he’d acquired last week, or just ambling the alleys of Laville listening to troubadours and watching
flowers and people blossom in spring.

  A footman filled the Baroness’s goblet yet again. (Gillmouth—drinks like a fish.) She was thin and hard and turning redder by the minute, looking and sounding like a rusty saw.

  “Of course,” she rasped, “you have heard about His Majesty’s friendship with Lady Gwendolyn?” She wiggled threadbare lashes over the rim of her goblet.

  “We prefer not to heed scandal.” Anyone who knew Agnes would have fled in screaming terror from that smile.

  “Oh, but this isn’t really scandal! I mean, there’s no doubt about it, so that makes it news, wouldn’t you say?” The harpy’s laugh was even harsher than her voice. “The man is bewitched! He follows her like a lap dog! And she… well! Let me tell you about the night of—”

  “Have you tried these eels in ginger?” Agnes snarled sweetly.

  Almost certainly, the Baroness was working the conversation around to the King’s betrothal. That was general knowledge now. Without it the sordid little story of his infatuation with the slinky Lady Gwendolyn would hardly merit a single sideways glance—monarchs had more opportunity for dalliance than other men and a lot less privacy. Athelgar had been more restrained than most, at least since the Thencaster Plot, but the outlandish bride in the wings added zest to this latest indiscretion. The Hedgeburys were not about to discuss state business with a drunken, tattling baroness.

  Like a death-cell reprieve, Lindsay stepped inside the doorway and looked meaningfully over at his employer. Lindsay was First Secretary, an excellent lad—a lad of thirty-six, Sir Lindsay, late of the Royal Guard, who must have been born about the time young Wat Hedgebury was admitted to Ironhall. Receiving a nod of consent, he glided forward to murmur in the ambassadorial ear.

  “Forgive the intrusion, Your Excellency. A Master Starkmoor is here to see you. I do believe his business is urgent.”

  There was no Master Starkmoor; there were a thousand of him, and if this one wanted nothing more than to pass on a bad joke, he would be a welcome distraction. Carefully avoiding Agnes’s eye, Hedgebury muttered an apology, rose, and led the way to the door.