Not Really the Prisoner of Zenda

by Joel Rosenberg

  He thought that the bright green color of the lynx spiders was an interesting contrast to the usual blacks and browns, but he didn’t much care for them, either.

  But he most particularly disliked Filistat’s familiar, a large, hairy tarantula whose slick black body was the size of Slovotsky’s fist, and whose fangs were sharp-tipped slivers of what looked like bone, and Walter Slovotsky even more disliked the way that Filistat would coax the spider up onto Slovotsky’s leg, step by hairy-legged step.

  Filistat had had it climb up that leg until it reached Walter’s sore right knee, then slowly, slowly, while Filistat muttered some vague incantations and vaguer assurances, the spider would sink those fangs — painlessly, yes, but they were still fangs — into Walter’s right knee, and the swelling would go down almost as quickly as a man’s erection would after hearing, “Doesn’t that look just like a penis, only smaller?”

  He shuddered. Spiders.

  Then again, as a kid, much to the embarrassment of Stash and Emma Slovotsky, he would wail when taken to the doctor for a shot, and scream that the needle was hurting him from the moment that old Doctor Menzer touched him with the alcohol-soaked cotton ball.

  The spider — and the Spider — took away pain, not even causing a little in so doing, but that didn’t mean he had to like it.

  What he did like was the way that his formerly swollen knee was working again. Arthritis? Some sort of tear in the cartilage? He didn’t know, and he didn’t really care — the point was that it didn’t hurt. There were other pleasures than the loss of pain, granted, but few were quite as wonderful, and none was quite as stark.

  It looked like it was going to be a good day.

  The last bits of Parliament business were wrapped up — well, many of them turned over to Bren Adahan, but Walter’s role was wrapped up — and the last news along the Nyphien border was that there was no news. Quiet was good, as a general principle, although the Nyphs would bear watching.

  Forinel and the rest were, by now, safely ensconced in Keranahan, and since Walter didn’t officially know that Forinel was really Kethol, he didn’t officially have anything to worry about, and he wasn’t much for worrying, anyway. Figuring things out wasn’t worrying, after all.

  Sure, Kethol and Pirojil would be worried about failing, but at worst it would appear that Forinel, during his long absence from Holtun, had become unsuitable for the job of baron, but probably not sufficiently unsuitable that the Emperor would have to consider replacing him.

  And it was a job, after all.

  Not the most pleasant of jobs, Walter had long ago decided. If you choose to play king of the mountain, there’s always somebody who wants to come knock you off so that he can be king of the mountain. That applied to a bunch of little kids playing out in a construction site at the edges of Hackensack on the Other Side as much as it applied to a baron — or an Emperor, for that matter — here and now, and that made it a lousy job, despite the perks.

  Much better to be an assistant to the king of the mountain, and get to go off and do interesting things while others did the dirty work.

  Walter Slovotsky was growing old, but he was resolutely determined not to grow up any more than necessary. The only question right now was whether he ought to be waiting around in Biemestren himself, or go off to do some troubleshooting — in New Pittsburgh, say. Aiea liked New Pitt, and while the sounds and the smells of the smelters weren’t exactly Walter’s favorite things, it was a nice place to visit, and it was a good idea for the lord proctor to pop up there, or anywhere, every now and then, without warning.

  Besides, it would really be more of a vacation than anything else. He liked the idea of going out to meet Bren Adahan — and Kirah, alas — in New Pittsburgh, and spending some time with his younger daughter, as well. He and Bren would probably never be friends, not really, but they had actually grown to like each other’s company, and that wasn’t a bad substitute, all things considered.

  The only reason he was still in Biemestren was on the off chance that Ellegon would show up, and that the dragon would have both the free time and the inclination to fly Walter out there.

  Granted, there was a delegation due in from Nyphien, but it was best to let Thomen handle it for himself. Walter would just stay out of the way.

  Besides, Walter never got along with Nyph nobles, who would spend hours comparing their lineages with each other and with whoever would listen, and there was only so long he could force himself to be patient and polite, what with their Euar’den this, and Tynear that, and Vilikos the other — deathly boring to a kid from Secaucus, New Jersey, You Ess of Ay, eh?

  Just clean up a few things, while hanging around to see if Ellegon would show up and be able to take him, and then, dragon or no, he was off.

  It was going to be quiet for a while. He hoped.

  ***

  Derinald was waiting for him at the top of the stairs.

  It was hard to read anything on Derinald’s thin face, and the way that his ridiculously large mustache hid his upper lip and most of his lower didn’t help. Walter wondered if he combed the mustache up when he ate, or just sluiced it off afterward, but didn’t ask.

  “You asked to see me, Captain?” he said.

  “Yes, I did, Lord Proctor.” Derinald nodded. It was good to see that he could actually talk and move without Beralyn having her hand stuck up his ass. Walter had wondered about that, from time to time.

  “I happened to be walking the ramparts last night,” Derinald said, “and I found something that I don’t quite understand.”

  Derinald sending for Walter Slovotsky had been surprising, but Derinald not understanding something was about as surprising as the sun rising in the morning.

  Derinald thought himself bright as a shiny new copper, but that was an opinion that Walter Slovotsky didn’t share, and didn’t think much of anybody shared. Derinald had been a minor disaster as a captain of troops, not knowing enough to leave training and discipline to his decurions, and it had been one of Walter Slovotsky’s first brainstorms as Imperial proctor to give Derinald to Beralyn as an aide, secondarily to keep him out of trouble, but primarily to give her somebody instead of Thomen to whisper complaints about and imprecations against the Cullinanes to.

  “Please. Show me.”

  Derinald led him down the Widow’s Walk to a buttress. Derinald’s name had been chalked there, in thin shaky Erendra letters.

  Just his name, and nothing more.

  “Well, hey — at least they aren’t writing your name in the barracks latrine, right after ‘for a good time, call …’” Walter said in English, knowing full well that Derinald didn’t speak more than a few words of English.

  “Excuse me?”

  Enough teasing. Walter raised a palm. “So, somebody has written your name on a buttress,” he said. “I take it that it wasn’t you?”

  “If I had written my name on a buttress — although I don’t know why I would — I certainly wouldn’t have asked to see you about it.”

  Derinald was trying to sound calm, but he was scared, and Walter saw his point.

  It didn’t make any particular sense, not by itself. Except for castle children climbing up on the ramparts to throw something down the other side into the outer bailey — sometimes garbage for the goats, although pig bladders filled with water were definitely the favorite, as they made a terrific splash — nobody much came up here, except for the soldiers who walked the ramparts on guard.

  And Beralyn.

  It was, of course, entirely possible that one of the soldiers had, for some reason, scrawled Derinald’s name here. But if Beralyn had done it, it was unlikely that the purpose was to memorialize some particular joy.

  And who would read the name written there?

  As a first approximation: nobody but the House Guard.

  “You haven’t been irritating anybody in the House Guard lately, have you?”

  “No, I haven’t.”

  Which might even be true. Walter Slov
otsky found Derinald irritating, and probably everybody in the House Guard did, as well, but it was one thing to find somebody an irritation, and another to make a threat.

  It could be some practical joke — sort of like a high school kid writing a Better Dead list, and leaving it lying around — or it could, possibly, have been something else.

  “Any idea how long it’s been here?”

  Derinald shook his head. “I often come up to join the Dowager Empress on her walks, but I hardly spend my time looking for, for such things as chalk marks. It could have been written yesterday, or almost a tenday ago. Certainly it was since the last rain, but, other than that,” he said, spreading his hands, “I don’t know.”

  “So … you think that the Dowager Empress herself chalked your name there, and you think that that probably doesn’t bode well for you, eh?”

  Derinald blinked. “I … I don’t know.”

  “Take a guess. Take two; they’re small.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Never mind.”

  Well, if Beralyn wanted Derinald dead, Walter Slovotsky wanted him alive, at least in principle. Rewarding your allies and frustrating your enemies was basic strategy.

  Not that he would go far out of his way to protect Derinald, mind.

  But …

  It was a mistake to think of the House Guard as an amorphous bunch. Gold Company, who were now assigned to patrol the inner ward, were housed in the barracks in the inner ward, while Purple, who had the outer wall during this rotation, were quartered in the larger barracks at the foot of the motte. If it had been up to Walter Slovotsky, a barracks would have been built in the outer bailey, but tradition — and maybe a good tradition — was that, for security reasons, the outer bailey was to be kept bare of anything except grass and the herd of goats that kept that grass short.

  Except for when the goatherds came out at dusk to chivvy their charges down the hill and out the front gate, anything seen moving in the outer bailey, night or day, had damned well better be moving slowly up the road toward the inner gate.

  “Well, I’ll tell you what I’m going to do,” Walter said. “I’m going to ask General Garavar to switch the inner and outer guard — let Purple take the status post for a while. I won’t tell him why; he’ll assume that it’s just that annoying Walter Slovotsky, shaking things up for the sake of shaking things up. So, if Beralyn has persuaded one of the inner guards to do away with you, that should at least make it more difficult.”

  Derinald almost pissed himself in gratitude, although Walter Slovotsky was far too realistic to think that the gratitude would amount to anything much or last very long.

  “Please,” Derinald said, “please don’t mention that we talked — not to the Dowager Empress?”

  For once, Walter Slovotsky was almost unhappy that he had picked such an incompetent conspirator for Beralyn to conspire with. Was Derinald always such an idiot? Or had fear just driven his brains into his asshole?

  They were standing on the rampart in full view of anybody, after all; anybody who knew about the name chalked here would have no trouble guessing what the subject of their discussion had been. If Beralyn had compromised any of the House Guard, which was certainly possible, she would soon know that the two of them had talked, and would have better than a guess as to what they had talked about, within the hour, probably, or by the end of the day, at most.

  Idiot.

  “Of course,” Walter said, “let’s keep this to ourselves. No reason to mention it to anybody else.” He rested his hand in a comradely way on Derinald’s shoulder. “Don’t worry about a thing; I’ll take care of it all,” he said. He looked down at the chalk scrawl. “I’ll go directly to talk to General Garavar, while you get rid of the mark. No need for anybody else to see it.”

  “But —”

  “And I’m sure you won’t mind spending a few moments, each night, noting down anything that you’ve seen Beralyn doing, or any conversations you’ve had with her.”

  Walter thought for a moment. “Leave the note under the planter at the top of the north staircase, east wing. Daily, mind.”

  When Derinald started to protest, Walter squeezed his shoulder with more than comradely strength.

  “I can’t help you if you don’t help me help you,” he said. “For now, get rid of those chalk marks.”

  Derinald swallowed heavily, then nodded. “I’ll go get some rags and water, and —”

  “No,” Walter said. “I’m sure,” he went on, lying, “that nobody could possibly have noticed the two of us up here, but you want to be sure not to come back here again, not unless you’re with the Dowager Empress.”

  “But how —”

  “Well, you can lick it off, I guess,” Walter said. “Or,” he said, fiddling with the buttons on the front of his own trousers, “there’s probably other ways, too. I’ll see that first note tonight, I hope.”

  Walter Slovotsky walked away.

  Well, so much for leaving, at least for now. It would be worth hanging around, at least until Derinald was dead.

  He shook his head. This shouldn’t have been as much fun as it was.

  9

  BAIT

  The first ninety percent of the job takes the first ninety percent of the time. The last ten percent takes the other ninety percent of the time.

  — Walter Slovotsky

  THE LINE OF poles snaked out from Castle Nerahan into the hills more slowly than he would have thought it would, so Kethol said.

  Pirojil wasn’t surprised. That was the way it was with Kethol: when it came to things that he knew about, he always understood both the opportunities and the problems. But with this, he was a fish out of water, trying his best to pretend that gasping for breath as he flopped around on the riverbank was perfectly natural.

  Pirojil shook his head. “This is the easy part. Another few days, and then it gets difficult.”

  “Another few days, and maybe I’ll be doing something I know how to do,” Kethol said.

  “There is that.”

  “Yes, there is.” Kethol nodded, and kicked his horse into a slow, hesitant walk down the hill, Pirojil following along behind.

  Berten and Ernel were, granted, engineers, but they were very junior, which Pirojil was sure was the only reason that that weasel, Nerahan, had permitted them to pry them loose for a few tendays.

  Prying workers loose had been much easier. It hadn’t taken any real prying at all, in fact. With spring planting long over and the fall harvest still several tendays away, the daily maintenance of farms and crofts could easily be left to the women and children for the time being, while the men earned hard copper money. Hearing of work for pay — in hard coin, by the day, and not just in vague, probably empty promises that taxes would someday be offset — workers had streamed from the villages and crofts.

  Down the hill, Pirojil could see three teams of diggers working, although he knew that there were twice as many already at work over the ridge. Each team consisted of four men, pushing the wooden arms of a posthole bore around and around, like oxen working a mill. They had to stop, from time to time, when buried rocks prevented the bore from penetrating far enough into the ground. Then they would go to the picks and shovels, sometimes, or more often simply pick up the bore and move it a short way to the side.

  But, still, each digging crew managed better than two postholes per hour, and the three-man post-burying crews were hard-pressed to keep up.

  He hadn’t realized that the job would need almost as many loggers as it did diggers.

  The Finster hills were covered with pines, although not quite as thickly covered as they had been. Pairs of woodsmen wielding huge saws were constantly toppling trees, then quickly stripping them of their bark so that hitched pairs of slow-footed dray horses could haul the logs up or down the hill to where they needed to be.

  Then it was just a matter of upending the logs into the holes, and tamping in dirt and rocks back around them, while the drillers moved farther up the l
ine to begin boring another posthole.

  Everything had turned out to be more complicated than Kethol had thought, just as Pirojil had said that it would.

  It wasn’t just a matter of drillers and foresters and teamsters to handle the dray horses — there were hostlers to handle the horses, cooks to keep bowls of hot porridge and hotter stew coming throughout the day, and the packhorse teams with their teamsters that kept a solid flow of supplies coming from nearby markets.

  And then there were the workers who brought their women, and a few children, and the inevitable whores setting up tents to drain the odd copper from those who were not too tired at the end of the day.

  Kethol had guessed that they would be able to do this with fifty to a hundred men, at the most, but he had made the guess privately, and kept his mouth shut in public, which was just as well. Pirojil was in no way surprised to be able to easily count more than two hundred bodies, not including the teamsters who, with their animals, made it a point to stay in the nearest villages, rather than with the moving camp.

  That was just fine with Pirojil. The more people involved, the more authenticity the whole thing had.

  The whole operation seemed to run on a stream of water and weak beer — Berten had calculated that they would need fifteen firkins of beer per day, and if anything he had been underestimating, and the packhorses seemed to constantly be staggering into camp with filled firkins from nearby villages, or lightly walking away, bringing empty ones back. If it wasn’t for the stream cutting through the valley below, they would have had to hire on twice as many teamsters just for the water.

  Living off the land only went so far, though; Kethol’s notion of shooting game to feed the workers had quickly been dismissed by Pirojil.