"The Warrior's Bond" - читать интересную книгу автора (McKenna Juliet E.)

The D’Olbriot Residence Gatehouse, Summer Solstice Festival, Second Day, Morning

I woke to one of those moments when your cares haven’t raised their heads and you can savour a comfortable bed, crisp linen and the promise of the new day. All that was missing was Livak curled close beside me and waking to my kiss. That fancy lasted about as long as it took me to fling aside the single coverlet that was all these sultry summer nights needed. Washed, shaved and out of the gatehouse before the early sun had risen a hair’s breadth higher over the roof tiles, I found the day outside still cool. Hedges lining the walks of the grounds cast long shadows still glistening with dew as I hurried to the barracks to see if any news had turned up while I slept.

Stolley was lounging on a bench by the barracks door. “Morning, Rysh, I’ve some messages for you.”

“Thanks.” I took two letters from Stolley. “Did anything else I should know about turn up last night?”

“Maitresse Tor Kanselin sent a bowl of crystal berries from her personal hot-house.” Stolley shrugged. “A lad from Tor Bezaemar came offering their Sieur’s personal physician. Sirnis Den Viorel sent him a tisane casket this morning.”

“Anything else?” I persisted.

Stolley sucked air through the gap where he’d lost three teeth in a fistfight. “You’re expecting some growling rough with a nail-studded club asking for a private audience, are you?”

“Or a mysterious beauty claiming to be an old friend, maybe some down-on-his-luck musician begging for a hearing?” I nodded, mock serious. All these characters and more were dusted off each year for puppet shows to tempt our Festival pennies. “How about the genial old man just looking for an honest game of Raven? I could do with winning a few crowns.”

“Don’t go looking in the barracks,” Stolley warned me. “All the new blood has been warned about you.”

“Spoilsport.” So nothing out of the ordinary had caught Stolley’s eye.

“Did you get any scent last night then?” Stoll was as keen as me and everyone else in the barracks to see whoever had stabbed Temar strung up from a gibbet.

“Nothing, and I checked in with every sergeant between the hills and the sea.” I shook my head. “I’d best get some breakfast and start calling back on them.”

“It’s the lower hall for upper servants,” Stoll reminded me with a pointed nod at the main house.

I groaned. “Why do housemaids have to be so cursed shrill in the morning?” But I crossed the grounds to the main house, mindful of Esquire Camarl’s rebuke. A hall servant I knew slightly was sweeping briskly around the door as I took the steps at the run.

“Ryshad, good morning!”

“And to you, Dass.” Not inclined to stop and chat, I took the backstairs down to the whitewashed lower hall, a long basement with shallow windows high in the walls bringing light from outside. Heavy, scarred tables with backless benches were crowded with ladies’ maids, housemaids, valets and lackeys, all talking at once and all trying to make themselves heard by speaking louder than their neighbour. The babble echoed back and forth from the limewashed stone, battering my ears. I knocked at the servery built between two massive pillars that once supported the undercroft of a D’Olbriot residence built and demolished generations since.

“What can I get you?” A freckle-faced child tucked a wisp of chestnut hair back behind her ear, wiping hands on her coarse apron.

“Bread, ham, whatever fruit’s left and a tisane with plenty of white amella.” I smiled at the lass.

“Something to keep you awake?” she chuckled as she assembled my meal from the plates and baskets to hand.

“Fifth chime of midnight was sounding as I got back last night,” I admitted.

“I hope she was worth it,” she teased, suddenly older than her years.

“And Fair Festival to you,” I retorted

She laughed. “It will be once I’ve served my turn today and fetched my dancing slippers.”

Sipping my tisane with a smile puckered by its bitterness, I found a seat at the very end of a table. A few of the maids and footmen spared me a glance but were more interested in sharing their gossip with the visiting servants. I knew most faces, even if I couldn’t put a name to them, and the few newcomers were visibly escorted by resident servants. Messire’s steward wasn’t about to have the smooth running of his household disrupted by some valet not knowing where to go for hot water or how to find the laundry.

The first note was another from Mistal, wanting to know where I’d got to yesterday, so I ignored it in favour of the salt richness of dark dry-cured ham against soft white bread still warm from the oven. The second simply had my given name scrawled clumsily on the outside. I cracked the misshapen blob of unmarked wax and unfolded the single sheet as I savoured the perfumed sweetness of a ripe plum.

“What in Dast’s name is this?” I was so startled I spoke out loud.

“Sorry?” The girl beside me turned from discussing southern fashions with a maid from Lequesine. “Did you want something, Ryshad?”

“No, sorry, but Fair Festival to you anyway, Mernis.” I smiled up at her with all the charm I could muster after shock on top of a late night. “Do you know if the breakfast trays have gone upstairs yet?”

“The hall lackeys were taking them up as I was coming down.” Mernis nodded. “You’re supposed to be shepherding the young D’Alsennin, aren’t you? Didn’t do too well yesterday, from what I hear?” She wasn’t being offensive, just curious, but I wasn’t about to give any gossip to share with her friends inside the House and beyond.

“Is he awake, do you know?” I wiped my sticky hands on a neatly darned napkin before tucking the letters inside my jerkin.

“I saw the Demoiselle Tor Arrial going in to him,” volunteered a lad some way down the table, the tailor’s apprentice as I recalled.

“Many thanks.” Everyone at this end of the long table was paying keen attention now, so I gave them all a bland smile and took the backstairs to the upper floors. I took them two at a time, varnished oaken boards underfoot softened only by a strip of woven matting and limewashed walls an unadorned yellow. There was no page outside Temar’s door this morning, but a newly sworn man, sufficiently flattered by the assignment not to pine for festivities he’d be missing.

“Verd.” I nodded a greeting. “Has anyone asked after D’Alsennin?”

“A few of the maids,” he shrugged. “Always after any excuse to dally.”

“Or flirt.” I grinned. “If anyone does come sniffing around, don’t set their hackles up, but I’ll be interested to know their names.”

Verd’s pouchy eyes were shrewd. “And what do I tell them?”

“Just shake your head and look dubious,” I suggested. “See if they look like that’s good news or bad.”

I knocked and hearing a muffled summons, opened the gilt-latched door. Temar was sitting up in the massive bed, an old-fashioned piece but still monumentally impressive. Hung with valance and curtains of scarlet and ivory damask, the ornately carved posts were matched by a deeply incised headboard. Temar sat against a bank of pillows looking uncomfortably self-conscious, a tray with the remnants of a good breakfast by his knees.

“When can I get dressed?” he grimaced in frustration, looking faintly ridiculous in a frilled nightshirt.

“When I am satisfied you are fit to do so.” This crisp response came from the Demoiselle Tor Arrial, who was sitting over by the window, hair confined in a silver filigree net this morning, a touch of elegance to offset her austere mauve gown.

“Ryshad, tell them to let me out of bed,” Temar appealed. I noted the appalling bruise had faded to a purplish smear and dark stains under one eye.

“How is he?” I turned to Avila. This healing was her handiwork so she was the best judge.

“Well enough,” she allowed after a pause.

“Can I get up?” demanded Temar.

“You lost entirely too much blood for my peace of mind,” said Avila repressively. “You must not do anything strenuous for at least another full day.”

“Getting out of bed is hardly strenuous,” the youth objected. “And I cannot spend half the Festival sat here. Inside a handful of days, the leading Names will leave for country properties with cleaner water and cooler air. There are people I need to see!”

“If you overreach yourself today you risk lying flat on your back for another three.” Avila met Temar’s challenge with equal force. “How will that help us recover the missing artefacts?”

“Talagrin’s haste is Poldrion’s bounty.” Temar and Avila both looked blankly at me. “Hurrying now risks more delay in the long run? Never mind. You feel fit enough sat in your bed, Temar, but you can’t rush a head injury. I’ve seen enough novices knocked senseless on the sparring floor to know that. What about your wound? You must be feeling that cut every time you breathe?”

“Avila healed it with Artifice,” said Temar scornfully. “She took the stitches out just now.”

“Oh.” There wasn’t much I could say to that.

“But we do not want another blade wasting my efforts,” Avila said waspishly. “Were you able to run any assailant to earth last night, Ryshad?”

“Not a one.” I shook my head. “Every man sworn to D’Olbriot and every other Name that owes us will be picking up the hunt, but until we get some scent you really shouldn’t go beyond the walls of the residence, Temar, not today certainly.”

“Have you found any hint of Elietimm within the city?” Avila demanded.

“Nothing.” I shook my head. “And Dastennin be my witness, I’ve looked. Have you felt anyone else working Artifice?”

“Not a trace,” she replied. “But I will continue to search.”

Temar looked as if he were about to speak, his thin face sulky, but he quailed beneath Avila’s steely gaze.

I pulled a letter out of my jerkin. “This morning’s bad news is someone wants to put a knife in me next. Whoever’s behind this, Temar’s not their only target.”

Avila recovered first from her astonishment. “Explain yourself

“This is a declaration of challenge.” I unfolded the anonymous note I’d received and read the crisply printed pronouncement aloud. “Be it known to all men duly sworn to the service of a Prince of Toremal that Ryshad Tathel, lately sworn to D’Olbriot and newly chosen to honour that Name, stands ready to prove his merit with sword, staff and dagger. According to custom, he will meet all comers in formal combat at the noon of Solstice on the practice ground of the D’Olbriot Cohort.” I folded the sheet carefully along its creases. “All quite according to form, as you see. The only problem is, I didn’t declare for trial.”

“I am sorry but I do not understand,” said Avila testily.

“Raising a Cohort was an uncommon event in your day, wasn’t it? Tenants were called up to serve for some specific emergency?” They both nodded slowly. “Well, during the Chaos the nobility needed standing troops to defend their people and their property. That’s when the first men were sworn, as soldiery to the Houses. By the end of the Kanselin era the formal structure we use today had developed. Recognised men are the bottom rung; they wear the livery of the House and if they show themselves trustworthy the Sieur offers them his oath and they swear to him in turn. Sworn men wear the amulet to symbolise those oaths. For those who make a mark, there’s promotion to chosen man, and then proven are at the top of the ladder, those few most highly regarded by the Sieur and his Designate.”

“And this business of challenge?” Avila gestured at the paper I held.

I looked at it. “There’s not so much need for warriors these days, but sworn men serve as bodyguards when nobility travel. Each House takes its turn supplying the Cohort keeping Toremal’s peace in the Emperor’s name, season by season and festival by festival, so we all have to be useful in a fight. Only a handful of Houses still maintain sword schools.” I ticked off the names on my fingers. “D’Olbriot, Tor Kanselin, Den Haurient, Tor Bezaemar and D’Istrac, but they all take men from the other Houses and train them up.

“When a recognised man comes to take his oath, he must prove he’s a competent fighter, so he issues a challenge with letters like this posted on all the sword school doors and sent to every House’s Sergeant-at-Arms. He has to fight everyone who turns up—any sworn man that is, not just ruffians off the streets—or he forfeits the honour of being offered an oath.”

“A test of endurance as well of skill.” Temar was looking interested. “You are also supposed to do this?”

“A sworn man elevated to chosen or a chosen man raised to proven always used to issue a challenge. Those already holding the rank would test his worth for promotion.” I rubbed a hand over my chin. “But it’s seldom done these days, only if the sword school wants to put on an extra display at the end of the recognition bouts or to honour a noted swordsman.” I shook my head. “And in any case, I didn’t issue the challenge. But now it’s posted I’m honour bound to answer anyone who turns up to meet it.”

“What is the person responsible hoping to achieve?” Avila wondered.

“Beyond killing Ryshad, if they get the chance,” commented Temar with a faint grin.

I smiled humourlessly back at him. “They won’t get that chance, but humiliating me out on the sand would be a major embarrassment for D’Olbriot.” Just as injuring Temar had humiliated the Name.

“If this challenge is nothing to do with you, why take the risk?” objected Avila.

“It is a question of honour,” Temar retorted swiftly.

I was glad he’d said that. “I’ll go down to the sword school this morning, shed a little sweat getting my eye in. It’s been a season or more since I did any serious training. I can ask a few questions while I’m there.”

“I had best take up the work you were doing yesterday.” Temar threw aside the coverlet, very nearly upsetting his breakfast tray.

I looked at Avila and saw my own doubts reflected in the Demoiselle’s eyes. “You really should stay within the walls today. Until we know more, we can’t risk you.”

“You need at least a day’s more rest, my lad,” Avila told him with a quelling look. “If someone truly wishes you dead, they will not send a man to face you with an honourable blade but with a dagger to hide in the shadows again. What am I to tell Guinalle if all I return to her is your ashes in an urn?”

I looked at my boots. That was a low blow from Avila, playing on the lad’s hopeless devotion for Guinalle. I happened to know she’d been keeping company with Usara, pupil and friend of the Archmage. His scholarship and intellect were far more to her tastes than Temar’s exuberance these days. Which reminded me—I still had to ask Casuel to use his wizardry to bespeak Usara to find out what Livak was up to. I couldn’t shake the suspicion that those brothers she was so fond of might lead her astray again.

“What am I supposed to do then?” Temar demanded crossly.

I hastily concentrated on the matter in hand. “There must be useful records in the library here. Not as many as at the archive, but the Sieur’s personal clerk will be free to help you. Messire will be at the Imperial Palace all day.”

Temar was still looking mutinous.

“At least you can get dressed,” I told him with a grin.

“I am invited to gossip over tisanes with Lady Channis and Dirindal Tor Bezaemar this morning,” announced Avila, a determined glint in her eye. “We can compare what we learn at lunch.”

Temar subsided on to his pillows. “I suppose so.”

“Please excuse me.” I bowed out of the room and caught up with a pageboy delivering carafes of spring water to the bedrooms along the corridor. “Do you know if Esquire Camarl has risen yet?”

The child shook his head. “He’s still in his bed, master, not even sent down for hot water or a tisane.”

Which meant Camarl’s fiercely devoted valet wouldn’t let anyone disturb him. I wasn’t surprised; when I’d reported my lack of progress to Camarl last night it had been well past midnight and the Esquire had still been working in the library, surrounded by parchments and ledgers. Better to go and see if anyone at the sword school could shed any light on this fake challenge, I decided. Then I could report to Camarl with more than half a tale.

I headed for the gatehouse, where I made sure Stolley knew not to let Temar go out without firstly getting Camarl’s express permission and secondly surrounding the lad with a ring of swords. A heavy wagon bearing the D’Olbriot chevron on its sides was lumbering past as I walked out on to the highway and I swung myself up on the back, nodding to the lugubrious carter.

“Chosen man, now is it?” He gave my armring a perfunctory glance and spat into the road. “You should know better than come borrowing a ride from me.”

“Where’s the harm, this once?” I protested with a grin. “Everyone does it, surely?”

“Everyone sworn, maybe.” He turned to his team of sturdy mules with a dour chirrup.

I swung my legs idly as the cart ambled round the long arc of the highway little faster than walking pace, but I was content to save my energies for the exertions a morning at the D’Olbriot sword school promised. The mules needed no prompting to take an eventual turn towards the sprawl of warehouses, chandleries and miscellaneous yards that sell everything and anything brought in from the towns and estates of the Empire or ferried from overseas in the capacious galleys that ply their way along the coasts from Ensaimin and beyond. As the carter began a series of stops to fill his wagon with sacks and barrels to supply D’Olbriot’s festivities I got off and waved my thanks.

It wasn’t far to the sword school, a rough and ready cluster of buildings inside a paling fence. It’s an old joke that our Sieur’s sacks of grain are housed in more luxury than the men who’ll defend his barns. But these austere barracks are where recognised men have their mettle and commitment tested; newer accommodations up at the residence reward those sworn to the Name with more comfortable lodging. I walked inside the weathered and gaping fence, a boundary more for show than defence. If anyone was foolish enough to think there was anything here worth stealing, he’d soon find fifty swords on either hand ready to explain his mistake.

But the sandy compound was empty today. All those who usually spent their days here training and sweating were either in attendance on the Names who’d recognised them or were off taking advantage of all the distractions Festival could offer. Those who drank themselves senseless would regret it soon enough when the first day of Aft-Summer had them back on the practice ground.

I headed for the simple circular building dominating the compound, rough wooden walls built on a waist-high foundation of stone and holding a shingled roof twice the height of a man. The wide doors stood open to welcome in any breeze that might relieve the summer sun, even for a moment. Squinting in the gloom I went in, grateful for the shade, even though the full heat of the day was yet to come.

A shove sent me stumbling forward, barely keeping my feet. I broke into a run, partly to save myself from falling, partly to get away from whomever was behind me. I whirled round, drawing my sword all in one smooth move, blade arcing round to gut anyone trying for a second blow.

My sword met the blade of the man attacking me in a harsh clash of metal. My blade slid down his and the guards locked tight. Our eyes met, his gaze on a level with mine. I threw my assailant away with a sudden heave, my sword ready for his next move.

The tip of his blade hovered a scant hand’s width from mine. He moved with unexpected fury, brilliant steel flashing down to cleave my head like a melon waiting for the knife. But I wasn’t waiting. As soon as his shoulders tightened I brought my own sword up, with a sliding step to the off hand to take me out of danger. I swept my blade down on his, forcing it away, the same movement taking my own sword up and into his face, threatening to slice his throat to the spine. He stepped back, balanced on light feet, raising his sword first to protect himself and then slashing up and round to scythe into my upper body. I ducked, moved and would have had the point of my sword into his guts but he changed his strike to a downward smash. Our swords caught fast again, both of us leaning all our strength into the blades, muscles taut.

“So what was she like, your Aldabreshin whore?” He tried to spit in my face but his mouth was too dry.

“Better than your mother ever was.” I blinked away sweat stinging my eyes and running down my nose to drip on the sand. “You’re getting old, Fyle.”

“I’ll be old when you’ll be dead,” he sneered. “You can stake your stones on that.”

“First time I heard that I laughed so much I fell out of my crib.” I shook my head. “A lot of dogs have died since you were whelped, Fyle.”

We broke apart and moved in a slow circle, swords low and ready. I looked him in the eyes, seeing implacable determination. In the instant he brought up his blade I stepped in, rolling my hands to lift my sword up under his arms, the edge biting into his shirt sleeves. As he flinched, retreated and recovered to continue his downward stroke, all inside a breath, I stepped out and around, bringing a sweeping cut in from behind to hack off his head.

I rested my blade gently on his corded neck, between grizzled, close-cropped hair and his sweat-soaked collar. “Yield?”

He dropped his sword but only so he could rub the tender skin above each elbow. “That cursed hurt, Rysh.”

“Good enough?” I persisted, turning my face vainly for a cool breeze but the air was heavy and warm inside the rough wooden circle.

Fyle nodded, easing broad shoulders in a familiar gesture. “Good enough, unless someone unexpected turns up to answer the challenge.”

“So you’ve heard about that.” I sheathed my own sword and picked up Fyle’s blade, returning it to him with a bow of respect. “Any notion who might be interested?

“In taking you down a peg or two? His laughter rang up to the crudely shaped rafters. “They’ll be lining up!”

“Anyone I know in particular?” I wiped sweat from my face with my shirt sleeve.

Fyle paused, shirt open at the neck, breeches patched and sweat stained. He had more than half a generation on me, the chest hair tangling in the laces of his shirt greying, but he was still impressively muscled. “It was D’Istrac men you got into that fight with, you and Aiten.”

I sat on a plain wooden bench to ease the laces on one boot but looked up at his words. “Which fight?”

“Well, there were so many, weren’t there?” Sarcasm rasped in Fyle’s voice.

“Not so many,” I protested. “And we didn’t always start them.”

“You started that one with D’Istrac’s men though.” Fyle shook his head at me. “When you were ringing a bell about the way men raised to chosen and proven should take their turn at challenge, same as the rest, same as it always had been done. Debasing the metal of the amulet, wasn’t it?”

“But that was ten years ago,” I said slowly.

“You’d forgotten?” Fyle laughed. “Well, throw shit in the sea on the ebb and the stink’ll come back on the flow, you know that.”

“Can’t a man say stupid things when he’s young, drunk and stupid?” I pleaded, shucking my jerkin and hanging it on a peg.

“Of course,” Fyle assured me. “But older, wise and sober, you admit your mistakes.” He looked at me sternly, the scant space between his bushy eyebrows disappearing. “That’s what I reckoned when I saw that challenge posted. If you’d come to me to get my warrant, I’d have told you to forget it and just buy enough wine to sink the insult if you felt that bad about it.”

“But it’s not my challenge,” I told him. “That’s what I came to see you about. Who might have posted it in my name?”

“I’ve no idea,” said Fyle, voice muffled as he scrubbed at his face with a coarse towel.

“What about the other sword provosts?” I persisted. “Maybe someone came to them looking for a warrant?”

“No, and I went asking, ready to take a piece out of anyone’s hide who thought he could give warrant for a D’Olbriot challenge.” Fyle shook his head.

I managed a rueful grin. “So D’Istrac will be sending every chosen man they can muster, will they?”

“All those who don’t mind risking a bloody nose or a few stitches to put a crimp in their Festival rutting.” Fyle shoved wide bare feet into loose shoes. “You’ve a face like the southern end of a northbound mule! There’s no malice in it, Ryshad, but you’ve done well for yourself, got the Sieur’s ear these last few years, been sent off on Raeponin knows what duty. So you got chosen when men you trained with are still polishing up their scabbards in the barracks, and the higher a cat climbs a tree the more people want to tweak its tail.” He slapped me on the shoulder. “I’ll get us something to wash the dust out of our throats and you can tell me all about that Aldabreshin woman of yours. I’ve been wanting to hear the full story.”

Fyle went to the open door and whistled. An eager lad appeared; there are always a few hanging round any sword school, watching, learning and hoping one day to be recognised.

Fyle gave the boy coin and he ran off to fetch wine from one of the many nearby inns and taverns making their money by quenching swordsmen’s thirsts.

Young men drinking deep on empty stomachs say some brainless things. Was it that simple? Were my own foolish words coming back to mock me? Dast be my witness, I’d completely forgotten that quarrel so long past. I couldn’t even recall exactly where or when I’d been laying down the ancient law of the sword schools, intoxicated with all the vigour of youth and not a little wine. I didn’t relish explaining this to the Sieur or Camarl, admitting this challenge wasn’t some ploy to deprive the House or D’Alsennin of a valued defender but just muck trailed in from the days I’d been too dimwitted not to foul my own doorstep.

Who else would have remembered that evening? Who would care enough, after all this time to want to set me up for a fall? Why now? I’d spent a lot of time away from Toremal these last few years, but there’d been other Solstices for anyone wanting to settle that score to set their little game in play.

Aiten would have laughed, I thought gloomily. If he’d been here, he’d have been the first I’d have suspected of posting the challenge. He’d have thought it a glorious prank and then would have trained with me every waking moment so I’d walk off the sand as victor at the end of the day. But he was two years dead, all but a season and a half. Dead at Livak’s hand, but his death was owed to Elietimm malice. I knew she still fretted about the appalling choice she’d made, to kill my friend to save my life and hers when his wits had been taken from him by foul enchantment. I only hoped this distance between us wouldn’t have her doubting my assurance that I never blamed her.

Fyle returned swinging leather beakers in one hand and a blackened flagon in the other. “We’ll drink to your success tomorrow, shall we?”

“I hope there’s plenty of water in that,” I commented, taking a drink. Aiten was dead, Livak was away and I had to deal with the here and now. Someone had set a challenge and I had to meet it. If I was paying debts run up in my foolish youth, so be it. If someone planned to leave me bleeding on the sand, I’d make sure he was the one needing the surgeon. Then I’d want to know whose coin had bought his blade in defiance of every tenet of oath-bound tradition.

“We’ll lift the good stuff tomorrow,” Fyle promised, seeing my expression as I sipped. “When you’ve seen off whatever dogs come yapping round your heels.”

“You think I’ll do?” If he didn’t, Fyle would soon tell me.

“You’re the equal of any sworn man I’ve had here in the last five years,” he said slowly. “You’re young for a chosen, so you’ll face men with more experience than you, but on the other side of that coin they’ll be older, slower.” He smiled at me, the creases around his dark eyes deepening. “You were a loud-mouthed lad, but you were saying nothing we sword provosts don’t mutter among ourselves over a late night flagon. Too many chosen and proven polish up their armring and let their swords rust.”

Like Glannar, I thought sternly. “So you’ll be putting down coin to back me, will you?”

“You know I’m no man for a wager.” Fyle shook his head. “I only take risks I can’t avoid, like any sensible soldier.”

We both drank deep, thirst gripping us by the throat.

“I’d have thought you’d have had a few more tricks up your sleeve,” remarked Fyle as he refilled our beakers with the well watered wine. “Didn’t you learn anything in those god-cursed islands down south?”

“You’re not going to let that go, are you?” I laughed.

“One of our own gets sold into slavery by those worthless Relshazri, taken off into the Archipelago, where even honest traders say disease takes three men for every two the Aldabreshi kill. He fights his way out with wizards behind him and then turns up on the far side of the ocean, unearthing Nemith the Last’s lost colony, untouched by time?” Fyle looked at me, mock incredulous. “You don’t suppose I’m going to swallow that, do you? What really happened?”

I let go a long breath as I thought how best to answer him. “I was arrested in Relshaz after a misunderstanding with a trader.”

“And they claim to have a law code equal to ours,” scoffed Fyle.

I shrugged. I could hardly claim the trader was being unreasonable when he’d objected to Temar taking over my hands and wits to steal that unholy armring. “Raeponin must have been looking the other way. Some mischief loaded the scales so I got bought by an Elietimm warlord looking for a body slave for his youngest wife.” Elietimm mischief had been behind it but I wasn’t about to try explaining that to Fyle. “I did my duty by her for a season or so, jumped ship, and headed north when I got the chance.” A chance offered me by the warlord, since I’d done him the favour of exposing the treachery of another of his wives, a vicious stupid bitch being played for a fool by those cursed Elietimm. “I got caught up with the Archmage and his search for Kellarin when I took a ride on a ship to Hadrumal.” I shrugged again. “After that, I was just looking out for the Sieur’s interests.” Discovering he’d sacrifice me for the greater good of the Name without too much grief.

Fyle leaned back against some cloak left hanging on a peg. “So what kind of service does a warlord’s wife want?” From the way he loaded the word, he meant it in the stableyard sense.

I laughed. “Oh, you’ve heard the stories, Fyle.” As had I and every other man in Tormalin. The Archipelago was ruled by vicious savages who used their women in common, slaking blood lust and the other kind in orgies of cruelty and debauchery. Crudely copied chapbooks with lurid illustrations periodically circulated round the sword schools, those who could read entertaining their fellows with the titillating details. When one particularly unpleasant example had come to light in a provost’s inspection, Fyle’s predecessor had made a fire of every bit of paper in the barracks.

“Well?” Fyle demanded. “Come on! Half the lads here were expecting you to float up dead on the summer storms and the rest thought you’d be cut two stones lighter if we ever saw you alive again!”

“Luckily eunuchs have gone out of fashion in this generation.”

Fyle laughed, thinking I was joking. I leaned over to him, keeping my voice low. “Fyle, you haven’t heard the half of it.”

“Master Provost?” A shout from the far door saved me from any more questions. It was the Barracks Steward, a thick ledger under his arm.

“Duty calls.” Fyle groaned. “But I’ll have the truth out of you, Rysh, if I have to get you drunk to do it.” He pointed a blunt, emphatic finger at me.

“You can buy the brandy to celebrate my success tomorrow,” I offered.

Fyle laughed as he left. “Yes, Master Steward, what can I do for you?”

I wandered out of the far door, squinting in the bright sunlight. A few lads sat in the dust, playing a game of runes with a battered wooden set discarded by some man at arms. White Raven’s more my game; I never have that much luck with runes, unlike Livak. But then, she makes her own luck if needs be. I wandered past the long, low-roofed barracks where narrow windows shed scant light on the cramped bunks inside. The shrine was at the far end of the sword school compound, a small round building in the same pale sandy stone, ochre tiles spotted with lichen on an old-fashioned conical roof.

I went inside and sneezed, old incense hanging in the air having its usual effect. The ancient icon of Ostrin had a fresh Festival garland around its neck and the bowl in front of the plinth was filled with the ash of more than one incense stick recently burned in supplication. Fyle took his duties as nominal priest of the place more seriously than Serial, sword provost through my early training. He’d left the place to dust and cobwebs that made a greybeard out of the youthful Ostrin, holly staff in one hand and jug in the other.

I looked up at the statue, carved in some smooth soft grey stone I’d never been able to identify, much to my father’s amusement. Ostrin has many aspects endearing him to fighting men: god of hospitality, legends tell of him rewarding faithful servants and even taking up arms to defend dutiful folk being abused by the unworthy. When taking up arms leads to bloodshed, then we can beseech the god’s healing grace. These days I’d be more likely to see what Artifice could do for me, I thought irreverently.

Taking incense, steel and flint from the drawer in the plinth, I lit a casual offering in remembrance of Aiten. I’d failed to bring his body back, to be burned on the pyre ground behind this little shrine. I hadn’t even returned with his ashes, purified in some distant fire and safe in an urn to join in the serried ranks lining the curved walls, mute remembrance of all those men who’d died in D’Olbriot service and now took their ease in the Otherworld. I hadn’t even brought back his sword or his dagger, to lay in one of the dusty chests tucked behind the altar. But I had his amulet, sewn in my sword-belt, the token in earnest of our oaths. I’d lay that to rest here, I decided, when I’d taken suitable revenge, some day, somehow, when I’d won a price in blood with all the interest accrued out of some worthless Elietimm hide. Ostrin, Dastennin and any other god who cared to listen could be my witness, the Elietimm wouldn’t lay hands on Kellarin, not while I was still breathing.

Would Ostrin care for Laio Shek, the warlord’s wife? I smiled. What did the gods think of those who never even acknowledged them? But Laio had looked after me, according to her peculiar customs. No, Fyle hadn’t heard the half of life in the Archipelago. I couldn’t speak for every warlord, but Shek Kul wasn’t merely a barbarian. An astute man, he walked a difficult path in a dangerous world of shifting alliances and armed truce. He was capable of unholy cruelty; I’d seen that when he’d executed his errant wife, but by the stars of the Archipelago that had been justice. His other wives were no mere ornaments subject to his lusts and abuse either, but intelligent women who managed more commerce and underlings than the Sieurs of many a minor House.

But trying to convince the assembled swordsmen of Tormalin that everything they’d always believed was false would be as pointless as shouting defiance to Dastennin in the teeth of a gale. Fyle and some of the others might listen if I told them a few new truths along with a circumscribed tale confirming the Archipelagan reputation for erotic expertise was no exaggeration. Aldabreshin women certainly took many men besides their husbands to their beds, but that was their choice, not some dictate of brutal masters. Not that I’d sully the memory of my intimate dealings with Laio by laying every detail bare to salacious view.

I smiled. Next time I accompanied my mother to Halcarion’s shrine, on her market day visits to polish up my sister Kitria’s urn, I’d light another scrap of incense in hopes that the Moon Maiden would look favourably on little Laio.

I frowned. I’d have to watch my tongue if Fyle did ply me with white brandy. Laio had sent me on my way with enough gold to buy a sizeable tract of the upper city. Truth be told, I still wasn’t certain if she’d meant that as payment for services rendered.

Enough of this self-indulgence; I had more important things to occupy me without wasting time in idle reverie. I turned my back on the feathery wisps of blue smoke and walked briskly back to the sword school, remembering I’d left my jerkin by the door.

When I entered the echoing building I saw someone going through my pockets. I caught him by surprise and had him face down on the ground before he could draw breath. “Turned thief, have you?”

“Get off, Rysh!” My brother Mistal spat out a mouthful of dust.

“Not earning a living at the law, so you come picking my pocket?” I had his arms behind him and a knee in the small of his back. “Come on, get up. A soft lot, you lawyers.”

He struggled ineffectually. “Let me up and say that, you bastard.”

“Now that’s really worth a slapping, sullying our mother’s honour.” I let him go and stood, ready for his move.

He didn’t make one, brushing pale sand from the dull grey of his law court robes with one hand and waving two crumpled notes at me. “Is there any pissing point sending you letters?”

I was surprised at his anger. “I’ve been busy, Mist. You know what Festival’s like. I’ve no time to go admiring masquerade dancers with you.”

“This isn’t about god-cursed dancers!” Mistal thrust a letter at me. “Nor’s this one. I needed to see you!”

“Chain up your dog.” My pleasure at seeing my brother was fading fast. “I’ll write a reply while the wax is still warm on your letter next time, good enough? Dastennin help you if all you want is to show me is some curly lass who’s been flirting her skirts at you.”

Mistal opened his mouth then shut it with a sheepish grin. “Fair enough. But this is serious, Rysh.”

I was starting to realise it must be for him to leave the court precincts during daylight. If Mistal just wanted to enjoy the Festival’s entertainments with me, he’d have waited until the tenth chime of day ended all business with sunset.

“Not here.” A sword school is no place for a confidential discussion.

“Let’s take some air on the rope walk.” Mistal reached into his pocket for chewing leaf. I waved away his offer.

The sword school’s not far from the docks and we took a short cut through an alley lined with brothels doing good business with both seafarers and men-at-arms. Not that combining such trades was without its hazards; Stolley had lost those teeth of his somewhere hereabouts.

“What are you doing down here?” Mistal asked. “Shouldn’t you be dancing attendance on your Sieur instead of sparring with your friends?”

I smiled without humour. “Someone thought it a good joke to post a challenge in my name. Given young D’Alsennin nearly had his skull cracked like an egg yesterday, we think someone’s out for D’Olbriot heads to hang from their walls.”

Mistal looked sharply at me before scowling blackly in thought.

We came out on to a broad quayside, a few galleys tied up but quiet decks empty of all but a solitary watch. All their goods had been unloaded days earlier in good time for Festival buying sprees. This stretch of the sea front was owned by D’Olbriot, bollards and warehouse doors marked with the lynx for a good distance in either direction. Some whores were enjoying a brief respite on the paved walkways, plenty of room for them to stroll while the ropemakers were away enjoying their Festival along with everyone else. They’d be back on the first of Aft-Summer, stringing hemp between frames and posts, walking up and down as they turned handles twisting yarn into cables strong enough to hold the broad galleys secure in this wide anchorage and ropes for every lesser task. But for now we had space to walk and talk and not be overheard.

Mistal was looking with interest at a fetching little slattern with improbably auburn plaits. She was glancing back from beneath her painted eyelashes. He’s a handsome man, much my height and colouring but with the finer features our mother has given him, whereas I have inherited our father’s forthright jaw. But his looks would be of less interest to the whore than his dress; advocates are noted for their heavy purses. I nudged Mistal. “You had something important to say? Or do you want to try a rush up her frills?”

“She can wait.” He gripped the fronts of his robe in a pose lawyers seem to learn in their first season around the courts. “It’s this colony of yours, the one D’Olbriot’s mixed up in. Some people are looking very greedily out over the ocean.”

“Lescari mercenaries.” I nodded. “I’ve heard those rumours.”

“Lescari mercenaries?” Mistal looked incredulous. “They don’t know sheep shit from dried grapes. Rysh, your Sieur is going to walk into a hailstorm of law suits tomorrow and I don’t think he knows a thing about it.”

I stopped in my tracks. “Who’s bringing suit?”

“Tor Priminale for one.” Mistal raised one finger then a second. “Den Rannion for another. They’re claiming rights in this Kellarin colony on account of ancestral due.”

“How so?” We started walking again.

“As the Houses who originally backed the colony. They claim a share of the land, the minerals, timber, animals. Whatever’s been turned into coin already, they want a penny in the Mark paid up prompt.”

“Can they do that?” I wondered.

“They can make an argument for it,” Mistal said grimly. “I don’t know how strong, but regardless, it’ll tie your Sieur up in parchment tapes until Winter Solstice.”

“How do you know all this?” Lawyers are bound by oaths they hold no less dear than we swordsmen, oaths of confidentiality and good faith, sworn to Raeponin and enforced with crippling penalties if respect for the God of Justice doesn’t keep them honest.

“I was asked to submit a reading on the question,” replied Mistal scornfully. “Along with every other advocate who’s ever argued a case on rights in property. Not because they wanted my opinion but to make sure that if D’Olbriot came looking for my services I’d have to cry off on account of prior interest.” He laughed without humour. “Not that a Name like D’Olbriot is ever going to come looking for representation in the stalls where lowly advocates like me ply our trade.”

“But whoever’s behind this didn’t want to leave any rabbit hole unnetted before he sent in his ferrets.” I was getting the measure of this now. “Tor Priminale is bringing suit? But the Demoiselle Guinalle is still alive, over in Kellarin. If the Name has any rights over there, she’d be their holder. Den Fellaemion was her uncle, and I’m sure he’d have willed his portion to her.” I’d have to ask Temar about that.

“Who’s to say it’s really her?” Mistal demanded. “Who’s to say she’s still in her right mind after Saedrin knows how long under some cursed enchantment? I’ll bet my robes against Mother’s ragbag that someone’s drawing up arguments like that to set aside her claims.”

“D’Olbriot can bring any number of witnesses to vouch for her wits,” I said scornfully.

“D’Olbriot witnesses?” queried Mistal. “Anyone impartial? Wizards, perhaps? Mercenaries?”

“She’d have to present herself, wouldn’t she?” I said slowly. “Stand up in a court she’s never seen, subject to laws she knows nothing of, harried with questions she’ll struggle to understand. If she does answer, that ancient accent’ll make her sound half-witted regardless.”

“She might well prove herself competent,” Mistal allowed, “but she’ll be spending Aft-Summer and both halves of Autumn in court to do it.”

“When she’s one of the only two people with any real authority in Kellarin. How are they supposed to manage without her? I’m sorry.” I shook my head. “I should have come to see you.”

“I could have made myself clearer,” said Mistal in some regret. “But I didn’t dare put this down on paper.” He looked round but there was no one within earshot. Even the pretty little whore had found some other amusement.

“I’ll keep your name out of it when I tell the Sieur,” I promised soberly. If word of this got out no one would ever trust Mistal again and that would be the end of the legal career he’s spent so many years pursuing.

“There’s more.” Mistal sighed. “Even allowing for Justiciary oaths, there are whispers in the wind. If Tor Priminale or Den Rannion get so much as a hearing, Den Muret will bring suit at Autumn Equinox and probably Den Domesin as well.”

I gaped at him. “Both of them?”

He nodded firmly. “And you were saying your Demoiselle Tor Priminale’s so important to Kellarin? I take it Esquire D’Alsennin’s just as significant?”

“Temar?” I stopped again, boot heels rapping on the stone.

“Tor Alder are bringing suit to have the D’Alsennin Name declared extinct,” said Mistal flatly. “Apparently your Temar’s mother married some Tor Alder back in the last days of the Old Empire. She bore him two sons and when the old Sieur ’Alsennin died he left what remained of his holdings to that Tor Alder line, in trust against Temar or his sons ever coming back.”

“All signed and sealed and locked in a deed box for generations?” I almost laughed at the irony.

“You know what those ancient Houses are like,” Mistal nodded. “They save every inky scribble down from the days of Correl the Potent. It’s been Tor Alder’s title to some of the best lands around Ast and a tidy stretch of property on the south side yonder.”

I looked out over the wide bay of Toremal, iridescent sea sparkling in the sunlight, ruffed here and there with white foam. The shore came sweeping round from distant northern headlands to the far-flung sandy stretches of the southern reaches, arms spread wide to welcome ships into a safe embrace. I’d no idea what land over there had been worth in Temar’s era but nowadays the rents would likely pay for a fleet of ships to serve Kellarin and all the supplies he could load on them.

“How can they declare the Name extinct?” I demanded. “Temar’s still alive.”

“Only just, from what I heard yesterday in the tisane houses,” Mistal pointed out. “And even if some dark sorcery brought him back from the brink of death—”

“Sadrin’s stones!” I objected.

“That’s what they’re saying,” insisted Mistal. “Anyway, even if he is alive with all his wits under his hat, there’s only the one of him, an Esquire, no Sieur, no badge, no nothing as far as law codes written after the Chaos are concerned.”

“Anything else?” I hoped for a shake of Mistal’s head.

He smiled. “Just Den Thasnet arguing that D’Olbriot Land Tax should be assessed against the entire extent of Kellarin henceforth, given that House is the only beneficiary of all those resources.”

“They can go piss up a rope,” I said before I could stop myself.

“Quite possibly a case to argue.” Mistal struck a lawyerly pose on the clean-swept cobbles. “The sons of that House have been splashing their inheritance all over their boots since they could stand straight enough to hold out their pizzles, my lord Justiciar.”

I laughed briefly. “Shit, Mist, this is serious.”

“It is,” he agreed, letting his grey robe fall back on his shoulders. “And clever, because if Den Thasnet’s argument is dismissed, that just strengthens Tor Priminale and the rest.”

“If Den Thasnet’s upheld?” Was there some legal point to counter the obvious conclusion?

“Then D’Olbriot has the choice of bankrupting the House to pay the taxes or acknowledging Tor Priminale and all the others in a counter suit.” Mistal confirmed my worst suspicions.

We’d reached the far end of the quay by now, where a collection of little boats had been left high and dry by the tide. We turned back, both walking in silence, arms folded and brows knotted in thought, strides matching pace for pace.

“ ‘Clever’ and ‘Den Thasnet’ aren’t words you often use in the same breath,” I said after a long pause.

“Indeed not.” Mistal looked down at his hands, twisting the ring that signified his pledge to the Emperor’s justice. “They’re puppets in this, I’ll lay my oath on that.”

“So who’s pulling their strings?” I demanded angrily. “This stinks worse than cracked shellfish.”

“Which is why I wanted to warn you,” said Mistal grimly. “My oath’s supposed to protect those dealing with good faith, not shield someone using the law as a stalking horse for their own malice.”

“How long have you known about this?” I asked.

“I was asked to draw up an opinion on Festival Eve,” Mistal answered. “Which is what made me suspicious. There’s no way anyone could come up with a winning argument in that time. It had to be a tactic to spoil the spoor for anyone else.”

“But someone’s willing to pay sound coin to do that,” I pointed out. “If you’re saying every clerk and advocate got the same retainer, that’s a fair sack of gold someone’s spending.”

“And they don’t mind risking word leaking out, not at this stage,” Mistal commented. “They’re sure of themselves, which means someone’s had archivists and advocates working on this for some while.”

“Lawyers won’t break a confidence, but where do archivists and clerks go to wash library dust out of their throats?” I wondered.

“Who put the notion of a legal challenge in the Sieur Tor Priminale’s head?” queried Mistal. “And Den Rannion, Den Domesin and Den Muret, all at one and the same time? One bright clerk coming up with the idea, I could believe. Two? Perhaps in closely allied Houses, but the last time Tor Priminale and Den Rannion worked together on anything must have been your cursed colony. Four Names all going to law at the same time, every clerk in the town sent scurrying round the archives and every advocate retained? You’d need that gambler girl of yours to work out the odds against that being happenstance.”

I felt a pang at Mistal’s dismissive reference to Livak. I’d expected our older brothers Hansey and Ridner to take against her, but I’d hoped Mist would like her. I looked at him. “You say word of this will be getting out?”

“That D’Olbriot’s going to be hip deep in horseshit tomorrow? You know what this town is like, Rysh.” Mistal shrugged. “Some clerk, some advocate’s runner will reckon that’s too ripe a morsel to keep to himself.”

“Dast’s teeth,” I cursed. “I owe you for this, Mist, and so does the Sieur. Will I see you round the courts tomorrow?”

He hesitated. “I can be seen with my brother but only if you’re alone. Whoever’s behind this won’t waste a breath before accusing me of bad faith if I’m seen talking to anyone representing D’Olbriot without good reason.”

I nodded. “Then you can walk back to safer streets with me. I can’t leave you here in your nice clean robes for any passing footpad to club.”

“Just remember who’s the oldest here,” Mistal warned me.

“Just remember what Mother said the last time she found a cure for the scald in with your dirty linen. I’m not leaving you near all these brothels.”

We bickered amiably enough all the way back to the lower end of the Graceway, where Mistal turned off to head back to the warren of crumbling stone and worm-ridden wood that makes up the Imperial Courts of Law. I hailed a hireling gig and told the driver to get me back to D’Olbriot’s residence as fast as his whip could manage.