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

Esquire Camarl’s Study, the D’Olbriot Residence, Summer Solstice Festival, Second Day, Afternoon

I came straight here to warn you.” I concluded my explanation of Mistal’s news and waited for the Esquire’s reaction, hands behind my back and feet a quarter-span apart. The calm stance belied my inner agitation, my desire to be out running rumour and suspicion to ground.

Camarl was sitting by the window, a small table at his side piled high with correspondence. He turned a carved ivory paper knife slowly in his hands. “This is certainly ominous news, as is this business of someone posting a challenge in your name. You should have told me about that this morning, before going off to the sword school.” He looked up at me, raising the ivory knife even though I’d made no move to speak. “I’m not going to bandy words with you. Chosen or not, Ryshad, you have to keep me informed. Is there any other news, anything about the attack on D’Alsennin?”

I sighed. “Last night I went round every barracks where I’ve friends, every Cohort I’ve shared duty with, asked every watchman hired for Festival that I could find. If any of them knew anything or even suspected, they’d have told me by now. I’ll wager my oath fee there are no Elietimm in the city, but I can’t swear any more than that. I’ve still got a few people to check back with, but I don’t think they’ll have anything different to tell.”

“You can send one of the sworn from the barracks to fetch and carry messages. I want your help looking for answers in different places.” Camarl smiled to take any rebuke out of his words. “I’m going to a meeting of my art society this afternoon.” Camarl indicated the discreet elegance of his sober clothing with a hand bearing a solitary silver band enamelled with the D’Olbriot lynx. “I meet men of all ranks there and I’ll hear a certain amount of the gossip about D’Alsennin, Kellarin and the rest, but everyone knows my Name, so most will guard their tongues. I think you should come with me, Ryshad. No one knows you, so you might catch some indiscretion.”

“If I ask the right questions,” I agreed slowly. It wouldn’t be the first time I’d kept eyes and ears open for the House’s benefit. There was far more to being a sworn man in this day and age than simply swinging a sword. “But are you sure I won’t be recognised?” I spent a good few years serving in Toremal before the Sieur sent me out on his various commissions to ride the vast D’Olbriot estates.

“No one looks at a sworn man’s face,” Camarl said carelessly. “You’ll just have been another nameless body in livery.”

“Am I dressed for the part?” I was in plain breeches and a nondescript jerkin, good-quality cloth and well cut but nothing special.

“Quite appropriate, for a mason from Zyoutessela, wouldn’t you say?” said Camarl with an approving smile. “There’ll be other artisans there, as well as traders and nobles. It’s one of the reasons I joined, to widen my acquaintance beyond my own rank.”

“What does the Sieur think of that?” I asked.

Camarl wrinkled his nose. “He agrees it’s a regrettable necessity of this era.”

I laughed, hearing the Sieur’s dry wit in the words.

“I have letters that need an answer.” Camarl nodded to his personal scrivener, who was sitting patiently in a corner of the room. “I’ll see you at the gatehouse shortly, Ryshad. Get something to eat if you need it.”

The lower hall was full of kitchen maids and scullions now, drab in washed-out gowns and shirts shapeless with repeated boiling. They gossiped idly, enjoying some respite before embarking on the myriad preparations for a series of private dinners in the smaller salons and the more ceremonial banquet that the Sieur would host that evening. Lady Channis always made sure no formal lunches were planned for days when the House entertained in the evening. The pot-washers and vegetable-peelers cast envious glances at the cooks, everyone plainly ranked by their chapped hands. The lowest slaveys from the scullery were scarlet to the wrist; the premier pastrycooks and the Master of the Kitchens could afford discreet lace at their cuffs and scrupulously manicured nails.

I took bread and cheese from platters on a table and went out to the gatehouse, where I knew I could cadge a glass of wine from Stoll. We had scant moments to wait before Camarl’s personal gig arrived, and the Esquire wasn’t long in coming.

The groom jumped down and swung himself up on the back step as the Esquire took the reins. As Camarl drove us down to the lower city with habitual competence, I turned to the groom on the perch behind us. He was staring ahead, face as impassive as the carved cats’ masks on the side panels, and he wouldn’t meet my eye. I really was going to have to get used to being one of those served rather than serving.

The bright sunlight was touched with the faintest hint of salt on a breeze from the distant harbour as Camarl turned off the encircling road down the main highway that runs clear across the lower city to the bay. The ancient walls of Toremal soon appeared between the rooftops, once mighty bastions in their day but now hemmed in all around with buildings nearly as high. Camarl got his horse in hand as we went beneath the sturdy arch of the Spring Gate and we emerged into the sunshine gilding the Graceway. Great mansions had been packed close within the old city walls in the uncertain days of earlier generations and the Names had guarded their privileges jealously. Nowadays the iron gates, with their badges of gilded bronze high above the heads of the crowd, stand open but rank still counts for something. It’s only those with a genuine amulet bearing recognised insignia that may use the wide, well-made street marching straight to the sea. I saw a woman trying to saunter past the duty guard with a beribboned basket held high in her arms and smiled as she was turned back to take the longer route through the tangle of lesser roads spreading ever wider beyond the walls. We were passed with a curt nod from the Den Janaquel man standing sentry, pike butt resting by one hobnailed boot.

“Do you know anyone sworn to Den Janaquel?” Camarl asked as we whipped the horse to a trot in the comparatively empty road. “They’re providing the Duty Cohort for the Festival, so they’ll hear more news than anyone else.”

“I’ve never had dealings with the House but I’ll see if I can get an introduction through the sword school.” Stoll probably knew someone, or if he didn’t Fyle would. Fyle knew everyone.

Out of long habit I noted changes to the buildings lining the Graceway. What had once been a Den Bradile mansion was being refaced with pale new marble; trim, rational lines replacing the curlicues of an earlier age. The handful of shops now sharing the fa#231;ade were getting broad new windows with deep sills for the better display of elegant trinkets for ladies, costly feathers and expensive lace. Further along a seamstress who’d been a tenant of Den Thasnet since before I’d come to Toremal had given up her lease to be replaced by some hopeful new tailor owing duty to the Name. His frontage was brightly decked to attract both year-round residents and those eager to buy the latest fashions on their once-yearly trip to this hub of sophistication.

This wasn’t Bremilayne, where I had little local knowledge and few contacts. This wasn’t chasing backwoods rumour in a fruitless quest for Elietimm sneaking into Dalasor to rob and maim. Whoever had attacked Temar had stepped on my ground. They had to have left tracks. Someone would get a scent, sooner or later.

“And here we are.” Camarl’s words broke into my thoughts. We were outside a tisane house, once a wing of some long-vanished residence. Now it boasted a brightly painted sign telling all and sundry that Master Lediard could supply the finest aromatics and spices and the most luxurious premises in which to enjoy them.

Camarl handed the reins to his groom. “Call for me at eighth chime.” He pressed a negligent silver Mark into the man’s palm but all I could offer was a smile so I hurried after the Esquire. I prefer wine to tisanes as a rule but I could get used to drinking them in these surroundings. This was no futile attempt to drag a failing tavern up the social scale by offering hot water and stale herbs in place of ale.

Comfortable chairs ringed sturdy tables set just far enough apart to stop people hearing other conversations. Most tables were spread with parchments, ledgers and counting frames, since tisanes have always been popular with men of business, who might lose more than the cost of the flagon if they let wine blunt their acuity. Some men bent solitary over their documents, some sat in twos and threes deep in talk, others relaxed with one of the latest broadsheets, plentiful copies racked by the door. A baize-covered panel beside it was crisscrossed with leather straps holding letters tucked securely beneath. A lad was emptying folded and sealed sheets out of a box below it. The nobility have the Imperial Despatch to carry their letters but the middle ranks have to rely on these more informal arrangements between tisane houses and inns.

I overhead a snatch of intense discussion as Camarl let a lass in a dull blue gown slip past with a tray laden with little bowls of spice.

“I’ll take a fifth share in the cargo, against covering you if the ship’s lost.”

“Toremal value or Relshaz value?”

“Relshaz value at Equinox’s best prices.”

“But what if they’re delayed by bad weather? Prices could be falling by the time they arrive.”

“That’s your risk, friend. Mine’s the ship sinking.”

The man beside us selected some ivory tags from a shallow tray in the middle of his table. He handed them to a girl who took them to a sharp-eyed woman behind a long counter.

“We’re upstairs,” said Camarl back over his shoulder.

As I followed him, I noticed the woman spooning the required herbs from the vast array of canisters on the shelves at her back. As the maid delivered the tisane ingredients to her waiting customer, another arrived with cups, tisane balls and a jug of steaming water, carried carefully from the far end of the room where a red-faced man tended an array of kettles on a vast range that greedily consumed the coal shovelled into its open maw by an ash-stained lad.

I followed the Esquire up a panelled staircase to find the whole first floor of the building was opened into a single room. Tables and chairs ranged around the walls were largely ignored by the busy crowd all talking at once in the middle. Plain coats, everyday jerkins and practical boots were the order of dress, though the discerning eye would see Camarl’s clothes were a cut above the rest in both cloth and tailoring.

“D’Olbriot!” A burly man in an ochre coat strained at the buttons waved at Camarl.

“Fair Festival, Master Sistrin,” he replied cheerfully.

“Let’s hope so.” Sistrin planted hands on hips as he jutted his chin at a younger man wearing the brooch of a minor House on his jerkin. “What does D’Olbriot think of some of us traders setting up our own academy with our own funds?”

“Endowing schools has always been the honour and duty of the nobility,” the young man said politely. I managed to place the badge; a cadet line of Den Hefeken.

“But we have more sons wanting places than the established colleges can supply,” commented a third man, accents of the merchant class ringing in his voice. “Learning letters and reckoning in a dame-school may have been enough for our fathers and forefathers, but times have changed.”

“If we endow a school, we have a say in what they teach.” Sistrin jabbed an emphatic finger at Den Hefeken. “Rhetoric and precedence in Convocation and what House holds which priesthood aren’t much use to my boy. He needs mathematics, geography, drawing up a contract and knowing which law codes back it up. Come to that, we’ve daughters who’d do well to learn more than sewing a seam or playing a pretty spinet.”

“With all D’Olbriot’s mining interests, you could do worse than teach your Esquires some natural science,” sniffed the third man.

“I quite agree, Palbere,” Camarl nodded. “Our tutors having been doing just that since the turn of the year, assisted by some newcomers from Hadrumal.”

“Wizards?” Sistrin laughed heartily. “That’d be unnatural science, then would it?”

Did I feel an unusual disapproval chill the air at the mention of wizards? Den Hefeken’s face was a well-bred blank but Palbere was scowling

Camarl continued, unconcerned. “I’d prefer my cousins learned their lessons alongside your nephews, Sistrin, rather than see schools divided by rank or trade. They’ll pick up some understanding of your glass trade, and shared knowledge is always a road to common prosperity.”

Palbere sipped at a steaming tisane. “Talking of roads, is it true D’Olbriot plans on digging a canal to cut the loop of the Nyme around Feverad? Will you be bringing wizards in to do the work of honest labourers there?”

“Feverad merchants first mooted the plan,” said Camarl cautiously. “They’ve suggested D’Olbriot might care to back the project and magical assistance makes such tasks considerably faster and safer.”

“So you’ll be taking the revenues off the rest of us when it’s built?” Den Hefeken asked with careful neutrality.

“If it’s built, and surely we’d be entitled to recoup our outlay?” Camarl looked at each man in turn. “Of course, those costs would be considerably reduced by employing wizards’ skills.”

Sistrin drew breath on some further argument but Camarl raised an apologetic hand. “Forgive me gentlemen, I have a guest with me today. May I make known Ryshad Tathel, stone mason of Zyoutessela.”

Several nearby heads turned away from their conversations to note my name and I smiled as benignly as I could.

“Are you sponsoring him to the society?” Sistrin asked belligerently.

“If he decides it’s for him,” smiled Camarl before drawing me politely away.

“That’s one man won’t leave you wondering about his opinions,” I commented in a low voice.

“Which makes him very useful, because what he says ten men more discreet are thinking,” agreed Camarl. “And he’s usually first with any hint of scandal, while Palbere has a nose for business second to none.”

“Do you do anything even vaguely connected to art here?” I grinned.

“Over here.” Camarl kept pausing to greet people but we finally edged our way through to the far end of the room, where tables in the better light under the windows were covered with books of engravings and single sheets of inked and coloured paper. “Boudoir art is over there,” indicated Camarl with a smile, “next to the satires and lampoons. We pride ourselves on being an open-minded society.”

Both artwork and model would doubtless be a considerable improvement on the grubby woodcuts that circulated round the barracks but neither interested me when all I had to do was shut my eyes and think of Livak. I picked up a small portfolio. “Plants of the Dalasor Grasslands?” I opened it on a beautifully detailed painting of a yellow heather.

“Several of our members are natural philosophers,” nodded Camarl. “And as a mason, you might be interested in the architectural drawings over there.”

“Esquire, might I have a word?” A long-faced elder with depressed dewlaps framing a downturned mouth appeared at Camarl’s shoulder. “Master Ganalt, of course.”

I noted the old man wore the silver-leaf collar of a shrine fraternity, something you don’t see so often these days.

“It’s the shrine to Talagrin on the Solland road,” Ganalt began after a hesitant glance at me. “It’s on Den Bradile land and the priesthood’s in their family, naturally, but the local people have always been faithful to the Hunter—” The old man fell silent.

“Is there some problem?” prompted Camarl.

“There’s rumour Den Bradile intend making it a private cinerarium, even planning to removing urns already consecrated there unless they’re linked to the Name in some way.” He lifted an unconscious hand to his silver rowan leaves, emblem of the Lord of the Forest. “We might use our funds to build another shrine, but we’re pledged to helping the poor…” He broke off with another dubious look at me.

“Excuse me, Esquire, I’d like to look at some of those plans you mentioned.” I nodded as much of a bow as I could in the confined space and slid past two men chuckling over a vivid satire. The architectural drawings included a series of maze designs, something increasingly fashionable in recent years, and I studied them with interest.

“The trick is matching suitable mathematical complexity with the tenets of Rationalism,” commented a man coming to stand next to me.

“And finding shrubs that grow fast enough to make a maze worth having before the whole thing goes out of fashion?” I suggested.

“There’s that,” he agreed. “Which is why this year’s innovation is patterns laid out in bricks between little raised banks. I believe a Den Haurient gardener suggested it but the Rationalists will tell you it’s so the logic of the whole can be better appreciated by seeing the whole design.”

I laughed, picking up an interesting perspective on new alterations to an old frontage.

“I hear you’re a mason?” remarked my new companion. “From the south?”

“Zyoutessela,” I kept my tone as casual as his.

“Is there plenty of work?” he asked with interest.

“The city’s thrice the size it was in my grandsire’s day,” I nodded. “He hired himself from site to site with little more than a bag of tools and rock-hard determination to better himself. When he died, he left my father a sizeable yard and me and now my brothers work three sites.”

“They say a good block of stone rings like a bell,” remarked my would-be acquaintance with studied idleness.

“If you strike it right, and there’s a tang to fine stone, like rotten eggs.” Hansey and Ridner were welcome to all the smells, the dust, the noise and headaches that went with the trade.

“Redvar Harl, Master Carpenter.” He bowed and I returned the courtesy. “I saw you arrive with Esquire Camarl? Are you D’Olbriot tenants?”

He was very interested in me for a complete stranger but I didn’t think he was about to stab me in an entire room of witnesses. “We are.”

“There must be all manner of opportunities in the south, what with D’Olbriot sponsoring this colony overseas,” my new friend mused.

“It offers some intriguing possibilities,” I said in neutral tones.

My companion stared out of the window. “D’Olbriot will want to do the best for their tenants, but if this land’s as big as rumour has it Esquire Camarl might do well to think in rather broader terms.”

I nodded silent encouragement.

“I’m from Solland. I take it you’ve heard about the fighting in Parnilesse, after the old Duke’s death?”

It wasn’t hard to see my next step in this dance. “Down in the south, we don’t hear that much about border matters.”

“D’Olbriot has holdings around Solland, so the Sieur will be fully aware of the Lescari land question.” Master Harl turned to look intently at me. “The Lescari still cling to their foolish system of all land going to the eldest born. Then they breed like the rabbits that infest their hills, whelping useless younger sons left landless and looking for a quarrel. Poldrion knows how much grief could be saved if those surplus spawn could be shipped across the ocean, to make their way in a new land by their own efforts.”

“That’s an interesting notion,” I said slowly. “I’d be interested to know what Esquire Camarl might make of it.” I could guess Temar’s reaction.

Master Harl’s eyes shifted to a point behind my shoulder.

“Excuse me, there’s someone I must wish a Fair Festival.”

I turned to see whom he meant but Camarl stepped into my line of sight, a carefully constructed expression of amusement on his face. “Now, Ryshad, what do you make of this?”

He handed me a crisp sheet of paper printed with a hand-coloured satire. A wedding carriage was being drawn through the streets of Toremal by the D’Olbriot lynx on the one hand and the Tor Tadriol bull on the other. This wasn’t the robust “ animal of the Emperor’s badge but a sickly calf with a foolish expression and comical spotted hide. The high-stepping lynx topped it by a head, looking down with avid eyes and sharp teeth exposed in a hungry smile. The Emperor himself was in the carriage, an unexceptional portrait but plainly recognisable. I tapped the face of the girl beside him, a vapid beauty with an unfeasibly large bosom. “Is this anyone I should know?”

“No one in particular.” Camarl shook his head, fixed smile still not reaching his eyes. “But I’ve a full handful of cousins of an age and breeding to make a good match for Tadriol. Most are here for Festival, naturally enough.”

I studied a capering fool in the foreground throwing handfuls of fire and lightning up into the air, stunning a few thatch birds in the process. The onlookers were barely sketched in but a few eloquent lines deftly conveyed expressions of contempt, ridicule and dissatisfaction. “Do you reckon that’s Casuel?”

The Esquire’s smile widened and did reach his eyes. “He’d hardly be flattered to think so. But few people know him and those that do find him inoffensive to the point of tedium. That’s one of the reasons we agreed to him being Planir’s liaison; no one could possibly see him as a threat.”

“Whoever drew this certainly doesn’t like the idea of magic’ I pointed to a hooded figure in sooty robes stalking behind the carriage, people drawing back from his ominous shadow. “Would that be Planir the Black, do you suppose?”

“The name’s a gift to satirists, isn’t it?” muttered Camarl with irritation.

“An apprentice joke, as I understand it,” I explained, “on account of him being a coal miner’s son.”

“We all have to take jokes in good part, don’t we?” Camarl’s eyes were cold and calculating once again. “Why don’t you see what other people here make of the jest?”

I weighed the paper in my hand and studied the detail of the picture. Engraving a plate to that standard was no overnight task. “There’s coin backing this artist.” I looked for a signature but couldn’t find one.

“An unusually retiring satirist, now there’s a novelty.” Camarl was clearly on the same scent as me. “Why don’t I see if someone can point me in his direction? After all, a talent like that deserves encouragement.”

“I’d say he’s already got some noble patron,” I observed.

“Quite likely,” agreed Camarl. “And perhaps he’ll be prepared to say who, in return for a commission to create as handsome a joke at their expense, along with some D’Olbriot gold.”

Several heads close by turned at the Esquire’s words, expressions eager. Genteel dispute between two great Houses would certainly liven up Festival, with scurrilous pictures to snigger over for a few coppers and discreet hints of scandal spicing up the usually stodgy fare of the broadsheets.

I’d track down the printer, I decided. There was no hope of stopping such things circulating: with books so costly, printers with mouths to feed need every copper they can tempt folk to spare on a sheet of gossip or a lewdly entertaining picture. But a few crowns might buy me some clue as to this tidbit’s origin.

“Let’s see what we can find out,” I said softly. I wasn’t about to forget the Elietimm but I reckoned we had more serious concerns now, enemies closer at hand, enemies who knew how to use oath-bound ritual, the law courts and the thriving social networks of the city against us. And they weren’t above knives in the back either, I reminded myself.

“Have you seen this?” I tapped a stranger on the arm in friendly fashion, introduced myself and we shared a chuckle over the satire. He offered an unsubtle depiction of some recent excesses by the younger Esquires Den Thasnet, which prompted his companion, a linen draper, to warn me against working for that House, claiming they were notorious bad debtors.

By the time I’d worked my way round the gathering and drunk more tisane than I usually do in a season, I was well up to date with the latest scandals, intrigues, births, deaths and marriages of Houses from the highest to the most lowly. I also shared in plenty of conversations where the nobility barely warranted a mention, an unaccustomed reminder of the life I’d known before I’d sworn myself to D’Olbriot, when the Name was merely a faceless rent office and a vague promise of help should some crisis strike our family. It was an interesting way of spending an afternoon but what I didn’t hear was any particular malice directed at D’Olbriot, D’Alsennin or Kellarin. There was plenty of speculation, but most of these solid men of business were more interested in debating the potential opportunities and hazards of a new trading partner on the far side of the ocean.

Esquire Camarl signalled to me from the far side of the room and I made my excuses to an apothecary who’d been displaying considerable if completely ill-informed interest in Artifice.

“I have to go, I’m expected at Den Haurient for some discussions and then dinner.” Camarl was looking just a trifle exasperated. “I have to go back to dress.”

“I’ve not heard anything significant,” I told him with regret.

He let out a slow breath. “Stay for a while longer. People may let some indiscretion slip if I’m not here.”

“I’ll keep my ears pricked,” I promised.

But the Esquire wasn’t the only one engaged to dine elsewhere and his departure prompted a growing number to make their excuses. The determined core who remained began pulling chairs into comradely circles and called for wine rather than tisanes from Master Lediard’s obliging maidservants.

I was going to look conspicuous if I tried to inveigle myself into those tight groups of long-standing friends, I decided.

These men might not realise I was one of D’Olbriot’s chosen, but they knew at very least I was a tenant of the House. The casual atmosphere where someone might let slip a hint by accident or design had evaporated.

I made brief farewells to a few of my new acquaintances and left. Standing out on the flagway, I wondered what to do next as leisurely couples went strolling past arm in arm now the heat of the day had faded and the rich and elegant came out to admire each other in all their Festival finery.

I could go back and kick my heels in the gatehouse, waiting to tell Camarl I’d learned nothing new, I thought, or I could do something more useful with my time. It was all very well the Esquire telling me to send sworn and recognised about my errands but I could hardly expect them to explain all the complexities of Temar’s search for his lost artefacts, could I? I had enough trouble making that tale sound convincing, and I’d been part of it.

I made up my mind and turned down the Graceway. Revellers were spilling out of taverns and inns with their goblets and beakers of wine and ale, so I stepped into the roadway. There was little enough traffic and, armring or not, most people hereabouts looked for me to step aside for them. I worked my way down to the heart of the old city. Here the Graceway crosses the Primeway, the ancient highway running parallel with the shore and leaving Toremal by the gates that guard the highroads to north and south. A fountain stands in the centre of the vast square formed by the crossroads, Saedrin looking to the east, Poldrion to the west and Raeponin with hands stretched to north and south, eyes raised to the skies. Years ago, word was, it had been a shrine dedicated by some long-dead Emperor in the days before the Chaos, now it was merely an inviting display of cool water where people could meet. Open coaches circulated round it, moving slowly for the better display of Festival finery.

The Popinjay is one of the bigger inns on the edge of this square, dominating the corner to the north and east. The ninth chime of the day was sounding from a variety of bell towers as I forced my way past the exuberant youths heedlessly blocking the doors. That earned me some hard looks but no one was bold or drunk enough to try taking me on. A glance at my armring was enough to make most clear my path.

“Banch!” I yelled over the clamour of people trying to catch a potman’s eye or a maidservant’s apron. “Banch!”

The burly tapster surveying the tumult with the calm eye of long experience turned his head. He waved a hand the size of a shovel at me and I pushed my way through to the counter. “Ryshad.” He handed over a tall flagon of ale, tucking the silver in a pocketed apron belted below his barrel of a gut.

“Have you seen Yane? Sworn to Den Cotise? I was here with him yesterday.” I leaned over the scored and puddled wood, lowering my voice to a muted bellow. Yane would be on duty again tonight, as soon as the first chime of night sounded, but he’d said he’d be meeting his sweetheart here and her mistress was usually done with her by the last chime of the day. She was the dresser to Tor Sylarre, who’d found the whole tale of Temar’s quest so romantic.

“Out the back with Ezinna.” Anger darkened Banch’s pocked moon of a face and he slammed up the counter top to come out and grab a couple of lads by the scruffs of their expensive coats. I don’t know where people found the room but everyone stepped aside as he threw the two offenders out into the gutter. One started to argue so I left Banch to explain the error of his ways and ducked through a far door.

Even with pot lids clanging, knives and cleavers hitting boards and the dog turning the roasting spit yelping in its treadmill, the kitchen was still quieter than the taproom. A handful of girls were busy on all sides, a pause for more than a breath earning them new instructions from the stout woman ruling her domain with a gesturing iron spoon.

“Cut more bread and then baste that beef before it dries out!” Ezinna cuffed a pinch-faced lass lightly round the ear to emphasise her orders. I stepped hastily aside as the gawky girl yelped, burning her fingers on the ladle resting in the dripping tray beneath the meat, splashing hot fat as she dropped it.

“Where’s Yane?” I asked Ezinna.

She tucked a wisp of hair dyed raven black behind one ear, the rest drawn back with a spotted kerchief that might once have been yellow to match her faded dress. Grey showed at the roots. “Out in the scullery.” Ezinna’s habitual smile vanished.

“What’s happened?” I frowned.

“It’s Credilla.” Ezinna shook her head in resignation. “Go on with you, you’re in the way. Have you eaten?” Ezinna grabbed a crumbling slice of bread from one girl’s passing basket and wrapped it round a thick slice of beef. She sent me on my way with a shove before turning to give the hapless bread girl a lesson in how many a loaf was supposed to serve if the inn wasn’t to be ruined by the baker’s bills.

Soiled crockery was stacked high in the scullery, waiting for two little girls standing on rough boxes by deep stone sinks. Neither was working very fast, round eyes in round faces gawping at Credilla sobbing into Yane’s shoulder.

“Credie, flower, Credie.” He looked over her head at me with a mixture of relief and stifled rage.

“What’s happened?”

Credilla’s sobs shuddered into a whimper and she turned around, chestnut hair tangled over her pretty face. It didn’t hide the ugly bruise disfiguring her, a great welt of purple and black high on one cheekbone, swelling half closing her eye and blood crusted around a cut that must have come from a ring.

“What happened?” I repeated, handing the bread and meat to a scullery girl who was eyeing it hopefully.

“Demoiselle Lida Tor Sylarre.” Yane managed to get a rein on himself, but he still looked like a man desperate for someone to hit and plainly fancying me as a target. “The Maitresse came in just after noon, all fired up, ordering all the daughters to turn out their coffers, checking every casket against every inventory and deed of bequest.” He shook his head, baffled. “The Maitresse starts taking pieces, telling Lida to hold her noise when she says she’ll need some necklace or other for her dress tonight.”

“She was in quite a rage,” Credilla managed to quaver. “I didn’t say anything, not really.”

“But you recognised the pieces the Maitresse was taking?” I guessed.

“Demoiselle Lida saw I was surprised.” Credilla clutched the tear-sodden front of Yane’s jerkin. “She wanted to know why. All I said was I’d met a D’Olbriot man who’s interested in old jewellery but Lida said there must be more to it for her mother to be so fussed. When I couldn’t tell her anything, she hit me.”

Yane folded protective arms around her as the recollection prompted fresh weeping. “You keep your head down when there’s a storm brewing, Credie, you knows that.”

I nodded. Volunteering knowledge is never wise for a servant; it only leads to questions and then more questions about where you got the answers you give.

“I’m sorry I mixed you up in this, petal. Can you go back?” If she’d been turned out by Tor Sylarre, I’d have to find another place for her. Not with D’Olbriot though; that would just confirm whatever suspicions Tor Sylarre might be nursing.

Credilla nodded, dabbing her battered cheek with a scrap of damp muslin. “Maitresse would lock Lida in her bedchamber till the end of Festival if she knew what she’d done. She gave me three gold Marks to keep my mouth shut and said I’ve got to work with the seamstresses until my face’s better.”

“That’s something at least.” I bit down on curses the little girls shouldn’t be hearing.

“What’s it all about, Rysh?” Yane looked up from brushing hair away from Credilla’s tear-stained face.

“Just keep your head down, both of you,” I advised. “There’s a storm brewing, but I don’t know where it’s going to break.” I hesitated as I turned to go. “Artifice, the healing magic from Kellarin could do something for that bruise.” Demoiselle Avila could surely repeat whatever she’d done for Temar.

Yane shook his head. “Best you can do is leave us well alone.” He didn’t mean it unkindly and worse; he was probably right.

The sun was sinking with its accustomed rapidity as I left the Popinjay, the fading gold of the skies darkening to rich blue dusk over the rise of the land ahead. The Graceway was bright with lighted windows, tradesmen returning to the homes above their shops for their own entertainments now while private parties celebrated Festival in the upper rooms of inns and tisane houses. Linkboys had their candle lanterns already lit and bobbing on poles to show people their footing for a few coppers.

Once out of the Spring Gate I waved down a hireling gig and pondered Credilla’s unexpected suffering. So Tor Sylarre had somehow got wind of Temar’s search for those ancient jewels and treasures that might restore his people, and the Maitresse was none too pleased. Did that mean the Name was somehow involved in these connivances against D’Olbriot? It was certainly an ancient House, dating well back into the Old Empire. I frowned. Hadn’t Demoiselle Avila been betrothed to some long-dead scion of the Name, some lad who’d died in the Crusted Pox? Had Tor Sylarre had anything to do with Kellarin’s first colony?

The gig was turning up the long incline back to the residence. Temar would be able to answer some of my questions, but I tapped the driver on the shoulder with a new request.

“Den Haurient, quick as you can, friend.”

I’d best report this new finding to Esquire Camarl before I did anything else. He might find himself facing some Tor Sylarre over the dinner table, or forewarned might be able to see some significance in an otherwise innocuous remark. Temar could wait, after all.