by Dave Duncan
“I was assigned to assist him in a project he has undertaken for Her Majesty, Ma’am.”
Lady Fury set her jaw for a moment. Her manner was businesslike. “Stalwart is an air-time person. That match made him a wonderful gleeman, acrobat, juggler and so on in his youth. He was a whirlwind with a rapier. But it also let him dream up some utterly fantastic schemes. We used to say, ‘Wart is flying again.’”
“All of which schemes turned out well in the end,” Lord Hedgebury remarked happily.
“Most of which turned out well. It was how they turned in before turning out that made my hair go white before I was twenty.”
“It seems to have gone back again successfully.”
“No thanks to you.” Clearly, the two of them were friends of very long standing. “So why have you brought your accomplice here, villain?”
Stalwart paused in his labour of selecting sweetmeats. “Yesterday I had him provided with a potentially useful conjuration. I wanted to show him how talented people like you could detect its presence.”
“Detect it? It was screaming at me before you crossed the ford. Not to mention rousing the ancestral Baelish beast in my six-year-old son, and agitating my nineteen-year-old daughter, Fawn.” She turned her attention back to Niall, and now managed to lose the frown. “I saw you light up whenever you looked at Fawn, Sir Niall—which is quite normal for any young man—and I must warn you that, even without whatever gadget you left upstairs, you have no prospects with her. She is at least as talented a sensitive as I was before I went to Oakendown to be trained as a White Sister.”
“Am I so repulsive?”
“Your elemental makeup is very unusual. Very unusual. Fawn is a gentle soul, and a born warrior repels her. Some women would—some woman will—find you exciting, fear not!”
He must have looked completely lost, because she smiled. “I’m sorry. Stalwart knows what I’m talking about. Briefly... We are all made up of eight elements, right? Four manifest elements: Earth, Air, Fire, and Water; plus four virtual elements: Chance, Love, Time, and Death. But each of us has one dominant element in each set, and one of those two, in turn, dominates the other. Usually. In your case I can detect your two dominants. They are neighbours in the octogram, which is an unusual pairing, and they seem to be equally balanced, which is very strange! You almost have two masters.
“Stalwart, as I told you, is an Air-Time person. Those are opposites in the octogram, which helps to produce a stable personality. I am Earth-Time. Those are neighbouring elements, but my Earth is clearly dominant. The Time element we had in common helped us work together.”
“We sang duets,” Stalwart said. “Seriously! So what is Niall?”
“Tell me what you think,” she said, refilling the goblets. “And why.”
“I think he’s an Air person, like me,” Stalwart said confidently, helping himself to another slice of jellied eel. He told the Cat story. “He obviously doesn’t wag an eyebrow at heights. I’d have guessed that his dominant virtual was Love.”
“Why?”
“Because when he was still the Brat, and having his first chance to swing a foil, he accidentally broke the master’s collarbone. He was so upset at having hurt the man that ever since he just fences defensively, and almost never makes an aggressive move.”
Lady Fury raised eyebrows. “Not a man you would want to have your back in a real fight?”
For the first time, Lord Hedgebury looked hesitant. “I admit he can be vicious.” He told the story of Niall’s invisible revenge on Inquisitor Brindle.
Emerald said, “Hm. And you, Sir Niall? What do you think your dominant elements are?”
“Never thought about it,” he said truthfully. She had just described him as a born warrior. Was that really true? “I’m stubborn. I tried to refuse the Queen last week. I’m meticulous—I like to do everything right first time, and never make mistakes.”
“I am not at all surprised,” she said. “Because your dominant manifest element is Earth. This collarbone affair. How old were you then?”
“Sixteen, Ma’am.”
“Older than most Brats, but even so, I don’t believe you did that accidentally. You must have applied a lot of force. I think you lost your temper and hit him with all your strength.”
“Maybe. Was a long time ago.”
She turned to Stalwart. “Remember Bevin Smealey?”
“Prime Candidate Badger?”
“He was quite a tragic character. Your dominant virtual element is obviously Death, Sir Niall. So was his. That’s why I told you that you have no chance with Fawn. She senses Death in you. Of course that sword of yours is also saturated with Death spirits. An invisible sword is a hugely dangerous weapon.”
Stalwart was red, either with anger, or perhaps embarrassment at being corrected so brutally. “How about the Cat boy? Why would a Death person risk his own life to save another? And why fight defensively all the time?”
It was Emerald’s turn to hesitate. “Because, while Niall’s dominants are Earth and Death, they seem to alternate their control of him. When he arrived here, he was a Death-Earth person and now he is Earth-Death. That is extremely unusual. Those elements are neighbours in the octogram, which may be part of the cause. For instance, Earth people generally dislike heights. I’m an Earth person. I was up on those battlements with the king on the night you climbed up there, and I was shaking like an aspen leaf. Yet Niall trusted his life to a rotting rope?
“Of course, Death people fear death less than others, having lived with it all their lives. I suspect that Niall is completely fearless. He would walk a tightrope over a waterfall carrying a leopard. Wouldn’t you?”
The image made him grin. “A small leopard, I might.”
“Besides, Stalwart, who told you about Cat, or how Niall fences?”
Stalwart turned to stare at Niall. “He did. But the Queen...”
“I remember warning you that Death people like Badger lie a lot.”
Niall had heard more than enough. “I do not lie! My father taught me never to lie, and I never do.”
Emerald smiled, “And you are not lying now. I would know if you were. Congratulations! I am quite certain that Death and Earth are the main components of your personality. I am sorry to tell you, this, but they are awkward partners. They may combine is strange ways. Death led you to Ironhall. Earth drove you to rescue the boy on the cliff.
“As the Brat your Death dominant made you break a collarbone and yesterday you scarred a man for life. A Death man trained as a Blade and armed with an invisible sword makes you incredibly formidable, Sir Niall! I know this sounds absurd when addressed to a Blade, but do try to stay out of serious fights. Your Death dominant will make you utterly ruthless.”
He nodded, because he had always known about his temper. “You still want me, my lord?” he asked Stalwart, hoping that the answer was no.
“More than ever I do. Tell him about Earth elements, Em.”
“Earth spirits give strength, stability, honesty, perseverance. They make women fecund and men protective. An Earth dominance often attracts women. Keep that side of your character uppermost, Sir Niall, and you may be very well rewarded.”
It made a sort of sense, but old wives’ tales usually did. He turned to Stalwart.
“I want to ask Lady Fury a very personal question. In confidence.”
Lord Hedgebury pouted, but muttered something about seeing the children, and walked away, out of the hall.
It wasn’t himself Niall wanted to ask about. Embarrassed to be gossiping about someone else, he clasped his hands and spoke to the floor.
“An Air-Time person, going on forty? Can’t do handstands well anymore. Was the first-ever Blade admitted to the Guard without binding. Saved the king’s life and became a royal crony before he was eighteen. Now there’s a new monarch, and he’s Queen Malinda’s c
rony also. Be awfully nice if he could save her life too! He’s too old to fly the way he used to. But he can dream up a future threat to her throne, and use that to persuade her to give him another young unbound Blade.” He paused.
“And the question, Sir Niall?”
He looked up. “Is Stalwart trying to relive his youth through me?”
“You are very perceptive, which just makes you even more dangerous.”
“So the answer is yes?”
“That is what I think. I’m very sorry for Stalwart. He’s been moping for years. He wanted sons, but Agnes gave him three daughters. No grandchildren yet. Now he has you. I am sorry for you.”
Niall felt a great weight of doubt lift off his shoulders. He hadn’t wanted to be a spy, and now he wouldn’t need to be. It was all Stalwart’s fantasy. He could go to Thencaster and enjoy life as a peaceable secretarial Earth person. He needn’t have nightmares of slaughtering men with his invisible sword. He suspected that he had never really wanted to be a Blade, except for childish dreams of being revenged on Ephraim Morley, and now the Queen was going to do that for him.
He stood up. “Thank you very much, my lady. I promise I won’t lose my temper and start slaughtering multitudes.”
She nodded, but did not smile.
Chapter 9
An Earth dominance often attracts women.
lady emerald
On arriving back at the Golden Jug, they were informed that two messages for Lord Hedgebury were waiting at Greymere Palace. He rode off at once to fetch them. Niall must not be seen there, and he felt rumbles of regret that he could not learn how his former classmates were making out in the Guard.
Stalwart returned all smiles. The Marquis of Thencaster had replied that he had not yet filled the position of private secretary and would much like to interview the man described. The other missive was a note to Stalwart from one of the Queen’s equerries:
I am instructed by Her Majesty to inform you that Master Banker Ephraim Morley is confined in the Bastion, awaiting trial.
“It’s nice to have friends in high places, lad.”
“She keeps her promises,” Niall admitted. But revenge was not necessarily better served cold. Like any other dish, it could lose its freshness. This news would have tasted juicier when he was sixteen.
He sat down and wrote a note to his mother. He was a Blade now, he told her, but on a special assignment far from Grandon. He hoped it wouldn’t last more than a year. The Queen herself had promised him that she would have the execution of his father’s will investigated, and today had sent him word that Morley was already in the Bastion. He did not suggest that the stolen fortune would be returned to the rightful heirs, because that might be trusting a monarch too far. Then he asked Stalwart for an advance on his pay.
Stalwart suddenly turned generous and gave him much more than he expected, so he was able to send his letter off by one of the Golden Jug’s own messengers.
Stalwart, the paradigm air-time man, was wishing he could saddle up and ride north at once, but the horses had done their share already that day and would face a long hard road to Thencaster in the days to come. “Lunch and a geography lesson,” he announced, and led the way down to the bar.
“Now, Neal... You had better get used to being Neal. Rap my knuckles if I call you by your real name. Thencaster marks the border of Wylderland. The Wylds are huge, hairy, and horrible, almost worse than Baels. Most of them have jet-black hair and milk-white skin, which gives them a creepy, subterranean sort of look. They fight all the time amongst themselves, but every generation or so, the nastiest will win out on top and proclaim himself Ciarán, which must mean king or something like. Then they swarm over the border and raid as much of Chivial as they can reach before we can get an army up there to kick their asses. They never learn!”
Niall knew all of this already, but he was content to chew, quaff and listen.
“It was Everard IV, a century ago, who put a stop to that by building the castle on the border and manning it. The upkeep was expensive, but it bought peace until about forty years ago, when another Ciarán, Pfari, arose and took the castle. How he did that is still a mystery. He must have bribed some of the guards to let him in. Didn’t do them much good, because he massacred every soul in it, and the cat too.
“Ambrose IV was king by then, so he raised an army and sent it north, but now the Wylds held the castle, and the Chivians were on the outside looking in. Winters are cold up there, so the army melted away and went home. Next summer he raised another army, but this time he put his son in charge.”
“Granville Fitzambrose.”
Stalwart chuckled. “You know the scandal about him? It wasn’t that his parents weren’t married. It was that his mother was three times as old as his father! No matter, Granville turned out to be a brilliant warrior. He bypassed the castle and started wasting Wylderland, turning their own game against them.
“Ciarán Pfari was forced to abandon Thencaster and march north to deal with the invader. But Granville dealt with him, sending him south in chains. Ambrose named Granville Rector of Wylderland, and declared Wylderland an integral part of Chivial.”
“Looked good on paper?”
Stalwart smiled and shrugged. “When written in blood. The Wylds refused to be integrated. Atrocity followed atrocity, and eventually Granville himself was captured and executed in some unspeakable fashion. Ambrose still called himself king of Wylderland. He confirmed Neville as Marquis and gave him the castle, plus as much of Wylderland as he could hold. In effect he is lord of the march, and he’s done well at keeping the peace.”
The promised geography lesson had turned out to be all ancient history, but Niall would see the geography for himself on his way north.
They left Grandon soon after sunrise the next morning, and the weather cooperated. Stalwart was well known among the landowners of Chivial, and a popular guest, so he could dispense with inns. For the next four nights he was wined, dined, and housed by friends all along the north road as far as Swaid.
Stalwart insisted that Niall wore Denial in her conjured scabbard, so that reports that he had travelled north with a young Blade in tow would not reach Thencaster. As a result, he was fed and boarded with the servants. This arrangement bore interesting fruit. On the first night, a chambermaid with fluttery eyelashes said he must be stiff after riding all day, and would he like a back-rub? He ignored the first part of the question, but admitted that he would love a rub. She never got as far as his back. He had been wondering all day why Stalwart had given him a lot of money—about three months’ pay for a Royal Guardsman. Now he knew, but he had not initiated the transaction, so his conscience could not complain. Rewarding someone afterward for a great job done felt very different from bribing her beforehand.
Much the same thing happened—with minor variations—on the second and fourth nights also. On the third night the girl he slept with was not the one who poked him awake the next morning. Travel, he had often been told, was very educational. Who needed the legend?
Swaid, the most northerly town in Chivial, was located on the banks of the Ralop, which was a poor attempt at a river. The valley bottom was weedy-looking farmland, but the hillsides were lush pasture.
“Astonishing town!” Stalwart declaimed as they rode forth on the final morning. “Twenty years ago, Swaid was nothing but a ramshackle collection of huts and now look at it. All Malinda’s doing.”
Niall tactfully pointed out that Malinda had been less than two months on the throne.
“But she married the pirate king and that stopped the war! At this time of year there’s just enough water in the Ralop for the Baels’ dragon boats to come this far upstream. They still do, some years, but now they come to trade, not raid.”
At a well-marked ford, he led Niall across to the west bank. “We’re heading for Rhapsody,” he explained. Rhapsody Hall was his own estate.
“The east bank road takes you to Thencaster. You’ll probably be coming back this way tomorrow, going to meet the Marquis.
“Thencaster,” he continued, “is said to be Wyldish for Three Rivers. If it is, they’re flaming bad counters, because there are only two rivers, the Ralop and the Frail, which is much bigger. There are three valleys, though, so could be that’s what it means.”
A league or so farther and the scenery made sense of the explanation. The rivers flowed there in deep canyons, three of them meeting in a T. The Frail came south, out of Wylderland, and made a sharp right turn, into its estuary, ocean bound. The little Ralop, trickling north from Chivial, joined the greater stream at its bend.
Another league or so, and they came to a jetty. “This is ours.” Stalwart called a halt to let the horses drink and catch their breath before the climb to Rhapsody Hall.
“And there,” he said unnecessarily, pointing over the waters, “is Thencaster Castle.”
The castle was certainly the largest building Niall had ever seen. A huge complex of ramparts and towers, it sprawled down the side of the valley like a frozen landslide of grey rock, and obviously it commanded a clear view both down the Frail, to see any Baelish dragon boats sailing in from the west, and also upriver, to watch for Wylds marching south along the banks.
Rhapsody Hall was located on the south—Chivian—bank of the Frail, a little way below the confluence of the rivers.
As they started up the hill, Niall again looked across at Thencaster Castle, on the far side of the wide and turbulent Frail.
“Stalwart? Assuming that the Marquis hires me as his secretary and one day I read or overhear something suspicious, how do I report to you?”
“You write me a letter. As his secretary, you will be sending letters to people almost every day. The Royal Mail’s most northerly office is located right there, in Thencaster Castle. Mail addressed to peers is delivered directly to their address. I will probably receive it the same day you wrote it.”
