by Iain Banks
"It is how I was raised, mistress, and it seems like a sensible precaution."
She sighed heavily and looked out at the people. "Ill humours," she said, and seemed to be talking more to herself than to me.
"Those ill humours you talked about from insects, mistress…" I began, recalling something that my master had communicated to me.
"Hmm?-"
"Can they be extracted from the insects and used? I mean, might some assassin, say, be able to have made a concentrate of such insects and administer the potion to a victim?" I tried to look innocent.
The Doctor had a look about her I thought I recognised. Usually it meant that she was about to launch into some extremely long and involved explanation concerning how some aspect of medicine worked, and how all the assumptions that I might have held about the subject were completely wrong. On this occasion, though, she seemed to fall back from the brink of such a lecture, and looked away and just said, "No."
There was silence between us for a while. During that time I listened to the braided canes of the chair as they creaked and cracked around us.
"What was wrong with the lady Tunch's arm, mistress?" I asked eventually.
The Doctor sighed. "It had been broken, I think, and then set badly," she said.
"But any saw-smith can set a bone, mistress!"
"It was probably a radial fracture. Those are always more difficult." She looked out at the milling people all walking, bargaining, arguing and yelling on the street. "But yes, a rich man's wife… especially one with a doctor in the family…" She looked round slowly at me. "You would think such a person would receive the best of attention, wouldn't you? Instead of, it would seem, none."
"But…" I began, then started to understand. 'Ah."
"Ah, indeed," the Doctor said.
We both watched the people for a while, as our quartet of hired men carried the chair through them, uphill towards the Palace. The Doctor sighed after a while and said, "Her jaw had been broken not long ago, too. It hadn't been treated, either." Then she took the purse mistress Tunch had given her out of her coat and said something that wasn't really like her at all. "Look, here's a drinking house. Let's go for a drink." She looked at me closely. "Do you drink, Oelph?"
"I don't, that is, I'm not really, well, I have but not-"
She held a hand up out of the side of the chair. One of the rear men shouted to those in front and we drew to an orderly halt right outside the door of the inn.
"Come on," she said, slapping me on the knee, "I'll teach you."
6. THE BODYGUARD
The concubine lady Perrund, attended at a discreet distance by a eunuch of the harem guard, took her daily constitutional as usual a little after breakfast. Her route that day took her to one of the higher towers on the east wing where she knew she could gain access to the roof. It was a fine, clear day and the view could be particularly fine, looking out over the palace grounds to the spires and domes of the city of Crough, the plains beyond, and the hills in the deep distance.
"Why, DeWar!"
The chief bodyguard DeWar sat in a large, sheet-covered chair that was one of twenty or so pieces of furniture which had been stored in the tower room. His eyes were closed, his chin was resting on his chest. His head jerked up, he looked around and blinked. The concubine Perrund sat in a seat beside him, her red gown bright against the dark blue of the sheet. The white-clad eunuch guard stood by the door.
DeWar cleared his throat. 'Ah, Perrund," he said. He drew himself up in the chair and straightened his black tunic. "How are you?"
"Pleased to see you, DeWar, though surprised," she told him, smiling. "You looked as though you were slumbering. I thought of all people the Protector's chief bodyguard would be the least likely to need sleep during the day."
DeWar glanced round at the eunuch guard. "The Protector has given me the Xamis-morning off," he said. "There's a formal breakfast for the Xinkspar delegation. There are guards everywhere. He thinks I am surplus."
"You think otherwise."
"He is surrounded by men with weapons. Just because they're our guards doesn't mean there isn't a threat. Naturally I think I ought to be there but he will not be told." DeWar rubbed his eyes.
"So you became unconscious out of pique?"
"Did I look asleep?" DeWar asked innocently. "I was only thinking."
"And very fast a-thought you looked. What did you conclude?"
"That I must not answer so many questions."
"A fine decision. People do pry so."
"And you?"
"Oh, I rarely think. There are so many people who think — or think they think — better than L It would be presumptuous."
"I meant what brings you here? Is this your morning walk?"
"Yes. I like to take the air from the roof."
"I must remember not to position myself here next time I want to think."
"I vary my route, DeWar, There is no certain escape in any public part of the palace. The only safe place might be within your own chambers."
"I shall try to remember."
"Good. I trust you are happy now?"
"Happy? Why would that be?"
"There has been an attempt on the Protector's life. I understood you were there."
"Ah, that."
"Aye, that."
"Yes. I was there."
"So, are you happy now? The last time we talked you expressed dismay that there had been so few assassins recently, taking this as incontrovertible proof that we must be entirely surrounded by them."
DeWar smiled ruefully. 'Ah yes. Then, no, I am no happier, my lady."
"I thought not." The lady Perrund rose to go. DeWar stood as she did. "I understand the Protector visits us in the harem later today," she said. "Will you be joining us then?"
"I imagine so."
"Good. I'll leave you to your thinking." The lady Perrund smiled, then made for the door which led to the roof, followed by the eunuch guard.
DeWar watched her and the guard go, then stretched and yawned.
The palace concubine Yalde was a favourite of General YetAmidous and was often called to his home in the palace grounds. The girl could not speak, though she appeared to have a tongue and everything else required for speech, and understood imperial well enough and the local language of Tassaseni a very little. She had been a slave. Perhaps there was something that had happened to her during that time which had addled whatever part of her brains would normally have granted her the power of speech. Still, she could whimper and moan and shout when she was being pleasured, as the General never tired of telling his friends.
Yalde sat on the same vast couch as the General, in the principal receiving room of his house, feeding him finger fruits from a crystal bowl while he played with her long black hair, twisting and untwisting it in one large hand. It was night, a bell or so after a small banquet YetAmidous had thrown. The men still wore their dining robes. Present with YetAmidous were RuLeuin, UrLeyn's brother, BreDelle, the Protector's physician, Guard Commander ZeSpiole, the Generals Duke Simalg and Duke Ralboute and a few aides and court juniors.
"No, there are paper screens or something," said RuLeuin. "He must have burst through those."
"It was the ceiling, I tell you. Think. It would be the best place. Hint of danger, and — whumpf! Straight down. Why, you could just drop a cannon ball on whoever was causing the trouble. Quite easy, really. A fool could do it."
"Nonsense. The walls."
"ZeSpiole should know," YetAmidous said, interrupting RuLeuin and Simalg. 'ZeSpiole? What do you have to say?"
"I wasn't there," ZeSpiole said, waving a goblet around. "And the painted chamber was never used while I was chief bodyguard."
"Still, you must know of it," YetAmidous said.
"Of course I know of it," ZeSpiole said. He stopped waving his goblet round long enough for a passing servant to fill it with wine. "Lots of people know of it, but no one goes in there."
"So how did DeWar surprise the Sea Company
assassin?"
Simalg asked. Simalg was a Duke with vast lands in the east, but had been one of the first of the old noble families to declare for UrLeyn during the war of succession. He was a thin, ever-languorous-looking man with long straight brown hair. "The ceiling, was it not. ZeSpiole? Do tell me I'm right."
"The walls," RuLeuin said. "Through a painting, a portrait in which the eyes had been cut out!"
"I can't say."
"But you must!" Simalg protested.
"It's a secret."
"Is it?"
"It is."
"There we are," YetAmidous said to the others. "It is a secret."
"Does the Protector say so, or his smug saviour?" Ralboute asked. A stout but muscled man, Duke Ralboute had been another early convert to UrLeyn's cause.
"You mean DeWar?" ZeSpiole asked.
"Does he not seem smug to you?" Ralboute asked, and drank from his goblet.
"Yes, smug," Doctor BreDelle said. "And too clever by half. Or even more."
"And hard to pin down," Ralboute added, pulling his dining robe more loosely over his huge frame and brushing some crumbs away.
"Try lying on him," Simalg suggested.
"I'll lie on you," Ralboute told the other noble.
"I think not."
"Do you think DeWar would lie with the Protector?" YetAmidous asked. "Do we think he really is a lover of men? Or are these only rumours?"
"You never see him inside the harem," RuLeuin said.
"Would he be allowed?" BreDelle asked. The court physician was only allowed to make professional calls to the harem when its own female nurse could not cope.
"Chief bodyguard?" ZeSpiole said. "Yes. He could pick amongst the household concubines. The ones dressed in blue."
"Ah," YetAmidous said, and stroked under the chin of the dark-haired girl at his side. "The household girls. One level beneath my little Yalde."
"I think DeWar does not make use of that particular privilege," Ralboute said.
"They say he keeps the company of the concubine Perrund," RuLeuin said.
"The one with the wasted arm." YetAmidous nodded.
"I have heard that too," BreDelle agreed.
"One of UrLeyn's own?" Simalg looked aghast. "You don't mean that he has her? Providence! The Protector would make sure he could stay in the harem as long as he liked — as a eunuch."
"I cannot imagine that DeWar is that foolish or so intemperate," BreDelle said. "It could only be courtly love."
"Or they could be plotting something, could they not?" Simalg suggested.
"I hear he visits a house in the city, though not often," RuLeuin said.
"A house with girls?" YetAmidous asked. "Not boys?"
"Girls," RuLeuin confirmed.
"I think I'd ask for double fare, if I were a girl who had to accommodate that fellow," Simalg said. "He has a sour smell about him. Have you never noticed?"
"You may have a nose for these things," said Doctor BreDelle.
"Perhaps DeWar has a special dispensation from the Protector," Ralboute suggested. "A secret one which lets him bed Perrund."
"She's crippled!" YetAmidous said.
"Yet still, I think, beautiful," Simalg said.
"And it must be said that some people have been known to find infirmity attractive," Doctor BreDelle added.
"Cleaving the regal lady Perrund. A privilege you enjoyed, ZeSpiole?" Ralboute asked the older man.
"Sadly not," ZeSpiole said. "And I do not think DeWar does either. I suspect theirs is a meeting of minds, not bodies."
"Too clever by twice," Simalg muttered, beckoning more wine.
"What privileges do you most miss from the post DeWar now has?" Ralboute asked, looking down as he peeled a piece of fruit. He shooed away a servant who offered to do this for him.
"I miss being near the Protector every day, but little else. It is an unnerving job. A young man's job. My present post is quite exciting enough without having to deal with murderous ambassadors."
"Oh, come, ZeSpiole," Ralboute said, sucking at his fruit and then spitting out a mush of seeds into a waste bowl before sucking again and swallowing. He wiped his lips. "You must resent DeWar, mustn't you? He usurped you."
ZeSpiole was silent for a moment. "Usurpation can be the right course, sometimes, Duke, don't you think?" He looked round the others. "We all of us usurped the old King. It needed to be done."
"Absolutely," said YetAmidous.
"Of course," RuLeuin agreed.
"Mmmm!" BreDelle nodded, mouth full of a sweetmeat.
Ralboute nodded. Simalg gave a sigh. "Our Protector did the usurping," he said. "The rest of us helped."
"And proud to do so," YetAmidous said, slapping the edge of his couch.
"So you don't resent the fellow at all?" Ralboute asked ZeSpiole. "You are a child of Providence indeed." He shook his head and used his fingers to break the flesh of another fruit.
"I no more resent him than you ought to resent the Protector," ZeSpiole said.
Ralboute was stopped in his eating. "Why should I resent UrLeyn?" he asked. "I honour UrLeyn and what he has done."
"Including putting us here in the palace," Simalg said. "We might have still been juniors, out of favour. We owe the Grand Aedile as much as any trader who pins his voting document — what do you call it? Franchisement. His Franchisement high on his wall."
"Just so," ZeSpiole said. "And yet if anything was to happen to the Protector —»
"Providence forbid!" YetAmidous said.
"— might not a Duke such as you — a person of high birth under the old regime yet who had also been a faithful general under the Protector's new order — be just the sort of person the people might turn to, as successor?"
"Or there's the boy," Simalg said, yawning.
"This talk's uncomfortable," RuLeuin said.
"No," ZeSpiole said, looking at RuLeuin. "We must be able to talk of such things. Those who wish Tassasen and UrLeyn ill most certainly will not shrink from such talk. You need to think of such things, RuLeuin. You are the Protector's brother. People might turn to you if he was taken from us."
RuLeuin shook his head. "No," he said. "I have risen so considerably on his cloak-tails. People already think I have climbed too far." He glanced over at Ralboute, who looked back with wide, expressionless eyes.
"Oh yes," Simalg said, waving a hand, "we Dukes are frightfully against such accidents of birth."
"Where's that housemaster?" YetAmidous said. "Yalde, be a dear and go and fetch the musicians back, would you? All this talk is making my head ache. We need music and songs!"
"Here!"
"There! There he is!"
"Quick! Catch him! Catch him! Quickly!"
"Aah!"
"Too late!"
"I win I win I win!"
"You win again! What cunningness in one so young!" Perrund picked the boy up with her good arm and swung him on to the seat beside her. Lattens, UrLeyn's son, squirmed as he was tickled then yelped and dived under a fold in the concubine's gown and tried to hide there as DeWar, who had run most of the length of the visiting chamber of the outer harem in a vain attempt to head Lattens off, arrived panting and growling.
"Where's that child?" he demanded gruffly.
"Child? Why, what child could that be?" the lady Perrund asked, hand at her throat, her blue-flecked eyes wide.
"Ach, never mind. I'll just have to sit down here to get my breath back after chasing the young scamp." There was a giggle as DeWar sat down right beside the boy, whose hose and shoes stuck out from the woman's robe. "What's this? Here are that rascal's shoes. And look!" DeWar grabbed Lattens" ankle. There was a muffled shriek. "And his leg! I'll bet the rest is attached! Yes! Here he is!" Perrund pulled away the fold of her gown to let DeWar tickle the boy, then brought a cushion from another part of the couch and put it under the boy's bottom. DeWar plonked him there. "Do you know what happens to boys who win at hide-and-seek?" DeWar asked. Lattens, wideeyed, shook his head and made
to suck his thumb. Perrund gently stopped him from doing this. "They get," DeWar growled, coming very close to the child, "sweets!"
Perrund handed him the box of crystallised fruits. Lattens squealed with delight and rubbed his hands together, staring into the box and trying to decide which to have first. Eventually he grabbed a small handful.
Huesse, another red-gowned concubine, sat heavily down on a couch across from Perrund and DeWar. She too had been involved in the game of hide-and-seek. Huesse was Lattens" aunt. Her sister had died giving birth to Lattens towards the start of the war of succession. Huesse was a plumply supple woman with unruly fair ringleted hair.
"And have you had your lessons for today, Lattens?" Perrund asked.
"Yes," the boy said. He was small made, like his father, though he had the red-tinged golden hair of his mother and his aunt.
"And what did you learn today?"
"More things about equal triangles, and some history, about things which have happened."
"I see," Perrund said, settling the boy's collar back down and patting his hair flat again.
"There was this man called Narajist," the boy said, licking his fingers free of sugar dust.
"Naharajast," DeWar said. Perrund motioned him quiet.
"Who looked in a tube at the sky and told the Emperor…" Lattens screwed up his eyes and peered up at the three glowing plaster domes lighting the chamber. "Poeslied —»
"Puiside," DeWar muttered. Perrund frowned severely and tutted.
"— there were big fiery rocks up there and Watch Out!" The boy stood and shouted the last two words, then sat down again and leant over the box of sweets, one finger to his lips. "And the Emperor didn't and the rocks killed him dead."
"Well, it's a little simplified," DeWar began.
"What a sad story!" Perrund said, now ruffling the boy's hair. "The poor old Emperor!"
"Yes," the boy shrugged. "But Daddy came along and made everything all right again."
The three adults looked at each other and laughed. "Indeed he did," Perrund said, taking away the box of sweets and hiding it behind her. "Tassasen is powerful again, isn't it?"
