by Kate Elliott
“Heya!” Tarnit nudged her. “Look there! Do you suppose that is the girl?”
Too far away to hear them but close enough to make out faces stood Reyad and a young woman. They were still arguing but standing close enough to touch. Dannarah had an idea that Hetta wasn’t ready to forgive him, not yet. But as the shock wore off it might be hard for her not to succumb to the idea that ridding the world of a poisonous man on her behalf was a form of flattery.
Tarnit whistled. “Whsst! They look good together, don’t they? She’s gorgeous.”
Standing together they were indeed exceptionally young and handsome.
“I remember being seventeen and wishing I looked like that,” said Dannarah as she dried her face. “I didn’t envy the girls who did as much as I despaired that I’d never be like them.”
“Now that I’ve peed I can cry for my lost youth and the beauty I never had,” said Tarnit with another laugh, sounding not one bit sorrowful. “Never stopped me from getting what I wanted. To tell the truth, nothing is funnier than to discover Reyad is the spoiled grandson of the archon of a farming village pining after a poor clan’s pretty daughter who scolds him. It explains a lot.”
Dannarah watched the way Reyad grasped Hetta’s hand but let go the moment she pulled away. “Coming here has given me a better measure of the kind of man Reyad is and how he can be of use to me.”
Tarnit cast her a sharp glance, alert to every nuance of Dannarah’s mood. “How so?”
“I’ll know when the moment is upon me.”
As much as she wanted to congratulate Reyad for murdering that ass Auri, it was important he not know she knew. As her father had once said, Never forget that a king wields many weapons, and some of them are men.
They flew north to Horn Hall.
Guiding two reeves to their first landing at Horn Hall was not a task for the faint of heart. Wind always buffeted the escarpment landing ground. On a ridgetop the shifts in the prevailing winds, the thermals altering direction from morning to night, and the interaction of air currents with the surrounding hills and the day’s weather all had to be taken into account as a reeve and her eagle approached the landing terraces.
Dannarah sent Tarnit down first onto the parade ground atop the ridge and flagged Reyad to follow. His eagle, Surly, made two passes before she decided she wanted to land. He managed a creditable job of coaxing her down but it was clear that at Argent Hall’s less challenging landing ground he’d not been given the strict training regimen Dannarah required of her novices.
Terror wanted to dance along the updrafts, and indeed there were a few eagles playing high up in the wind, but she circled the raptor back to watch Lifka’s approach.
The girl had an exceptional hand with the jesses; her experience with driving mules made the basics of handling a large raptor come easily to her. She had a lot to learn about eagles and air, but her sense of her surroundings and her ability to adjust to Slip’s intelligence were already good. She had the instinct to be prudently nervous and enough natural confidence not to be fearful. Fortunately Slip remembered Horn Hall well enough that he did not balk at coming in with an inexperienced reeve at harness. After Lifka was safely down, Dannarah landed.
It was good to see familiar faces, like the big fawkner Ruri, who headed in to sort out Terror as Dannarah unbuckled her harness. “Heya! Marshal, good to have you back!”
“What news? What trouble did you get into while I was gone?”
In twenty years as a fawkner Ruri had never been badly injured thanks to his astonishing knack for settling the birds and a certain measure of luck. “Neh, Marshal. I only get in trouble when you’re here so you can fish me out.”
She thumped his meaty upper arm as greeting and left Terror to his ministrations. A young steward came running up to take her harness away to be cleaned and repaired, although she would check it thoroughly later. Her chief steward, an easy-tempered man about her age, had drawn Tarnit off to one side and was already interrogating her for news.
Dannarah went over to them. “Nesard, show Reyad to the men’s barracks. He’s joining us from Argent Hall, so assign someone to give him the tour and see him settled in.”
“Of course, Marshal.” He shifted his crutch and limped over to the young man. “I’m Nesard. How much gear did you leave behind at Argent Hall?”
Reyad was staring around the ridge with a look of the greatest delight, like a hungry man thrown into a pot of ginger-sesame fish. “Nothing that matters. If I never see that place again I’ll not cry. Are those gardens and an orchard down at the other end of the ridge, Marshal?”
She nodded, so accustomed to the neat ranks of greenery that she scarcely noticed them now. “It is. We supply most of our own food.”
“Where do we live?”
“In chambers carved into the rock. This is an ancient place, most likely made by delvings.”
“Delving tunnels! Up so high and in the light? Isn’t that unusual? One time Hetta and I walked partway down the entrance steps into an abandoned delving-home at the edge of the Suvash Hills, but then our candle began to flicker so we had to go back up. She’s not afraid of anything! Are there private rooms here for married people?”
Tarnit waggled her baton like an erection, thankfully where Reyad couldn’t see as Nesard led him off.
“Thank you for that enlightening demonstration of your knowledge of anatomy.”
“You’d be disappointed if I didn’t do it, Marshal.”
“I’d be pretty certain you were unconscious, or dead. Show Lifka where she’ll be sleeping, introduce her to a few people, and take her down to get measured for gear. Then bring her to my office. You’ll take a week’s leave after, at my order.”
“Curse you, Marshal, you know how I despise having to visit my family!” Tarnit twirled the baton and sheathed it with a flourish. “Come along, Leaf. You’ll love it. There are decent baths.”
“How do you get the water up here?” the girl asked.
“There’s a mechanism used to pump water up from a spring trapped deep within the rock.”
“This is where I’m going to live now?”
Dannarah had to laugh at the way Lifka gaped at the spectacular view of sacred Mount Aua rising in splendor fifteen mey west.
“Yes. Come along.” Tarnit tucked a hand in Lifka’s elbow and led her away.
Dannarah descended steps cut into the cliff face that led to a wide terrace below. As she reached the terrace and its entrance into the cavernous eating hall, her hall officials hastened up, passing through bars of light from the shafts that lit and aerated the big chamber. Her chief reeve instructor and deputy Feder was a reeve no longer able to patrol after losing an arm below the elbow although he could still fly his eagle, Bright. The chief fawkner, Goro, had lost an eye years ago. Chief steward Nesard used a crutch to compensate for a twisted leg. Their experience and knowledge made them perfect to manage administrative tasks and oversee the hall, thus giving her freedom to patrol.
“Marshal!” Feder was always first to speak, having known her longer than anyone; they had trained together over forty years ago. “You’re later than we expected. Iyar returned yesterday from Sardia with the reeves you left to hunt the escaped prisoners.”
“Any news?”
“They found no one. He thought you would already be here. I must say you look pregnant with news.”
“I am! Chief Marshal Auri is dead.” She cut through their exclamations. “King Jehosh has promised to appoint me.”
Feder slapped her on the back, as old comrades did.
Nesard grinned. “About time!”
Goro shook his head. “Does that mean we have to move to Palace Hall?”
“As much as this will surprise you, I’m thinking it might be wisest to follow Auri’s example.” She waited for their laughter to die down before going on. “Keep my administration here, and use Palace Hall as an auxiliary office I’ll visit once or twice a week. That way Jehosh and I won’t have to clash on a
daily basis. It will work better for both of us. Meanwhile we’ll wait for the summons. I have reason to believe the king won’t act precipitously but will wait twenty days or so before he calls for the election.”
She paused long enough to set down her gear in the marshal’s cote, the traditional name for her study, then descended by a set of back stairs to the baths on the level below. After washing, she soaked in the nearby hot pool as her people filled her in on the patrols conducted in her absence and on cases her reeves had adjudicated at village assizes courts in the areas that fell under Horn Hall’s patrol territory. Finally. Finally! She would get to set the reeve halls back in order.
Afterward she stretched out on a mat and for a measure of blessed silence a steward massaged the aches and pains of travel out of her muscles.
Back in the marshal’s cote, seated at her desk, she sipped tea and discussed redheart wreaths and red-nut rice with her staff. “Auri refused to share information between halls, which is the first thing I will change. If demons are beginning to act this boldly all over the Hundred, we need to know and to coordinate our efforts to track them down. Send two reeves back to River’s Bend to see if they can find who cut and who purchased redheart wreaths in the last month.”
Tarnit entered the chamber with Lifka. They both had bathed and wore freshly laundered kilts and vests. A few examined Lifka, interested by her looks, but quickly got back to business.
“Nesard, as soon as I’m chief marshal you’ll collect incident reports from all the reeve halls involving escaped prisoners and outlaws in the last three years. I also want you to begin to record and track the movements of all troupes of Hasibal’s players throughout the Hundred.”
“There was a troupe of Hasibal pilgrims up in Elsharat,” said Tarnit thoughtfully.
“Exactly. I am particularly curious to know if Hasibal’s players are carrying redheart wreaths or red-nut rice. Or harboring escapees.”
“I’ll have a clerk keep an account just as a merchant would,” said Nesard. “Insofar as we can track their movements. It won’t be easy.”
“Did you see something in particular that makes you want to track Hasibal’s players, Marshal?” Tarnit asked, watching her with a guarded expression.
Dannarah rubbed the bridge of her nose, trying to blink away the mild ache pressing right around her eyes. “Just an instinct. Feder, Reyad will need additional instruction in the basics that he missed at Argent Hall. I want him assigned to my flight. Also, I want you to personally supervise Lifka’s reeve training. She’ll be assigned to my flight as well.”
“As a fledgling reeve she should be assigned to the fledgling flight, shouldn’t she, Marshal?”
“I’m expecting trouble with Prince Tavahosh over her, so it’s best I keep her close. As for that, I’ll want dress tabards and gear ready for when King Jehosh calls the reeve convocation.”
The bell for dinner rang in the distance. People shifted on their cushions. She wasn’t the only one who was hungry, and she had kept them talking half the afternoon.
“It’s good to be home,” she added, then sketched the gesture for mouth prudently closed. “What we speak in this chamber goes nowhere else. I know each of you puts the security of the reeve halls above all else. That will be our task as we move forward.”
Dannarah gestured for Tarnit to stay as the rest filed out. “One last thing, Tar. This is for you alone. Atani left a widow, Queen Yevah, and a lover, Eiko. My younger sister Meenah also lived with them. They left the palace after Atani died. Find them.”
“Find them? Where do I start?”
“Queen Yevah had an estate close to Toskala. Possibly she retired there after his death.”
“Does this have to do with our visit to Salya and the man Hari, whom I’m meant to keep secret? Now that your father is dead, maybe there are some questions it’s better not to ask.”
“There are never questions it’s better not to ask. I’m going to find out everything my father and brother never told me.”
Part Three
27
Late one afternoon Kellas walked through the city gates of Toskala. The guardsmen barely glanced at another old man trudging along with a battered sack slung over his back.
Because he visited Toskala every year he had no trouble navigating the changed streets of Stone Quarter, where he had grown up. The temple dedicated to Ilu the Herald where Kellas had served as a novice sixty years ago had been closed down in the last years of the reign of King Anjihosh. At that time the temple grounds had been turned into a carpentry yard. During the reign of Atani it had been built up into cheap row houses where families lived crammed together as rents rose elsewhere in the city. After the ascension of Jehosh a similar fate had met all the other temples within the city dedicated to the seven gods. In Toskala, at least, Beltak had truly become the Shining One Who Rules Alone.
The old temple gate still stood, flanked by stone guardians each wielding an envoy’s staff. Inside lay a tiny courtyard, the last scrap of open ground from the expansive temple yard where once novices and envoys had paced out each day’s devotions in his distant youth. Dusk was falling as Kellas slipped into the courtyard unobtrusively. A handful of others mumbled evening prayers amid the fraying silk banners and withered offerings of cut flowers. A restless child fidgeted while holding the hand of an old man. A trio of young women nervously plowed through a prayer as if they had laboriously memorized the whole rather than singing it every day of their young lives.
Horses trotted past beyond the gate. Hearing them, everyone in the courtyard stiffened. Sometimes guards arrested worshippers on order of the supreme exalted master of the Beltak shrine, but these guards rode on. Kellas said his prayers and left an offering of rice balls wrapped in nai leaves for the crippled old woman who swept the courtyard and intoned the full daily devotion. She had been an envoy once—she had Ilu’s staff and key tattooed on her arm—but she was no one he recognized from his own novitiate.
After that he walked to the compound where he had grown up, still the home of Twelve Dogs Clan. The last of his sisters had died last year, but as he had been the youngest of that generation her death had come as no surprise.
His nephew Belon was closing the gates when he caught sight of Kel walking out of the twilight. “Uncle Kellas! Good tidings to you! What a surprise this is! We did not expect you until next season.”
“I hope it is no trouble.” He glanced toward a man loitering on the street. When the man saw Kellas looking, he ambled away.
Belon hadn’t even noticed. “You’re always welcome, Uncle. I’ll have your room aired and bedding brought in. If you’d like, I can send a boy to your clerk’s office to alert him you’ve arrived.”
“I would like that, Belon. Thank you.”
“Not at all! You’ve come just in time, like in the Tale of the Welcome Guest. We have a feast tonight. Your grand-niece Hedo—”
“She’s the daughter of your sister Jadara.”
“That’s right. Hedo’s just become betrothed to a Fifth Quarter man. Plenty of rice wine and fish and spicy bean curd!”
Belon escorted him to the porch, where he took off his sandals and settled on a pillow of honor on the matted veranda. The main courtyard of the compound was bustling with the extended family all awake and merry. A gaggle of boys and girls brought him a tray with pickled plum and vegetables and a cup of warmed wine. They giggled when he counted down their names, because names were the sort of thing he never forgot.
“Uncle Kellas! How long are you going to stay? Will you tell us the story of how you climbed Law Rock?”
Gods, they were so young and so bright, their interest so flattering. After he related the well-worn story of his climb up Law Rock, they wanted another. It was tempting to let pour a few of the secrets stored away in his mind. He contented himself with telling how in the dead of night he had swum to shore from a ship anchored in Messalia Bay to sneak into the household of the woman he had fallen in love with but was forbidden to eve
r see, and swum back with no one the wiser.
“Another story!” the children clamored, and he smiled wryly.
Too many of the stories he had to tell weren’t right for these sweet children.
Everyone rose to sing the traditional songs to celebrate the betrothal. The betrothed girl was lively and attractive, and had such good manners that she served him supper with her own hands, a platter of fish baked in coriander and pepper and garnished with mango, and a stew of turnips and greens ladled on rice. Probably he drank too much.
He woke disoriented in the early morning upon finding himself in the room he had slept in as a boy. Melancholy swamped him as he creaked to his feet and stood with a hand on the open window, looking over the courtyard. Women chatted by the open hearth as they prepared rice porridge. Children were raking and sweeping. If he blinked, he almost expected to see his sisters and cousins and mother and aunts walking into the compound through the open gate with buckets filled to the brim with water from the neighborhood well.
Back then he had chafed, thinking the simple chores not just tedious but pointless. He had wanted excitement, adventure, a purpose. The palace had swept him away and the clan had gone on without him, although he was pretty sure he had broken his mother’s heart regardless of how many times he had come to visit her over the years before she died.
A stick rapped the wall alongside the curtained door. “Uncle Kellas? Are you awake?”
He pulled on his vest. “I’m awake,” he said, stepping outside.
Belon’s smile quivered with an unexpected pinch of nervousness. “It’s just that the boy we sent yesterday to your office with the message never returned.”
The last traces of bleary-eyed sleep vanished. “Which boy?”
“Not one of our own boys. As you may recall, to make ends meet we’ve had to rent out rooms to country laborers come in to find work.”
