Jim Baen's Universe-Vol 2 Num 2

by Jim Baen's Universe! staff

  As the orchestra began to play another melody, Undercommander Areyst eased across the space before the platform toward Mykella. He bowed politely. "Might I have this dance, Mistress Mykella?"

  "You might." Mykella inclined her head and smiled.

  Areyst took her right hand in his left and positioned his left hand at waist level on her back, guiding her gently into the flow of dancers.

  "After our last meeting, Mistress Mykella, I've discovered that you're quite good with numbers and ledgers. That is an unusual preoccupation for the daughter of the Lord-Protector."

  "Not so unusual as one might think," replied Mykella. "A Lord-Protector's daughter should know her heritage, yet she cannot mingle so freely as a son. From where golds are collected, and in what amounts, and where they are spent and at what frequency can tell a great deal . . . if one knows where and how to look."

  "Pray tell, what do they say to you?"

  "The Southern Guard is currently understrength. It lacks as many experienced officers as it once had. Supplies such as tack for mounts are more costly than in the past, possibly because of the depredations of the Ongelyan nomads several years back— "

  "That was several years ago, though." Areyst guided her past another couple.

  "Tack requires leather. Calves take several years to become steers," Mykella pointed out.

  "Tell me more."

  "Ammunition supplies are down, most probably because gunpowder costs are up, and that is because brimstone has become more costly. I wouldn't be surprised if you or the Commander had considered ordering great care in rifle practice."

  "Considered? That is an odd way of putting it."

  "If you had actually done so, Jeraxylt would have let it slip. Since you have not, and since you are a prudent officer, I would wager that you have considered it but possibly did not because that might have made the seltyrs of Southgate and the plains nomads more bold. It might also have encouraged the Landarch to request a concession or two."

  Areyst laughed. "Would that some of my officers understood so well."

  Mykella forbore to comment on that.

  "What else might you tell me from your ledgers? About something other than the Guard?"

  She could tell he was interested, and not merely patronizing her. "The vineyards in Vyan had a bumper crop last year, and that reduced tariffs . . ."

  "Reduced?"

  "There were so many grapes that the prices went down, and tariffs are leveled on prices. Not so much as if the crop had failed, but the slight increase in tariffs on raisins showed that the cause was a surplus of grapes."

  Areyst looked directly at her. "You could unsettle any man, Mistress Mykella."

  "I don't usually speak so, especially to men, Undercommander, but you did ask, and you were interested, and since you were most kind to my brother, I thought you deserved an explanation of sorts."

  "Your golds will tell what has occurred. Can they tell what will happen?"

  "No more than good judgment and observation," she replied. "Some things are obvious. If tariff collections are lower than in the past, that will mean that expenses must be reduced, or tariffs must be raised. If times are hard, raising tariffs will create unrest and discontent. Yet, if one reduces expenditures, say, for the Southern Guard, that can create another kind of discontent." She smiled. "Would you not agree?"

  "That is true if the Guard is required to do as much as before, or more," Areyst acknowledged.

  "But when times are hard, there are always more challenges to the Lord-Protector and the Guard."

  At the end of that dance, when Areyst escorted her back to her sisters, Mykella could tell that her comments had not so much upset Areyst as put him in a far-more-thoughtful mood than when he had asked her to dance. Strangely, she found that thoughtfulness far more attractive and appealing than a smile or pleasant and meaningless banter would have been.

  "You left the Undercommander with a most-serious expression on his face," observed Salyna. "That's not what you wish to do with a man who has no wife. You want to put him at ease."

  "He asked some most-serious questions," replied Mykella, "and I made the mistake of replying seriously." She doubted that it had been a mistake, but it was wisest to say so.

  XVI

  Three days later, at breakfast, Feranyt looked up from his tea and asked Mykella, "Have you been prowling around the lower levels of the palace again?"

  "Ser?" Mykella counterfeited confusion. Besides, she hadn't been prowling. "No, Father. I haven't been prowling anywhere. I have more than enough to do teaching Maxymt about the accounts. Why?"

  "There have been reports, strange things, doors opening with no one around, silvers lying on the stones, door locks clicking when no one was there . . ." He kept looking at her.

  Mykella was surprised— and more than a little worried, not that there were reports, but that such reports had been brought to her father only weeks after the events had occurred. Was that just another indication of how out of touch he really was?

  Feranyt chuckled. "I can see you're as surprised as I am. Good. I wouldn't want you to make a habit of nocturnal prowling."

  Not like Jeraxylt, she thought, without voicing the thought.

  After breakfast, she made her way to the Finance chambers, thinking about both her father's questions and Undercommander Areyst. She'd been concerned about the Undercommander ever since they had danced that single waltz at the ball because he came across as direct and honest. After what had happened to Kiedryn and what she had sensed from both Nephryt and Demyl, the thought that something might happen to Areyst was more than a little disturbing. Yet how could she even warn Areyst without putting him in danger? And what could she say— that he was the only honest senior officer left in the Southern Guard and that he was in danger because he was? Who could possibly believe that? Equally problematical was that she was unlikely to see him anytime soon, and to create any public opportunity would be noted, and jeopardize him, while any use of the sight-shield to reach him might well create questions better left unraised. Then, too, there was the problem that she found himattractive . . . and, if anyone discovered that, she'd soon be on her way to Dereka— or somewhere even worse.

  Once in the Finance chambers she turned to the ledgers, reviewing the entry clerks' work and Maxymt's entries. She had to admit that Maxymt had learned quickly and that he was probably sharper with figures than Kiedryn had been— and that worried her as well.

  She forced herself to concentrate on the columns of figures in the ledgers before her. Slowly, slowly, the figures began to absorb her, and she was beginning to see yet another pattern . . .

  "Mykella!" Salyna burst through the door to the Finance study.

  Mykella looked up from the ledger, biting off the words of annoyance she had almost voiced when she sensed the grief and fear radiating from her sister. "What's the trouble?"

  "Jeraxylt . . ." Salyna opened her mouth, then closed it. Her body shook with silent sobs.

  Mykella bolted to her feet. "What about Jeraxylt?"

  "He . . . there was an accident . . . they were practicing with blunted sabres . . . and his broke. So did the other guard's, but . . ."

  Mykella glanced to Maxymt, then back to Salyna. Somehow, Maxymt was surprised . . . yet not surprised.

  "I'll be back when I can," Mykella said, moving toward Salyna.

  XVII

  The ceremony for Jeraxylt was private and held in the family's hillside mausoleum behind the palace. Beside the honor guard, only the family —including Joramyl, Berenyt, and Cheleyza— and the senior officers of the Southern Guard were present.

  Under a clear silver-green sky, her head lowered, Mykella studied the mourners standing under the graystone arches of the open stone structure. Her father radiated sadness in a distant way, and Salyna had trouble holding in sobs. Silent tears ran from the corners of Rachylana's eyes, but Berenyt stood beside her.

  To the right of Feranyt stood Joramyl, his head bowed. Within him, Mykella co
uld detect, not so much a sense of triumph or gloating, but a feeling of acceptance and inevitability. Arms-Commander Nephryt actually seemed saddened, but Commander Demyl held within himself a sense of righteousness and duty.

  The ceremony was brief, beginning with an acknowledgment by his father of Jeraxylt's death, followed by a short statement about the meaning of his life by Arms-Commander Nephryt.

  After that, Undercommander Areyst stepped forward to deliver the final blessing. "In the name of the one and the wholeness that is, and always will be, in the great harmony of the world and its lifeforce, may the blessing of life, of which death is but a small portion, always remain with Jeraxylt, son of the Lord-Protector. And blessed be the lives of all those who have loved him and those he loved. Also, blessed be both the deserving and the undeserving, that all may strive to do good in the world and beyond, in celebration and recognition of what is and will be, world without end."

  His words had been offered with dignity and a clear sense of sadness and mourning, for which Mykella was grateful. She didn't know if she could have concealed her rage if either Nephryt, Demyl, or Joramyl had offered the blessing.

  In the moment of silence that followed, Mykella eased over to the Undercommander. "Thank you for the blessing. You offered it well, and in a spirit of honesty that reflects the past heritage of the Southern Guard."

  She could sense him stiffen inside.

  "I know you embody that spirit, and that made the blessing meaningful. Thank you." She inclined her head as if in respect, and murmured. "Take great care of yourself."

  From his internal reaction, she could sense he had heard.

  Areyst inclined his head in response, then straightened. "I could do no less in serving Tempre and the Lord-Protector."

  "It was still appreciated, Undercommander." Mykella eased back toward her father.

  "Mykella?" inquired Feranyt.

  "I just thanked him for the blessing. He offered it well, and he meant it." She stepped back and waited for the honor guard to begin the long walk back to the palace.

  XVIII

  That night, unsurprisingly, Mykella knew she would not sleep, or not well. Had her actions led to Jeraxylt's death? Would the "accident" have occurred had he not accompanied her on her visits to the factors? She had the clear feeling that, although she had not intended it that way, at the very least, her inquiries had been indirectly responsible.

  She had to do something, even if that something were futile, and after retiring to her chambers and waiting, she gathered the sight-shield around her and made her way down to the Table chamber, slipping past the guards with an ease born of practice.

  Once inside the chamber, she wasted no time but walked to the Table itself, where she looked down and concentrated on trying to see Joramyl, but when the swirling mists cleared, she found herself looking at the image of the Ifrit. At least, she thought it was the same Ifrit.

  You have returned once more. Most excellent. The violet eyes burned, and immediately, she could sense the misty purple arms rising out of the Table.

  Mykella only took one step back, throwing up her shields against the arms, yet those arms did not move toward her as they swelled with purplish power and malevolence, but toward her lifethread where it passed through the solid stone toward the greenish blackness below. Instinctively she extended her shields to protect it, and the arms lunged toward her midsection and that node where the fine lines of her being joined to form her lifethread.

  Mykella managed a second set of shields, but she found herself being pressed back by the expanding force of the arms. The Table itself was glowing an ever-brighter purple, so bright that she wanted to close her eyes, although she understood closing them would do nothing because the glare was in her senses, not in her eyes.

  Did the arms have a node, something similar to what the Ifrit sought to attack in her? She made a probe, like a sabre, extending from her shields, angling it toward a thickness in the leftmost of the arms facing her.

  Just as suddenly, one of the arms hurled something at her. Her shields held as the object shattered against them, but Mykella found herself being thrown back against the stone wall of the chamber. Her boot skidded on something, and she went to one knee. She put out a hand to steady herself, and found the stone floor wet, with fragments of ice chips.

  Ice? The arms had thrown that icicle with enough force to disembowel her had it not been for her shields.

  I will not be defeated by something attacking me from inside a stone Table. I will not! She forced herself erect and called on the darkness, and the greenish depths to which her lifethread was somehow attached.

  A purplish firebolt sprayed against her shields, and she staggered, but moved forward, calling . . . drawing on the greenish blackness of the depths, the green that recalled the Ancient.

  The entire chamber flared greenish gold, and under that flood of fully sensed but unseen light, the purplish arms evaporated into mist and haze, then vanished.

  The Ancients . . . still there . . .

  There was a sudden emptiness around the Table, as it subsided to the faintest of purplish sheens. Then, that, too, vanished.

  Mykella felt a smile appear on her face. Exhausted as she was, she had learned two things. Her shields were proof against weapons, some of them, at least, and she could stand up to the distant Alector. And if she could stand against an Ifrit, surely she could hold her own against Joramyl and his scheming supporters, could she not? Could she not?

  XIX

  On Quattri, Mykella was nearing the Finance chambers in late afternoon, after returning from carrying a summary of recent expenditures to her father in his study.

  He had seemed tired, almost gray, and had taken the sheets from her with a weary expression. "Thank you, Mykella."

  While he had not actually dismissed her, he might as well have, for his eyes had dropped to the papers on the table desk before him. Mykella had slipped out, once more asking herself what she could do. Sooner or later, either Joramyl or Berenyt would become Lord-Protector, and with the weariness she saw in her sire, she feared it would be sooner, and that was her fault. With Jeraxylt's death, he had become quieter, more withdrawn, as well. Why was it that everything she tried to do had made matters worse? She tried to warn her father and only succeeded in warning Joramyl. She'd let Jeraxylt know, and that had made him a danger to Joramyl, and now her brother was dead.

  Her thoughts were interrupted by the sight of an officer in a Southern Guard uniform standing outside the Finance door, waiting. It was Berenyt.

  She forced a smile as she neared him. "Good afternoon."

  "Good afternoon, Mykella. You're looking well."

  "After all that's happened, you mean?"

  "It's been a difficult time for everyone," he replied.

  What bothered her immediately was that he clearly believed that. Why had times been difficult for Berenyt? He hadn't been close to Jeraxylt, and he certainly hadn't cared anything about Kiedryn.

  "It has, but we'll manage. Life does go on."

  "It does" —he nodded— "often for the best, although we don't always see it that way. You know, Mykel the Great lost his entire family in the Cataclysm? You have to wonder if he'd been so good a Lord-Protector without suffering that loss."

  "I'm sure he wouldn't have wished that." Mykella barely kept her voice pleasant.

  "You know, Mykella, it's too bad that Jeraxylt had that accident."

  Mykella had doubted that Berenyt's words were ever anything but carefully chosen, and this was no exception. "It was a surprise to all of us. He was always so careful in arms practice."

  "He wasn't always as careful in other matters. He could have been a great Southern Guard and Lord-Protector, if he had concentrated on arms. That was his strength."

  Mykella managed to keep her expression puzzled. "Jeraxylt was always careful, and he certainly did concentrate on arms."

  "He should have. He should have concentrated on those more, rather than using you as a front f
or his calculations."

  Mykella wasn't sure from the swirl of feelings within Berenyt whether he actually believed that Jeraxylt had been the one to discover the diversions of golds and brought them to the Lord-Protector's attention or whether Berenyt was not so indirectly offering her a way to disavow what she had discovered. Although she felt frozen inside, Mykella managed to offer a sad smile. "We all have different talents."