Rex Regis

by Jr. L. E. Modesitt

  Quaeryt glanced around, trying not to be too obvious in doing so, and seeing no one near or looking at them, nodded to Lhandor.

  Lhandor returned the nod and vanished from sight.

  * * *

  A younger captain whom Quaeryt neither knew nor recognized, not surprisingly, stood from behind a small table desk outside a set of double oak doors as Quaeryt and the undercaptain appeared. The captain frowned, clearly not recognizing a strange commander.

  “Sir?”

  “Just tell the submarshal that Commander Quaeryt is here to see him,” said Quaeryt pleasantly, hoping that the three imagers stayed separated and well back from him, as he’d ordered.

  The captain stiffened slightly, then swallowed. “Yes, sir.” He walked over to the door and rapped, firmly, then announced, “Commander Quaeryt is here to see you, sir.”

  After a moment of silence, Myskyl replied, his voice clear even through the heavy door. “Show him in by all means.”

  The captain opened the door and inclined his head. “Commander.”

  “Thank you.”

  Even without looking back, as the captain closed the study door, Quaeryt could sense the looks of puzzlement exchanged by the two junior officers.

  The study had likely been used by a younger member of the High Holder’s family, or perhaps by guests, given its modest size, four yards by five, with a single bookcase on the inside wall to Quaeryt’s right and a settee and a single upholstered reading chair set before the left wall. A table desk had been set before the single wide window, with three chairs before it and one behind it, from which the gray-haired Myskyl had risen, a smile upon his face and in his eyes, not that Quaeryt would have expected anything less.

  “Quaeryt! What a pleasant surprise to see you.” Myskyl frowned for a moment, then resumed smiling. “I hadn’t heard that you had arrived.”

  “That’s not surprising. We just got here.”

  “I hope you didn’t divert too many troopers. We scarcely need any more.”

  “Oh, no. Only a few.”

  “I just got word that Skarpa was successful in conquering Antiago, and that he’s acting governor.”

  “He was most successful. Unhappily, sometime after Vaelora and I left Antiago, he was assassinated. Commander Kharllon is currently acting governor, and all appears to be calm from his dispatches.”

  “Strange things often happen after you’ve left places,” mused Myskyl.

  “They have,” agreed Quaeryt, “but as you know, I wouldn’t have had anything happen to Skarpa. So it must have been someone else’s strangeness.”

  “That’s possible. I can’t imagine who, though.”

  “There’s always someone. I’m certain you’ve found some strangeness here. Several of the High Holders I spoke to on the ride north mentioned that Rivages was almost a different land.”

  “I wouldn’t call it that,” replied Myskyl. “A great deal more traditional, however.”

  “Traditional…” mused Quaeryt. “Yes … I suppose that would fit as well.”

  “We should go to the officers’ salon. It’s comfortable there, especially for you after such a long ride.”

  “You even have an officers’ salon?” asked Quaeryt. Since when has Myskyl ever been concerned for your comfort?

  “It’s better than imposing on Lady Myranda too much.” Myskyl gestured toward the study door.

  “Then that might be for the best.” Quaeryt offered an agreeable smile.

  “Excellent.”

  Quaeryt let Myskyl lead the way.

  As they left the study, Myskyl nodded to the captain at the small table desk outside and said, “If you’d have Commander Luchan and his assistants join us in the officers’ salon.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Luchan is your second in command?” asked Quaeryt as the captain walked briskly away.

  “He is. Very competent. He’s devoted to the cause of Telaryn.” Myskyl turned northward, toward the center of the hold house.

  “As you and the marshal are, I’m certain.”

  “And as you are to Lord Bhayar,” replied Myskyl genially.

  “Obviously, Commander Luchan is here in the chateau,” said Quaeryt. “Do the other commanders and subcommanders have studies here, or did you follow the marshal’s example and house them in the outbuildings?”

  “You still show great concern for others in the most peculiar of ways, Quaeryt.” Myskyl stopped at the second door, leaving it open, and then entering through a deep archway almost a yard and a half long.

  “I suppose I always have, but … I do try to learn from what I observe.” Quaeryt followed the submarshal, taking in the chamber. There was one wide window set in the middle of the wall, with plain dark wood paneling on each side, as well as around the room. The window casements looked slightly deeper than those in Myskyl’s study. A circular wooden table, with chairs for eight, sat before one window, while a settee, flanked by comfortable leather upholstered chairs, was set against the left inside wall. Brass corner tables held unlit lamps.

  Myskyl took the chair facing the window and gestured to the one facing him.

  Quaeryt took it, not without some trepidation, strengthening his shields. The “salon” bothered him, although he couldn’t have explained why.

  “The regimental commanders have studies in one of the guesthouses,” replied Myskyl. “Might I ask why you’re inquiring?”

  “As a scholar, I try to observe what works and why people do things. You obviously have learned much from Deucalon, and he, I daresay, much from you.”

  “We do work well together, as do you and Lord Bhayar.”

  “How did you come to such an accommodation with Fiancryt’s widow?”

  Myskyl shrugged. “There was no accommodation. We needed a base of operations. Fiancryt died, and he’d been a close supporter of Kharst.”

  “So was Ryel.”

  Myskyl shook his head. “Ryel has a much smaller hold house and fewer outbuildings. Fiancryt was far more suitable, and it even has a wall that makes it secure … in a limited way, as you must have seen on your way in.”

  “I didn’t observe any breaks in the wall, and both entrances were gated and guarded. There is, of course, the river…”

  At the rap on the salon door, Quaeryt paused.

  “Yes?” asked Myskyl.

  The young captain opened the door slightly, peering in. “I beg your pardon, sir, but Commander Luchan has an urgent question, sir. He needs to send word before he joins you.”

  Myskyl sighed and stood. “It’s always something.”

  Quaeryt stood as well when the submarshal rose. “It is, indeed.”

  “Just sit down, Quaeryt. I’ll likely only be a few moments.”

  Quaeryt tried not to stiffen as Myskyl walked toward the salon door, but he did not seat himself, instead strengthening his shields.

  The submarshal half turned, as if to say something, when he stepped into the doorway, the door but half open. Abruptly he stopped, as if somehow blocked from moving. Behind Myskyl, Quaeryt could see the young captain, reaching for something, when he suddenly froze in place. The slightest rumbling alerted Quaeryt, and he clamped shields around Myskyl. Then, what looked to be a solid iron shutter descended from the upper window casement, and the salon dimmed into total darkness except for the sliver of light from the half-open salon door, partly blocked by Myskyl’s shield-frozen figure.

  A massive concentration of force slammed into Quaeryt’s shields, and he could barely remain standing.

  Kharst’s imagers.

  Quaeryt tried to move against the forces—or shields that pressed against him—then stopped as a shower of silver flared into the salon. Silver rain cascaded toward him from the iron shutter that had covered the salon window. In instants, it became clear that the rain was melting away those heavy shutters even as silver fragments floated toward him.

  Myskyl stood frozen in the doorway, and three shadowy figures appeared as the rain also melted away a fals
e wall beside the half-open salon door, then formed into chains of light that pinned the shadowy figures against the metal wall behind them. The silver rain flared in intensity. Yet, even as its pattering died into silence, the silver formed a glittering and gleaming archway where the iron shutter and window had been, with a reddish silver road beyond it leading upward into a brilliant star-filled night sky, for all that Quaeryt knew, outside the chateau, it was a bright midmorning.

  Fascinated, Quaeryt could only watch as a figure strode down that reddish silver road, then walked through the archway and halted. Erion, for it could only be he, stood there for a moment, then looked at Myskyl.

  In the light that poured from and around and behind the silver-haired man, Quaeryt could see Myskyl’s eyes widen and an expression of disbelief infuse his face. His mouth opened soundlessly, and an expression of fear and shock appeared. The same expression was duplicated on the face of the captain behind him.

  As before, Erion held a dagger with a blade of brilliant light, and he pointed the dagger at Myskyl. Across Erion’s back was the mighty bow, and in his other hand was a small golden yet leatherbound book.

  “There is blood on this dagger,” said Erion. “Were it up to you, this land would flow with blood once more. But that will not be.” In a single fluid motion he threw the long dagger, and like lightning it struck Myskyl squarely in the breastbone, buried to its hilt and pinning him to the heavy oak door.

  The silver-haired figure then turned, looking to Quaeryt’s left at the three shadowy figures, held in chains of silver light, and saying, “You have seen treachery, and you have supported it. You have seen evil, and you would again replicate it. There is always treachery, especially by those like you who are powerful, but for whom no amount of wealth and position will suffice, for you know your failings and will not see them. Instead, you seek forgetfulness in the elixir of power. You will have eternal forgetfulness.” Erion gestured, and three lightnings flared, and the three figures blackened, and crumpled. Erion turned back to Quaeryt. “You, my son, will never know forgetfulness of your failings. Nor should you. Ever.”

  For all that he had heard words like that once before, Quaeryt could believe them, more than ever in the cold certainty of Erion’s voice.

  The silver-haired figure nodded, offered an enigmatic smile, then turned and walked back up the red-silver road through the archway in what had been a window covered by an iron shutter. But when the silver radiance faded, the archway remained, an archway of fused stone and metals combined, and the brilliant sunshine of midday in summer flowed through the opening.

  The shields that had imprisoned Quaeryt were gone. Myskyl’s body hung from the long silvery dagger, and three charred and dead imagers lay facedown on the charred wood of the false bookcase behind which they had waited.

  Quaeryt shook himself, then took one step, and then another.

  “Sir! Are you all right?” called Khalis, wrenching the door full open, and ignoring the dead submarshal. “Get out of there now!”

  Quaeryt didn’t hesitate. He ran, if still holding full shields, through the salon and into the corridor to see the three imager undercaptains, as well as an ashen young captain, immobile. Quaeryt looked to the imagers.

  “The other wall, the one on the other side of the salon from where the imagers were—it’s got a small cannon filled with balls and aimed at where you were. Lhandor stopped the commander from triggering it.”

  Quaeryt glanced at the open door to a concealed alcove. Inside, a body lay facedown below what did appear to be a small cannon or a huge blunderbuss.

  “The imagers were trying to block me. I had to kill him,” explained Lhandor. “Khalis managed to slow down the submarshal so he couldn’t get out of the salon so quickly. Elsior’s holding the captain. Elsior also told us where the imagers were. That helped. He also said we couldn’t let the door close.”

  Couldn’t let the door close? For a moment that puzzled Quaeryt. Then he nodded and said to Elsior, “You can release the captain. But you can kill him if he makes a single wrong move.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The captain stood there shaking. “That … That was Erion…” Then he fainted.

  “It was Erion, wasn’t it, sir?” asked Khalis.

  Once again, Quaeryt had to question whether it had been Erion, or his own creation of the great hunter. Will you ever know? For certain? Most likely not. “I don’t know. I don’t suppose we’ll ever know.”

  The three exchanged dubious glances.

  Quaeryt squared his shoulders. “How are you all with fire?”

  “Fire, sir?”

  “The one that started when we were fighting the evil imagers.”

  “But, sir…” Khalis broke off his protest, clearly belatedly understanding.

  “Of course, the fire started when we fought them, after the submarshal escaped their control of his mind and they killed him and Commander Luchan,” Quaeryt added.

  “Yes, sir.”

  Besides which, this holding isn’t going to revert to heirs, not after all that it’s been used for. Quaeryt sent a fireball into the paneled wall, beside the salon doorway. “Wake up the captain there and tell him the hold house is on fire.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Quaeryt imaged fireballs to various points along the corridor that stretched northward to the main section of the hold house. So did Khalis, and then Lhandor. Then he turned and began to hurry toward the courtyard entrance, calling, “Fire! Everyone out! Fire!”

  When they hurried into the courtyard, Quaeryt imaged fire into the upper rooms he could see, as well as sending fireballs to the north wing.

  “Fire! The entire hold house is on fire!”

  Men appeared from everywhere, some running from the outbuildings, and some from the hold house. Almost in moments, or so it seemed, flames were shooting from the hold house in dozens of spots.

  Quaeryt hoped most people could get out of the hold house, but with the numbers that were appearing in the courtyard, he thought there might not be many casualties. And a lot fewer than if Myskyl’s and Deucalon’s plans hadn’t been thwarted. Except … he knew that the business of thwarting them wasn’t quite finished. Not yet.

  “Elsior … you go find Ghaelyn,” ordered Quaeryt. “You and he and the rankers ride back and tell Zhelan and Calkoran what happened, then have them ride here to join us. Be ready to provide shields. I don’t think you’ll have to, but it’s possible.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Abruptly Quaeryt found that his legs were shaking, and flashes of light flared across his vision.

  Something exhausted you. “I think I need to rest.”

  “We’ll get you away from here, sir, and find something to eat and drink,” said Khalis.

  “So you’re ready to deal with the other commanders after the fire,” added Lhandor.

  That was fine with Quaeryt, even though he wasn’t looking forward to such a meeting or what would follow.

  47

  The hold house fire did not erupt quite so quickly as it seemed to Quaeryt at the time he hurried out into the courtyard, but it spread fast enough and burned long enough that it was well past the third glass of the afternoon before all that remained was a pile of smoldering ashes and charred stone and brick walls. The various regimental commanders had managed enough men and buckets to keep the fire from spreading to the outbuildings, although that was helped greatly by the fact that the courtyards were wide enough that, with almost no wind, few sparks and embers traveled that far. In the upheaval and firefighting, Zhelan and Calkoran had little difficulty in entering the hold grounds.

  Quaeryt did take the precaution of putting the shaken captain under guard and protection of the imagers, since he was the only witness besides the imager undercaptains. He also had a guard posted around the area of the south wing of the hold house where the officers’ salon had been. Once the fire was no longer a threat, slightly before fourth glass, Quaeryt summoned the remaining two full commanders—Justanan
and Nieron—to a meeting in what had been Luchan’s study in the large guesthouse.

  By the time both commanders entered the study, Quaeryt had eaten and rested somewhat, and he stood beside the table desk that had been Luchan’s. He gestured to the chairs before the table desk. Nieron had thick black hair, wide blue eyes, and an open face, the kind most people trusted on sight. Justanan was narrow-faced, with deep-set watery green eyes and fine and thinning blond hair. His forehead was lined, as if he’d worried his entire life.

  After a moment both sat. Quaeryt settled into the chair behind the table desk.

  “You asked us to join you, Commander?” asked Nieron. “Should that not have been Commander Justanan’s prerogative, since he is senior?”

  “Commander Justanan is indeed senior, but there are a few matters to discuss, Commander,” replied Quaeryt coldly. “Lord Bhayar sent me to determine why he had received no reply from Submarshal Myskyl, despite a number of dispatches and inquiries. When I tried to ask the submarshal about that, he turned three of Kharst’s former imagers on me, and attempted to use a blunderbuss on me. The failure of the Bovarian imagers resulted in a fire and an explosion that killed the imagers, the submarshal, and Commander Luchan.”

  “We have only your word for that.”

  “Actually, that’s not true. Captain Whandyn, the submarshal’s personal aide, was a witness to the entire disaster, and we managed to rescue him from the fire. So were two of my undercaptains. Shortly, I’ll let the captain tell you his version. Once we return to Variana, Lord Bhayar will make a final judgment, but at present, given the fact that Submarshal Myskyl appeared to have been compromised, or somehow had his judgment or loyalties altered by the Bovarian imagers, and perhaps Lady Myranda…” Quaeryt paused, then asked, “By the way, has anyone seen the lady?”

  “She rode off during the fire, we think,” replied Justanan.

  “There will likely be a price on her head,” replied Quaeryt, “but that will be up to Lord Bhayar.”

  “Don’t you speak for Lord Bhayar?” asked Nieron sardonically. “In anything that matters?”