The Briar King

by Greg Keyes

  He regarded her for a moment, taking the question seriously. She was an exuberant, enthusiastic lover, if one without the skills of an older woman. Her political designs were charmingly transparent and naïve. She got drunk well, and when her guard was down she was unselfconsciously sweet, and her mind went down tracks strange to his, which he enjoyed on the pillows.

  She was a welcome change from Gramme, whose mind had turned almost obsessively to her bastards these last few years. They were provided for, of course, and he liked them, especially little Mery, but Gramme wanted them to have the Dare name and said so far too often. Alis was less ambitious, and perhaps didn't even have the intelligence for such ambition.

  That was fine. Two intelligent women in his life were more than enough.

  “No, not at all,” he told her. “You are a delight to me.”

  “Then shall we to bed? It's something past midnight. I can soothe you to sleep, if you don't desire loving.”

  “You go to bed, lady,” he said gently. “I shall join you presently.”

  “In your chambers, Majesty?”

  William turned an irritated frown on her. “You know better than that. That is my marriage bed, and I share it only with my wife. Do not presume, Alis, merely because she is away.”

  Her face fell as she realized her mistake. “I'm sorry, Sire. You'll come to my chambers, then?”

  “I said I would.”

  She swayed to her feet and picked up the stockings, then came over, stood on tiptoe, and gave him a little kiss on the lips. Then she smiled, almost furtively, and cut her eyes down, and for a moment he felt himself stir, but he was too drunk and too sad, and he knew it.

  “Good night, Sire,” she murmured.

  “Good night, Alis.”

  He didn't watch her go, examining instead the largest painting in the room. It depicted Genya Dare, burning like a saint, leading a great army. Before her towered the vague but threatening shadow of the Skasloi fortress that had once stood on the very spot where Eslen castle now stood. Against that dark red citadel, giant formless shapes of black were barely discernible.

  “What shall I do?” he murmured. “What is right?” He took his gaze round the other paintings—the battle of Minster-on-Sea, with its rolling thunderheads, the fight at the Ford of Woorm, the siege of Carwen. In each, a Dare stood at the head of an army, resolute and steadfast.

  A hundred years ago, these same walls had depicted scenes of Reiksbaurg victory. They had been stripped and painted over.

  It could happen again.

  He shivered at the thought, and wondered if it wasn't time to go see him. The thing in the dungeon, the thing his father had shown him, so long ago. He found that thought nearly as troubling as a Reiksbaurg victory, however, and dismissed it.

  Instead, William moved back to the table and unscrolled a map, weighting its corners with brass counters made to resemble ram-headed vipers, coiled to strike.

  “Still up? Still brooding?” a faintly mocking voice asked.

  “Robert?” William swung around, nearly lost his balance, and cursed.

  “What's the matter?”

  “Nothing. I can hardly drink at all, these days. It takes no more than a bottle to give me clumsy legs. Where the saints have you been this past nineday?”

  Robert smiled thinly. “Saltmark, actually.”

  “What? Without my leave? For what?”

  “It were better not to have your leave for this,” Robert said darkly. “It was more of my—I think you would say inappropriate—dealings.” He put on a grim smile. “You did make me your prime minister, remember?”

  “Had this to do with Lesbeth?”

  Robert fingered his mustache. “In part.”

  William paused for courage before he asked the next question. “Is she murdered?”

  “No. She is alive. I was even allowed to see her.”

  William took a deep draught of the wine. “Thank Saint Anne,” he muttered. “What sort of ransom do they want?”

  “May I have some wine?” Robert asked mildly.

  “Help yourself.”

  Robert glanced at the carafe on the table and made a disgusted noise. “Do you have anything else? Something from a little farther south? I don't see how you stomach that sour stuff.”

  William waved at the cabinet. “There is a freshly decanted bottle of that red from Tero Gallé you're so fond of.”

  “Vin Crové?”

  “That's the one.”

  He watched impatiently as Robert produced and poured some of the sanguine liquid and tasted it.

  “Ah! That's better. At least your vintners have good taste.”

  “How you can be so calm, when our sister has been kidnapped?”

  “Don't ever doubt my concern for Lesbeth,” Robert said sharply.

  “I'm sorry—I was wrong to remark so. But please, give me the news.”

  “As I said, she is well, and I was allowed to see her. She sends her love.”

  “From where? Where is she?”

  “She is a captive of the duke of Austrobaurg.”

  “How? In the name of the saints, how? She was last seen on her horse, riding east from the Sleeve. How did they abduct her from this island?”

  “That, Austrobaurg would not tell me.”

  “Her fiancé from Safnia arrived, you know. A day ago. He is beside himself.”

  “Indeed?” Robert's eyes gleamed strangely.

  “Well, come. What does the duke want?”

  “What do you suppose? He wants a ransom.”

  “What ransom is that?”

  “He wants a ransom of ships. Twenty, to be precise.”

  “Twenty sailing ships? We cannot spare them, not if we go to war with Saltmark. Or Hansa, saints-me-to-bed.”

  “Oh, he doesn't want twenty of our ships. He wants twenty Sorrovian ships. Sunken. To the bottom of the sea.”

  “What?” William thundered. He hurled the goblet against the wall and watched it shatter into a thousand purple-drenched shards. “He dares? By Saint Rooster's balls, he dares?”

  “He is an ambitious man, Sire. Twenty ships to his credit will take him far with the court at Hansa.”

  “To his credit? My ships must appear to be from Saltmark? You mean he expects my ships, my crews, to sail under his flag?”

  “That is his demand, Your Majesty,” Robert said. His voice took on an angry edge. “Else, as he put it, he will rut with our sister to his heart's desire, then give her to his men with orders to ride her until her back is broken.”

  “Saint Michael,” William swore, taking his seat. “What has the world come to? Is there no honor in it?”

  “Honor?” Robert bittered a humorless laugh. “Listen, William—”

  “You know I cannot do it.”

  “You—” Robert actually lost his tongue, for a moment. “You pompous ass!” he finally got out. “This is Lesbeth!”

  “And I am emperor. I cannot sell the honor of my throne for one sister, no matter how well I love her.”

  “No,” Robert said, voice very low, finger pointing like a dagger. “No. William, I will sink those ships myself, do you hear me? With my bare hands, if need be. You should have sent Lesbeth off with the rest, but you heeded her whim and let her stay here to meet her Safnian prince. The same Safnian prince, I might add, who sold her to Austrobaurg.”

  “What?” William stared at his brother, wondering if he had somehow misunderstood the words.

  “I said Austrobaurg would not tell me how he kidnapped her. But I did discover it through my spies, one murder and torture I'm sure you don't want to hear about. Austrobaurg has enemies, some very near him, though not near enough to open his throat, more's the pity. Not yet. But I discovered what I wanted to know. Lesbeth's Safnian prince has called in Hansa many times. He is well known there, and he is in their pay. He sent a letter, telling Lesbeth to meet him on the Cape of Rovy, that his ship was damaged and he'd made camp there. She went to him, only to find a Hanzish corvette.”<
br />
  “Prince Cheiso did this? You have proof ?”

  “I have the proof of my ears. I trust my sources. Oh, and there is this.”

  He pulled something from the pouch at his belt and tossed it to William, who caught it. It was a slim metal box, with a catch fastening it.

  “What is this?”

  Robert made a peculiar sound, and William was stricken to see tears start in his brother's eyes.

  “It's her finger, damn you.” He spread his right hand and wiggled the index finger. “This one, with the twin of this ring. We put them on when we were eight, and have not, either of us, been able to remove them since we were fifteen.”

  William opened the catch. Inside, indeed, was a slim finger, nearly black. On it was a gold band with a scroll of oak leaves about it.

  “Ah, saints of mercy!” He snapped the box shut with shaking hands. Who could do this to Lesbeth? Lesbeth the ever smiling, the best, the most compassionate of them all?

  “Robert, I did not know. I—” He fought back tears.

  “Do not console me, Wilm. Get her back. Or I will.”

  William found another goblet. He needed more wine for this, to pacify the blood thundering in his ears, the blind rage he felt building again.

  “How, Robert?” he snapped. “If we do this thing, it could cost us every alliance. Even Liery might break with us. It's impossible.”

  “No,” Robert said, his voice still quavering. “It isn't. We have already sent ships in secret to the Saurga Sea, haven't we?”

  “It's not much of a secret.”

  “But the ships have not been counted or accounted for. Only the two of us know how many have been sent. Crews can be found; I know where to find them. Crews that will ask no questions and tell no stories, if they are paid well enough.”

  William stared at Robert for a long moment. “Is this true?”

  “It is. Austrobaurg will get all the credit, as he desires— and he will get all of the blame. The sea lords of Liery will be none the wiser of our part and will remain our friends. I will oversee this personally, William. You know my love for Les-beth; I would risk nothing, here, that might mean her life. But I would never risk our kingdom, either.”

  William drank more wine. Soon it would be too much; already the world was flat, like the paintings on the wall. This was a poor time for judgment. Or perhaps, in such matters, the best.

  “Do it,” he whispered. “Only do not give me details.”

  “It is done,” Robert replied.

  “And Prince Cheiso. Have him arrested and put in Spinster Tower. Him I'll deal with in the morning.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  THE PRINCE OF SHADE

  THE AIR ABOVE the ochre brick of the Piato da Fiussa shimmered like the top of a stove. It was so hot that even the pigeons and grackles—which normally covered the square, scavenging for bits of bread or cheese—would not light upon it for fear of roasting themselves.

  Cazio, similarly concerned, exerted himself just enough to scoot an armspan, following the shadow of the marble fountain his back rested against as he gazed laconically around the square. There he found few people with any more ambition of mobility. Earlier, the little market town of Avella had been a bustling place. Now, with the sun at noon, people had more sense.

  Buildings of the same yellow brick up to three stories high walled the piato, but only on the south side did they cast a meager shadow. In that welcome umbra, the shopowners, bricklayers, vendors, street officers, and children of Avella, sat, lay, or otherwise lolled, sipping the brash young wines of the Tero Mefio, nibbling cellar-cooled figs, or dabbing their brows with wet rags.

  Smaller gatherings under awnings, next to stairways— wherever the sun was thwarted—made plain why the hours between noon and three bells were named z'onfros caros— the treasured shadows. And, in a city where noon shadows had value—indeed, were sometimes bought and sold—the shade of Fiussa's fountain was one of the dearest.

  That was where Cazio rested, with the nude, flower-adorned goddess watching over him. The three nymphs at her feet disgorged tall plumes of water, so that a gentle damp mist settled on his darkly handsome face and broad shoulders. The marble basin was cool, and no matter which hour of the sessa it might be, there was ample shade—for perhaps four people.

  Cazio lazily examined the upper-floor windows across the piato. This time of day the rust or sienna framed windows were all thrown open, and sometimes pretty girls could be seen, leaning on the casements to catch a breeze.

  His laconic search was rewarded.

  “Look there,” he said to his friend Alo, who reclined nearby. “It's Braza daca Feiossa.” He nodded his head toward a dark-haired beauty looking out over the square. She wore only a cotton undershift, which left much of her neck and shoulders bare.

  “I see her,” Alo said.

  “She's trying to catch my attention,” Cazio said.

  “Of course she is. The sun came up just for you today, too, I'm sure.”

  “I wish he hadn't bothered,” Cazio murmured, wiping a bead of sweat from his forehead and pushing back his thick mop of black hair. “What was I thinking, getting up so early?”

  Alo started at that. “Early? You've just now risen!” A sallow-faced boy with caramel-colored hair, at sixteen Alo was a year younger than Cazio.

  “Yes, and see, it's too hot to work. Everyone agrees.”

  “Work? What would you know of work?” Alo grunted. “They've been working all morning. I've been up since dawn, unloading bushels of grain.”

  Cazio regarded Alo and shook his head sadly. “Unloading grain—that isn't work. It's labor.”

  “There's a difference?”

  Cazio patted the gleaming pommel of his sword. “Of course. A gentleman may work. He may do deeds. He may not labor.”

  “A gentleman may starve, then,” Alo replied. “Since I labored for the food in this basket I doubt that you want any.”

  Cazio considered the hard ewe's cheese, the flat brown round of bread, the stoneware carafe of wine. “On the contrary,” he told Alo. “A gentleman has no objection to living off the labor of others. It's the nature of the arrangement between master and servant.”

  “Yes, but I'm not your servant,” Alo observed. “And if I were, I don't see what I would get out of the arrangement.”

  “Why, the honor of serving a gentleman. And the privilege of resting here, in my palace of shade. And the protection of my sword.”

  “I have my own blade.”

  Cazio eyed his friend's rusty weapon. “Of course you do,” he said, with as much condescension as he could put in his voice.

  “I do.”

  “And much good may it do you,” Cazio replied. “And see, look, you may soon have a chance to use it.”

  Alo turned to follow his gaze. Two men had just ridden into the square from the Vio aza Vera. One was trimmed out in red velvet doublet, black hose, and broad-brimmed hat jaunted with a plume. His beard was neatly trimmed and his mustache delicately curled. His companion was attired more modestly in a plain brown suit. They were headed directly for the well.

  Cazio put his head back and closed his eyes, listening to the sound of hooves approaching. When they were quite near, he heard a squeak of leather and then boots scuffing on brick as the two dismounted.

  “You don't mind if I get a drink from the fountain, do you?” an amused voice asked.

  “Not at all, casnar,” Cazio replied. “The fountain is a public work, and its water free to all.”

  “Very true. Tefio, fetch me a drink.”

  “Yes, master,” the fellow's lackey said.

  “That looks a comfortable spot you're sitting in,” the man said, after a moment. “I think I shall have that, too.”

  “Well, now there you are mistaken, casnar,” Cazio said, in an amiable tone, his eyes still closed. “The shade, you see, is not a public work, but is cast by the goddess Fiussa, as you can see. And she—as you can also see—favors me.”

  “I
see only a pair of boys who do not know their station.”

  Alo made to move, but Cazio restrained him with a hand on his arm. “I know only what I have been taught, casnar,” he answered softly.

  “Are you begging me for a lesson?”

  Cazio sat up a little straighter. “Beg, did you say? I don't know the meaning of that word. Since you seem so well acquainted with it, am I to understand that you are offering me instruction in grammar?”

  “Ah,” the fellow said. “I understand now. You are the village fool.”

  Cazio laughed. “I am not, but if I were, my position would have changed the moment you rode through the gate.”

  “That is quite enough of that,” the man said. “Relinquish your spot or my lackey will beat you.”

  “Set him on me and you shall be lackless. And do I understand you now, casnar? Do you feel unqualified to instruct me? Please, tell me more of this ‘begging’ of which you speak.”

  “You mark yourself when you speak so and wear a sword,” the man said, his voice suddenly low and dangerous.

  “Mark myself ? What, with this?” Cazio asked, pointing to his weapon. “This is for marking, yes. It's a right good pen, if I dip it in the proper inkwell—but I've never marked myself with it. Or do you mean you see the marks of dessrata on me, and wish to trade in proficiencies? What a wonderful idea. You will teach me about begging, and I will teach you about swordplay.”

  “I will teach you to beg, yes. By Mamres, I will.”

  “Very good,” Cazio replied, slowly levering himself to his feet. “But how is this: Let us make an agreement that whoever learns the best lesson shall pay the going rate for it. Now, I've no idea what they charge for lessons in begging, but at Mestro Estenio's school of fencing, I hear the rate is a gold regatur.”

  The man looked over Cazio's faded leather jerkin and threadbare velvet breeches. “You don't have a regatur to your name,” he sneered.

  Cazio sighed, reached under the collar of his white shirt, and drew forth a medallion. It was gold, with a rampant boar embossed on it. It was nearly all that remained of his father's fortune, and worth at least three regaturs.

  The man shrugged his shoulders. “Who shall hold our money?” the man asked.