Dust and Light

by Carol Berg

  My gut clenched as we approached the portico. No liveried Guard Royale, but ten battle-dressed lancers flanked the bronze doors, presenting arms as if I were a foreign potentate—or a rogue sorcerer to be arrested?

  Simple justice. Navronne’s safety. Bastien. The reminders helped.

  Orrin paid the lancers no mind. Opening one of the bronze doors, he motioned Bastien ahead, properly allowing my servant to assume the risk of first entry. The somber coroner marched through, his hand near but not touching his sword hilt. We both knew this venture was chancy.

  “I’ll leave you here, domé,” said Orrin, bowing. “His Grace will join you soon.”

  “Your guidance has been useful, Hugh de Orrin. One more matter . . .” I pulled three rolled messages from my waist pocket. “Give these to the porter at the west gate to be delivered within the hour. These additional members of my party will arrive this afternoon in answer to a Crown summons. They should be brought here immediately. You can be sure the prince will wish to see them.” Unless he’d had us executed by then.

  Orrin accepted the ribbon-tied rolls. “As you command, Domé Remeni. I shall return and stand doorward for your guests as soon as I’ve discharged this mission. The grace of the gods be with you on this day.” He hurried off, leaving the heavy door to swing shut behind us on its own.

  Clerestory windows cast a soft light on the cavernous space. Bastien, hands on hips, frowned. “What the devil kind of place is this?”

  I could not help but grin. No one ever expected what they found beyond the grandiose entry.

  “A treasury of igniters for a pureblood historian’s magic,” I murmured as I came up beside him.

  The Repository appeared to be more of a castle undercroft than a temple of learning. There were no chambers or passages, but only ranks of columns to hold up the roof. Every quat of the stone floor was crammed with stacked crates and leather trunks, scroll cases, canvas bags, and barrels packed with straw. Shelves were scattered with caskets and tins, rusted tools, and dusty vials filled with everything from buttons to coins to dried beetle husks. It was a panoply of miscellany, a chaos of Navronne’s refuse.

  While the Registry Archives held documents, portraits, and magical artifacts from pureblood history, the Royal Repository housed every kind of relic both from Navronne’s history and from times before the kingdom’s founding. My grandsire had brought me here often as a child, allowing me to explore his treasury of pots and scraps. He had taught me how to interpret their making and glean what they could teach us. Only in Eodward’s reign, he’d told me, had Navronne gained the luxury of studying our own history that we might understand what our past could teach about present and future.

  I’d cared naught for such abstractions early on, only for the curiosities and the individual puzzles. But as my bent developed, and I was able to discern connections between battles and bowstrings, castles and trade routes and oranges, I became enraptured with the grand portrait of our kingdom and its people that these bits and pieces could sketch. Only then did I begin to appreciate Eodward’s great-great-grandsire Caedmon and his monumental work of uniting three disparate peoples: the fierce warlords of mountainous Evanore with their mighty fortresses and rugged caves in the south; the wily traders, merchants, and shipbuilders of the river country, Morian of the north; and those who tended the sweet, fertile hills of golden Ardra, the farmers, artists, students, and philosophers nurtured by the land’s beauty. Caedmon had made them one kingdom, far stronger than the sum of their individual might.

  It gave me heart to believe Prince Perryn valued what my grandsire had tried to teach him. Enough, at least, that he had tamed Orrin’s suspicions and disregarded my inconvenient timing. And he had agreed to my suggestion that we meet in the same venue as his original invitation. All could change easily, of course. If he arrived with his wife and a crowd of court ladies, he likely wouldn’t thank us for bringing up such delicate matters as his bastards, debauched children, and his murderous duc. And then, of course, if we presented our case and Perryn refused to believe . . . That trouble made all others seem small.

  “Wait here,” I said to Bastien. “I’m off to hunt my grandsire’s missing secrets.” I’d told him of Capatronn’s last investigation and my surmise that the white tree of Xancheira might be related to the Path of the White Hand. He was not stupid. He had recognized right away that my secret dealings with Demetreo and the Cicerons had spurred such an insight.

  Pluvius believed I had taken something from the Registry Archives, something important and dangerous, having to do with Capatronn’s Xancheiran investigation. I hadn’t. But my vision in the Tower cellar had shown my grandsire kneeling before a small painted wooden chest, examining artifacts marked with Xancheira’s tree. If my grandsire had wanted to hide something from the Registry, he might well have taken it home to Pontia, in which case it had burned with everything else. But he might very well have moved it here, protected by preservation spells. No pureblood had the authority to search these premises. I had to look.

  There was an order of sorts to the chaos. Not markers or labels; my grandsire had disdained those as ephemeral—misplaced or out of date as soon as they were installed. Instead he had grouped things by logical association. Moriangi artifacts here, Ardran ones there, relics of Caedmon’s era distinct from those of the years since Eodward’s coming. Maps, charts, and notes were not stored in one place but left with objects from the sites they described.

  Unfortunately, Xancheira fit nowhere. We had no solid artifacts . . . or so I’d thought. Fortunately my grandsire had set aside a corner for unsortable oddments. Blood heating with excitement, I headed for the northeast corner of the building, scrambling between stacks of Moriangi shields and a dusty worktable piled with bows and arrows. I bypassed the larger trunks and casks. No time to search them. Capatronn’s favorite place to store mysteries was a knee-high crate with a lid of woven branches—itself a curiosity he’d found before I was born.

  No sooner had I spied the crate under a dented breastplate than a sharp hiss from Bastien shifted the dusty air. I couldn’t stop, though. I unhitched the worn leather loop that held the crate closed.

  The bronze doors boomed and torchlight flared from the entry as I set the breastplate aside and raised the square of woven leather and sticks. And there it was. Amid some rusted knives and swords, a bronze cauldron, and a rolled tapestry sat the small rectangular chest, straight out of my vision. Patches of red and yellow paint still shone bright on the dry wood.

  The chest reeked of enchantment, which encouraged my belief in its importance. I snapped the first layer—my grandsire’s private locking charm—with a familiar twist of magic. But inside the lid lurked a blanket of deterrent spells that churned my gut and blurred my vision. I’d no time to devise a counter; thus I fumbled blindly through the contents: small boxes, a leather pouch, some shards of stone, a rusted dagger. What I wanted was one of the small stitched journals where he described his findings and their provenance, his theories and conclusions. I searched for enchantments rather than shape, for his journal would bear the thickest layer of protection, especially if he were hiding secrets. Something not at all journal-shaped kept stinging my fingers.

  “His Grace Perryn, Duc of Ardra, Prince of Navronne!” A herald’s cry. I had to go.

  Still no journal. I needed something to take with me. I might never get back here. Again I encountered the enchantment that pierced my hand and eyes like shards of heated glass. The protected object felt like a small roll of canvas or linen wound on a wood spindle. It must have some importance. I stuffed it inside my doublet and replaced the woven branch lid.

  Bastien had ducked behind a man-high barrel of oil lamps. I hurried past, then paused to calm my breathing when I reached the last row of columns before the entry.

  Three men and a woman stood with their backs to the gray daylight streaming through the double doors as footmen set torches in nearby brackets. Though I had not seen Perryn since we were boys, I could h
ave picked him out of a much larger party. It was not his grand apparel—the deep, rich blues of satin and brocade, the trailing sleeves of intricate lace, the thick ermine ruff, or the diamond pectoral glittering in the torchlight. His companions wore equally elaborate garb. Rather it was the golden hair so like spun silk, the milk-fair complexion that spoke of pure Ardran lineage, and the long, lithe body that would be graceful whether dancing, riding, climbing trees, or fighting barbarians. Not so muscular in chest or shoulder as his father, and less ruddy in the cheek, despite months on campaign. But with such a noble presence, clear eye, and fair, open visage, he was most definitely Eodward’s son. My hopes soared.

  “My lord prince,” I said. “You are most gracious to receive me with so little notice. Your summons was relayed to me only recently, and I’ve rushed here straight from the road, lest I miss this opportunity.”

  “Remeni . . . Lucian!” He abandoned his party and hurried forward, his hand extended in welcome. “Indeed, it is our pleasure! What a fortuitous day! I was most distraught when I heard you were out of the city . . . ill, I was told. But you’re better now?” He was near bouncing in his jeweled slippers.

  “Very much better, Your Grace. It was but a mild upset.”

  I would not kiss his ring. Instead I touched my fingertips to forehead and inclined my back just enough to acknowledge his rank, while leaving no impression of subservience.

  He gave no appearance of pique, but cupped his extended hand and clapped it to his breast in exuberant drama. “Good! Good! The message from the curators made your illness sound quite dire. For a month or more I’d been determined to meet you here, but gave up all hope.”

  This was all so strange, as if we were longtime friends instead of two men who had crossed paths two or three times in our very different childhoods.

  “I could not gather a great party to come.” He leaned close, as if to whisper a great secret, but did not modulate his voice in the least. Perhaps his high spirits had to do with spirits—he reeked of wine. “When I told them I was meeting the grandson of my father’s pureblood historian in a dusty warehouse, almost every member of my household found some more urgent task to be about. So these are now my most stalwart friends.” He beckoned them over. “Hierarch Eligius of the Karish cathedral . . .”

  I squinted into the light. The broader of the two men, gowned in red silk, would be the Hierarch of Ardra—the highest-ranking Karish clergyman in Navronne. The red cap atop his frizzled brown hair and his gold pendant shaped like a sunburst confirmed it. His presence was surprising; I’d no idea the prince dabbled in the new religion.

  Eligius and I exchanged nods of respect.

  “. . . and one of my most intrepid field commanders, Fallon de Tremayne . . .”

  Tremayne! But Fallon, not Laurent. Young, beardless, and slight of stature, his hair dark but trimmed close to his skull, he was not the man I’d seen on the temple stair. He’d be one of the Duc de Tremayne’s formidable sons, I guessed, for despite his youth and slender build, the planes of his face were chiseled granite and his well-fitted black satin bespoke steel sinews. When he rose from a crisp bow, his gray gaze met mine straight on. Very bold indeed. A scarce-healed slash on his face spoke of recent tenure on the battlefields.

  The formidable son intrigued me. Bastien had issued the murderous duc a summons to ensure his presence. But the son might be useful as well. Only two days since Bastien’s runner, Pleury, had spoken to the palace wet nurse who told tales of the Duc de Tremayne’s second wife. It happened that the young wife had borne the much older duc a girl child some nine years since. Nine years. Perhaps Fleure was his daughter’s friend.

  “. . . and the Ducessa de Spano, the merriest lady in any court.”

  The woman was slight and fair, a perfection of form and face, exquisitely gowned in white satin and dripping with rubies. Though her years could not yet have numbered twenty, her sapphire gaze was locked on Perryn like that of a lynx on a roe deer.

  “I’ve learnt to trust your entertainments, lord prince.” Her silk mantle floated behind her as she twined ivory arms about his waist. “None can match your jongleurs and masques. I’ve not danced so much in a year as these few days since your return. How could I stay behind and miss such glorious amusement as a treasure hunt?”

  CHAPTER 29

  A treasure hunt? An entertainment for his mistress? Had no one told Perryn that his starving city was in chaos and his enemies on his doorstep?

  “Fickle woman, now you’ve spoilt the surprise!” The prince drew his finger across the ducessa’s parted lips in a most intimate manner. Then he nibbled at her ear, stopping only when she giggled and pushed his hand away.

  “Dearest Your Grace,” she said, squeezing closer, “we must be about our fun with the pureblood before my lord husband and your other knights grow restive in your hall.”

  “My lord, it is ever my pleasure to fulfill your wishes,” I said, uneasy, “but Palinur’s streets are not safe today.” I wasn’t even sure what kind of treasures they’d wish to hunt.

  Perryn’s hand waved to encompass the repository. “Well, of course, it is the treasures of Navronne we seek, else why would I summon Vincente’s favored grandson?”

  Keeping confusion beneath my mask, I fumbled onward.

  “I understood you wished to reminisce about my grandsire, lord prince.” Gods, I sounded insufferably priggish. “Of course, one could say his life was something of a treasure hunt.”

  “Exactly so!” said the prince, dragging his attentions away from the woman. “That’s what spurred me to fetch you here. I was always jealous of you, you know. When we were boys.”

  “Jealous? A son of history’s noblest king?” I almost laughed aloud at such a ridiculous assertion. But a certain bite in Perryn’s speech registered danger quick enough to turn my course. “Indeed, lord, I doubt a pureblood youth forever bound to his rules, studies, and contracts could hold any advantage over a young Prince of Navronne. Both were chosen by the gods for their roles in life.”

  “Yes, yes, ’tis only in one matter.” He sniggered and waved a limp hand, dismissing my serious reply with a ripple of lace. “But it’s time to set it right. My father forced me to spend interminable hours in this dreary house of dust and rust with Vincente, who preached at me endlessly of battles and lawgiving and naked savages who lived in Navronne before the gods were born. I felt quite abused, because he said that when you came here, he set you to seek Navronne’s most valuable treasures buried amidst all this rubbish. ‘None can find them so well as my clever Lucian,’ he told me. Indeed that must be true, as my own pureblood and I came here not a year ago and found little beyond a few emerald chips and some bent medals. So I decided that you must show me where these treasures might be.”

  He spread his arms wide as if to embrace the entire Repository.

  “You seek valuables . . . like gems or gold?” My faith in Eodward’s blood dissipated like frost in sunlight.

  “Maintaining a kingdom is very expensive,” he said, sniffing the ducessa’s hair and fingering the rubies dangling round her neck. “And this damnable war empties my coffers as quickly as this lady here empties my bowls of oranges.”

  “Lord prince, I regret to tell you—”

  “Do not say this is holy pureblood business or that somehow the valuables in this repository belong to you or the Registry!”

  As Perryn’s tone sharpened, young Tremayne stepped forward, alert.

  “Certainly not, lord,” I said. “Everything here belongs to Navronne’s righteous king. It’s only . . .”

  If I told him the truth—that when my grandsire spoke of treasures, he meant these very rusty bits Perryn so disdained—besotted pique could ruin any chance of justice for the dead children. I had to twist the truth into Perryn’s expectations.

  “My grandsire was a most excellent student of history, lord, but no judge of worldly value. I recognized that only as I grew older and realized what men with experience of the world consider pre
cious. The ‘treasures’ he sent me to find were a jade game piece or an ancient wax tablet—things no practical man would value. I’m thinking your own noble father recognized this. He incorporated any cache of gold or excellent gems into the Royal Treasury in the same hour my grandsire revealed them. But if it pleases you, we could seek out the best of what is left—surely a few pieces.”

  Though his exuberance was damped, the prince agreed. “Use your best skills. Convince me not to have all this burnt.”

  Bastien had said he would step out to begin the inquest when the time seemed right. So why didn’t he? What reason to wait?

  I knew why, of course. Because our three witnesses would not arrive for an hour yet. We had allowed time in our plan to accommodate Perryn’s wishes.

  “Certainly, lord prince.”

  I buried my disappointment, and for most of an hour sought out what salable objects I could recall. Many were missing. Perryn’s pureblood must have found the ten jeweled daggers of a Moriangi prince, and the goldwork jewelry, goddess figures, cups, and fibulae from gold-rich Evanore. I hoped something would please him before our witnesses arrived.

  Hierarch Eligius, his puffy face sagging like overwarm cheese, trailed after us, sniffing frequently—whether at the dust or the poor display, I didn’t know. Young Tremayne didn’t seem at all interested. He wandered off on his own, shuffling items on shelves, poking idly into boxes and peering into crates and barrels. The ducessa, however, twittered like a canary, especially when I found a silver comb set with pearls, and a necklace of rare moonstones from the western shores.