As she and Areyst rode up toward the entry portico, Mykella noticed the uniformed Southern Guards stationed at intervals around the villa and guarding the portico.
“Lady-Protector, Commander!” called out the squad leader who rode up. “We’ve let no one leave, as you instructed.”
“I appreciate that, Jekardyn.” Mykella was grateful she’d recalled the man’s name.
She reined up before the portico and dismounted, then walked toward the doors, checking her Talent shields. Two Guards opened the doors and entered before her, as did Areyst, his hand casually near the hilt of his saber. Once past the oiled and shining golden oak double doors, Mykella took several steps, then studied the polished rose marble floor of the high-ceilinged entry hall, glancing briefly through the archway on the left into the small receiving parlor, where she’d once been forced by her father to beg Cheleyza’s pardon. Her eyes went to the central grand staircase and the white marble walls, framed by darker rose marble columns. Besides the pair of archways, situated on both sides of the hall, there were also two doors of dark oak, both closed. One led, Mykella knew from her use of the Table, to Joramyl’s very private study.
A man in a blue uniform, trimmed in gray, hurried up and bowed. “Lady-Protector … we have done nothing. Nothing, if you please.”
Mykella looked at him. “You are?”
“Hrevor, the assistant steward, Lady-Protector.”
“Where is the steward?”
“Paelyt came here with Lady Cheleyza. He departed with her.”
Mykella nodded. “No one remaining here has taken anything?”
“Lady … I have not. I have told all the servants to leave everything as it was.”
While Hrevor’s forehead was damp, Mykella sensed the man was telling the truth. “You may escort us through the villa. We will begin with the private study behind the oak door beneath the grand staircase there.” She pointed.
“I do not have the key to that chamber, Lady. Only Lord Joramyl did. Not even Lady Cheleyza did. The sculls could only clean it when Lord Joramyl was present.”
Mykella looked hard at Hrevor, but the assistant steward was telling the truth. If the villa had been closer to the palace and the Table, Mykella could have reached out to the greenish darkness that underlay the Table and palace and slipped through earth and stone to enter the study from beneath; but she’d already discovered that only worked near the greenish black pathways that radiated from the old Tables—or had it been that the Tables had been placed on nodes in the pathways? Either way, that possibility wouldn’t work in the villa.
Areyst cleared his throat softly, and held up a ring of keys. “One of these might suffice.”
Mykella looked to the commander.
“Since the Lady Cheleyza fled before Lord Joramyl’s body was recovered, we removed all personal items for safekeeping and placed them in the Arms-Commander’s locked storeroom. There were no obvious valuables. You are the next of kin, Lady, except for Lady Cheleyza. I thought the keys might prove useful and removed them from the lockbox this morning.”
“You are prepared for everything, Commander, for which I am most grateful.” Mykella smiled warmly at Areyst as she took the keys. How many other things will you overlook?
Hrevor followed, a step behind, while Mykella and Areyst crossed the entry foyer and came to a stop at the study door.
The fourth key Mykella tried was the one that unlocked the heavy door. She pushed it open, but did not step into the darkened chamber, instead letting her Talent probe the chamber.
Areyst gestured to one of the Southern Guards who had accompanied them. The ranker stepped past Mykella and into the chamber, looking around it.
“Seems clear, sir, Lady.”
Mykella had not sensed anything either and eased into the hexagonal study, which looked to be exactly as she had seen it when she had used the Table. A round oak table, six oak chairs with padded seats and wooden arms drawn up to it, a single sideboard on which goblets were set on a tray, three bronze lamps in wall sconces, and two small and narrow windows high on the rear wall, both closed.
Areyst took a striker from his belt pouch and lit one of the lamps.
Mykella looked through the sideboard, but all it held were several sets of dice, some pasteboard cards, more goblets, a set of blue linens, and a halfscore of bottles of wine, all unopened. There has to be more here … somewhere.
She began to move along the paneled dark oak walls, occasionally tapping the wood, trying to feel what might lie behind the paneling. One part of the wall, the angled section between the rear wall and the left wall, felt different, almost empty. She studied it more intently, first with her eyes, then her senses, noting something like a cord or a wire that seemed to run behind the paneling and just … ended. Except, where it ended looked like a knot in the wood.
She pressed the knot. A narrow door swung open, revealing a small triangular room with three sturdy shelves. One each shelf rested an ironbound and locked wooden chest.
“It looks like the Lady didn’t make off with everything,” Mykella said dryly, fingering through the keys. None looked to fit the locks.
She tried them all, and none did. “We’ll have to cut the locks, or break the straps.”
“One of the armorers has tools to open locks,” suggested Areyst. “That might be easier.”
“We’ll need a wagon to take the chests to the palace. I don’t want to leave them here, but we need to see if there’s anything else we need to take for safekeeping.”
“I’ll send for a Guard wagon.”
“Thank you.” Mykella stepped back and closed the hidden door.
She walked toward the study door, knowing she had much more to do. Even though the villa was hers as Lady-Protector, and even though Cheleyza and Joramyl had plotted the murders of her brother and her father, and stolen thousands of gold, she felt vaguely uneasy about rummaging through the rooms, necessary as she felt that was, but she needed to inspect every chamber … and that included cellars and storerooms.
7
By the third glass of Novdi afternoon, Mykella had returned to the palace, with the chests opened, their coins counted and stored in the Lady-Protector’s strong room off the formal study. Mykella’s search had turned up nothing that she might have called easily moved valuables, such as jewelry or coins—except for the three chests … and close to one hundred sumptuous dresses and gowns, none of which could have been sewn for less than five to ten golds apiece. There were also more than threescore ladies’ riding outfits, thirty pair of leather boots, and over a hundred pair of shoes. All that in less than two years? Mykella had marveled.
A small chest in Berenyt’s quarters contained fifty-seven golds, and forty silvers and some coppers had appeared in drawers and pouches throughout the villa. The three chests from the hidden study held one thousand seven hundred and eleven golds, a hundred forty-three silvers, and eighty-four coppers. That sum—and even the cost of Cheleyza’s finery—left unanswered the question of what had happened to the larger part of the more than ten thousand golds, if not more, siphoned from the accounts of the Lord-Protector while Joramyl had been Finance Minister. She’d located three hidden chambers, one of which had held a score of ancient sabers, but found no other golds.
Mykella was sitting alone at the desk in the formal study when the door eased open and Salyna stepped inside.
“You didn’t eat anything…”
“I didn’t get back until a little while ago.”
“Where were you?”
“At Joramyl’s villa…” Mykella went on to explain what she had found—and what she had not, ending with, “… was just thinking about what to do next.”
“You might think about eating.” Salyna paused. “Over a hundred fancy dresses and gowns? She was only married to Uncle Joramyl two years. That’s a new fancy dress every tenday—and there are five balls a year, something like nine if you count the Seltyrs’ functions.”
“I haven’t counted,”
replied Mykella dryly. “Rachylana could tell us the number and how long each lasted to the glass.”
Salyna winced. “You’re being cruel.”
“Cruel … but accurate.”
“You need to eat. I had Muergya leave a warm plate for you. It’s probably not warm now, but it’s still good. I’ll keep you company.”
The two sisters walked back to the breakfast room, where Mykella sat down and began to eat a cooling fowl pie. A half loaf of dark bread and a beaker of cider sat on the table.
“What are you going to do the rest of the afternoon?” asked Salyna
“Study maps,” replied Mykella after taking several more mouthfuls.
“You’re not an Arms-Commander.”
“No … but I want to understand what my Arms-Commander tells me.”
“Mykella … do you trust anyone?”
“I trust you. I trust Commander Areyst.” She paused. “Just because someone is trustworthy doesn’t mean they’ll make the right decision. The more I know…” She shrugged.
“You have something in mind, don’t you?”
“I have an idea. The maps might help to see if it’s workable.”
“If not?”
“Then I’ll have to think of something else.”
“Do you really think Northcoast and Midcoast will invade Lanachrona?”
“I’d be foolish not to prepare for that, but I think they will. So does the commander. So, for that matter, does Rachylana. Envoy Malaryk and Majer Smoltak both hinted at it.”
“What will you do?”
“Commander Areyst is marshaling the Southern Guards in Viencet. I’ll study the maps and see what I can do.”
“You said that before.”
Mykella smiled. “I know.”
“Sometimes, you’re impossible.”
“I won’t know what I can do until I know more.”
Salyna just shook her head.
After eating, Mykella finished the cider in the beaker, then rose from the table. “Thank you. I did need to eat. I’ll see you later. Would you look in on Rachylana now and again.”
Salyna nodded. “She’s still brooding. Later…”
Mykella nodded. She understood that as well, even though she didn’t want to have to worry about Rachylana on top of everything else. As she walked back to the formal study, thinking about Rachylana and her concerns about matching, Mykella wondered if she’d hear anything, directly or indirectly, from Prince Skrelyn’s envoy. The odds were she would, if only so that he could report something back to the prince.
Once she returned to the study, after stopping by her quarters for her nightsilk riding jacket, Mykella pored over the maps, tracing the hills that bordered the southern bank of the River Vedra between Tempre and the Midcoast border, those that were closest to the northern highway. After a glass, she closed the folio and pulled on her riding jacket, then walked to the window, where she could touch the granite. She reached out to the greenish darkness beneath the palace, let it enfold her, and slipped downward through the stone to the Table chamber.
When she emerged, she paused. Did the Table display a slightly brighter purplish pink than it had since she’d defeated the Ifrit or its creation? Strengthening her shields, she moved closer, but she could sense nothing that suggested the presence of an Ifrit, even one watching her through the Table from wherever it was that the Ifrits lived. Still … the pinkish purple seemed brighter, and she’d have to watch that as well.
Looking down at the mirrored surface of the Table, she focused her attention on Cheleyza. The mists appeared, swirled, and revealed her aunt still upon a barge, looking windblown and angry. Mykella couldn’t help but smile. Cheleyza deserved whatever misery befell her. Quick searches through the Table revealed Areyst in an armory, Maxymt riding a horse westward along a dirt track rather than an eternastone road, and Seltyr Porofyr standing on a balcony, his face impassive.
Mykella stepped back, watching the mists vanish, and concentrated on the blackness below, letting herself meld with it and slip downward through the stone into the bone-chilling darkness. She pressed westward along the underground way, trying to judge how far she had come. She thought she felt the silver heaviness of the river to her right, and she tried to keep herself well within the blackness but not too far from the river. After a time, she sensed she was getting farther from the river, and she let herself rise through the earth and stone, only to find herself in the middle of a field. The damp earth was littered with limp tannish stalks, most likely of beans, remaining from the previous fall.
To the west, according to the sun, the field extended less than a hundred yards, ending at a low stone and earthen berm. South of her was a small cot with an outbuilding, and behind it a low line of hills. She turned and saw a line of trees to the north. Was that the Vedra?
Abruptly, she was surrounded by a mist that quickly dispersed. For a moment, she puzzled, but realized that the chill of her riding jacket had created a frost that had turned to mist. While the spring afternoon was cool, the air felt pleasant after the chill of the depths.
She raised a concealment shield. Could she soar any, drawing from the blackness beneath the field?
After recalling that feeling, which took several moments, because it had been weeks since the single time she had tried soaring, she rose from the ground and directed herself toward the hills beyond the cot. According to the maps, the hills curved more to the south just to the west of Viencet, but did the blackness follow the hills or parallel the eternastone highway or…?
She had no idea. She was ruler of Lanachrona, and she knew so little of the land beyond Tempre … and less of the people.
She managed to travel across the field and past the cot and perhaps half a vingt toward the hills before she could feel her ties to the blackness weaken. She eased herself back down onto the winter-matted grass and studied the meadow and the scattered trees at the base of the nearest hill, estimating they were another vingt away. She wasn’t about to walk away from where she could reach the blackness beneath the ground.
She turned back toward the cot, noting a thin trail of smoke rising from the mud-brick chimney. Whoever lived there could surely tell her where she was.
By the time she reached the narrow track that passed for a road, her boots were caked in mud, and she stopped to scrape the worst off on a stone. She glanced eastward toward several cots a vingt or so along the road, There was nothing to the west, except hills and woods. If those woods were part of the reserve woodlands held by the Lord-Protector … Lady-Protector—once she got back to the palace, the maps might help her figure out where she’d been.
She dropped the concealment and raised her shields tightly about her, then walked up the packed-clay path toward the cot.
A woman with braided black hair, clad in a shapeless gray garment that might have once been a dress, opened the door before Mykella reached it. Her face was worn and haggard. “Where did you come from, girl?”
“Where am I?” asked Mykella, not wanting to answer the woman’s question.
“Standing in front of Tedor’s and my cot, I’d be thinking.” From inside the cot came the gurgling cry of an infant.
“How far is it to Viencet? Which way?”
“You’d be thinking of walking there?” The woman shook her head. “It’d be another day’s walk. You’d best cross the hills to the old road first.”
“The eternastone road that the … Southern Guards and the traders use?”
“The shiny stone one that never wears out. Aye … that’d be the one.”
“How far is it across the hills?”
“As long as it takes. Half a morning, maybe less, ifn you walk quick-like.”
“What’s the nearest hamlet or town?”
“Meithyl … just up the way.” The woman pointed eastward.
“Is there any hamlet to the west on this road?”
That got Mykella a headshake. “Them’s the Lord-Protector’s woods. Wouldn’t want to be going there
. Foresters’ll flog you, they catch you.”
Mykella fumbled in her belt pouch. Did she even have any coins? She felt one, two … They were silvers. She eased one from the pouch and extended it to the woman. “Thank you.”
The woman’s eyes opened. Then her mouth did. “What…”
Mykella felt embarrassed. “Please take it.”
The woman finally did.
At that, Mykella dropped her shields. She stepped backwards from the stoop of the cot, then reached to the blackness and let it enfold her, sinking back to the chill beneath.
She looked so … old … tired … Yet, Mykella realized, the woman probably was less than ten years older than she was.
Pushing that thought away for a moment, Mykella pressed westward through the darkness for about as long, she felt, as it had taken her to reach where she had first stopped. Then she eased her way upward. It seemed to take longer. Is that because you’re getting tired?
She emerged in the shadows of a wooded hillside, where the ground sloped upwards to the south. She decided on body-shields, rather than concealment, and began to walk, deciding that trying to soar through the woods would be unwise, given her lack of practice in avoiding things, because, while she could hold concealment while soaring, she could not hold body-shields as well … and sometimes not either, depending on how strong her ties to the blackness were. The trees were mostly evergreens, predominantly pines that seemed to top out at less than ten yards. The soil was dry and even rocky in places, and that suggested she was definitely more to the west, because Jeraxylt had mentioned how much drier the land was nearer the border with Midcoast.
Lady-Protector Page 8
