Valdemar Books

by Lackey, Mercedes

  And it gave Alberich an opportunity all unlooked-for, to get back down into Haven and concentrate all of his attention on Norris.

  And on a new problem.

  ***

  The sound of music and laughter from the common room and taproom of the Bell was loud enough to reach all the way to the stables. Wedding fever had begun even down in Haven; the banners that had greeted the coronation were being hung again, more decorations were being hung every day, and it seemed to be all anyone could talk about. And of course, where there was an event, there would be commerce—medallions, flags, and banners to wave, portraits and statues, dozens of songs (most bad). There were even stalls with pairs of Selenay and Karathanelan dolls appearing—either dressed as the Moon Maiden and the Prince, or in what were fondly supposed to be the Queen and Prince’s wedding finery.

  And even the quiet Bell was abuzz. Alberich wasn’t terribly unhappy about all the fuss—it made it easier to slip in and out, rather than more difficult—a good thing, since for a change he was here in broad daylight. He was actually in his secret room, changing into one of his personae, when he heard the stable-side door open behind him.

  His heart leaped into his throat. He whirled with a knife in his hands, one small part of him wondering how anyone had gotten past Kantor, when he saw it was Myste.

  He slipped the knife back in its hiding place, hoping she hadn’t seen it, and was going to say something—something irritated, actually, since she wasn’t supposed to burst in on him like this—when he caught the look of worry on her face. That, and the fact that she was wringing her hands together, made him bite back what he had been about to say.

  “I’m in trouble,” she said, and for one, startled moment, he flashed on the only thing that phrase meant, back in Karse—

  “They want me to become their full-time clerk, accountant, and treasurer,” she continued, oblivious to whatever expressions had flitted across his face in that brief moment. If any had. He’d probably looked like an idiot with his mouth hanging open.

  Then what she’d said penetrated, and he realized that the situation was quite serious indeed. “Oh, hellfires,” he said. They want her to work for them and only them, and how is she supposed to do that and continue being Herald-Chronicler? Scratch that; spending that much time with them, how is she going to manage without getting caught?

  “Norris has found a backer, and he’s getting a theater for the company. The gods of actors and idiots only know where he’s getting the money from, but it’s quite certain. And the fellow that handles all the business matters—you met him, remember?—wants me to do all of the money things for them. It’s a full-time job, I can pledge you that, between managing the take at the door, getting everyone and everything paid for, taxes, hiring things like cleaning women and laundresses.” She shook her head frantically. “Thank the gods I got wind of this before they actually asked me. I think they’re waiting—wisely, may I add—to be sure that the money for the theater is in hand before they say anything to an outsider.” Now her voice took on the tones of a wail of fear. “But what am I going to do?”

  She wasn’t panicking, but she looked as if she was in knots. “Sit down, for one thing. You look as pale as a shirt.” She did as he ordered, while he sucked on his lower lip and thought, hard. “All right, you can’t take that job; I couldn’t take it and stay undiscovered with a trained actor like Norris watching me. Which means we have to come up with some reason why you can’t take it.”

  The moment he said, “You can’t take the job,” he saw relief suffuse her features. And he was very glad that it was Myste in front of him now, and not Keren, who would have been offended at the very thought that she couldn’t keep up the deception. “I think we have these options to get Myste the Clerk out of range before the offer can actually be made. You can ’take another position’—tell them tonight, even, that you’ve been offered a job, say, on some Great Lord’s staff but on his estate, so you have to leave. You can send them a letter saying that some wealthy elderly relative you didn’t even know of before today is sick, and wants you to move in and take care of her, and if you do, you’ll inherit everything. Or Myste can have a terrible accident and die.”

  “Myste will, if we can’t figure out something,” Myste said darkly, but looked infinitely more relaxed. “Well, the first one won’t do, because every Great Lord is going to be here until the wedding is over, and I want to be able to tell them I’m leaving tonight. I’d just as soon not close off all options by killing my old self, so that leaves the second. And I want it to be by letter; I don’t want to take the chance on arousing any suspicion by giving them a chance to start asking questions about my story.”

  “The best choice, I think,” he agreed. “No one is going to seriously suggest that you give up a grand inheritance in favor of a position with a theater company that doesn’t even have a theater yet. And in case Clerk Myste ever has to come back to Haven, it can either be as a visit after your wealthy aunt has died, or it can turn out that the wealthy aunt wasn’t as wealthy as she made herself out to be, and you are back looking for work.”

  “Excellent,” Myste replied, and closed her eyes and sagged back against the wall, “And I have to leave immediately. Better yet, I’m already gone. My aunt sent a coach, and I left in it. I don’t mind telling you, I was panicked. Especially after last night.”

  Alberich nodded; he could well understand Myste’s concern, for last night she had gotten to copy another one of those encrypted messages from Norris to—well, whoever they were to.

  And that gave him an idea. “Writing a letter is perfect,” he said, “In fact, write two. One to the manager of the company and one to Norris. If you were as infatuated as he thinks you are, he’d think it strange if you didn’t send him a personal good-bye. As your old friend, I’ll take them both over, and you can go back up the hill as soon as you change.”

  “What—” Myste began, and then she nodded. “Right! So that Norris doesn’t suspect, after last night, that I’m a spy who is running off now that I have what I need. I think I know just the tone. The brokenhearted farewell letter of the hopelessly infatuated woman who knows she had less chance with him than a lapdog, but can’t bear not to tell him about how her soul will be empty forever without him. It’ll take some clever writing—”

  “And hold out the offer that if he is ever in—Three Rivers, I think that’s far enough, and rustic enough—or if he ever finds himself down on his luck, he can call on you for anything he needs.” Alberich chuckled a little as Myste made a face. “You might as well spread it on thick.”

  “Oh, I will.” She stood up and went to the small chest that held writing materials. “This won’t take very long.”

  And it didn’t. By the time he was finished changing into his guise as the carter, she had finished both letters, sanded them to dry the ink, folded, and sealed them with a blob of candle-wax and her thumbprint. On the outside of one, she made a little drawing of a pen, and on the other, a mask. “The mask goes to Norris,” she said, handing them to him.

  “Good. Would it sound loutish of me to say that I am relieved that this is over for you? And that I have never liked having you in this position?” he asked, taking them and stowing them in his pouch.

  “No, and not half as relieved as I am,” she replied, and unexpectedly kissed him. “I make a good historian. I make a mediocre spy.”

  “But if it had not been for you—” He kissed her back, feeling warm and peculiarly protective. It was a very pleasant sensation, now that she was going to be out of danger. He had deliberately not thought about her being in danger while all of this was going on. It wouldn’t have done any good in the first place, and in the second, well, it might have done both of them quite a bit of harm. They were, first and foremost, Heralds. They had duties. Only she could do what she was doing, and they both knew it.

  But now he certainly knew what people meant by the phrase, “having your heart hostage to fortune.” It was not a feeling t
hat he had welcomed.

  “I still make a mediocre spy,” she replied. “And I hope you never need my peculiar mix of talents again.”

  “Oh, I shall—but I hope not as a spy.” He raised an eyebrow and she flushed, but laughed. “Don’t forget to tell the innkeeper before you leave the Bell where Clerk Myste is going, and that she left in a private coach for Three Rivers a candlemark ago.”

  “I won’t,” she promised. He gave her a little bow, and slipped out the back way.

  The last thing he was going to do, especially after this, was to go directly from the Bell to his destination. Instead, he cut through back alleys and even through a few unfenced yards to get him to the part of town where the tanners and dyers had their workshops, before he finally headed for the inn. He never came at it from the same direction twice if he could help it, and today it would be especially important that there be no association between himself and the Companion’s Bell.

  Other than that his “friend” Myste had lived there, of course.

  He discharged the first errand by leaving the letter in the room that served as an office, for the business manager was out on some errand or other. But as for the second—the troupe was rehearsing in the stables, and he had heard Norris’ voice when he passed by. Now he went in, and waited patiently until there was a break in the action and Norris left the group that was declaiming at each other to get himself a drink of water from the barrel Alberich stood beside.

  “Message for you, sir,” he said, making sure that his voice was pitched low, his tone harsh, rather than high and shrill as the “scholar” had been. He thrust the folded paper at Norris, who took it automatically, but with a look of annoyance.

  Still, the man did open it, and read it, his mouth twitching with amusement. Alberich was rather surprised to find himself wanting to punch that mouth and make him eat that amusement. . . .

  “So, the little mouse has got herself a granary, eh?” he said, carelessly. “Well, I can hardly blame her for running off to secure it. Lads!” he called to the rest of the group, whose heads all turned in his direction. “That drab little clerk of ours has fallen into the cream! Some rich auntie’s got sick, and she’s run off to nurse and inherit!”

  “Cor, I could do with a rich auntie,” said a beardless fellow enviously.

  “Hey, Norris, if she’s rich enough, reckon she can afford you?” catcalled another, as Norris made a face.

  “She’d have to be richer than the head of the Goldsmiths Guild,” Norris scoffed back.

  Throttling down the urge to throttle Norris, Alberich started to turn away to leave. Because if he stayed a moment longer, he might hear something that would make him lose his temper.

  “Say, fellow, could I get you to run a similar errand for me?” Norris asked. “For, say, a silver penny?”

  Alberich turned back. “Aye,” he said curtly. “As long as it don’t take me out’o town.”

  “Oh, it won’t.” Norris pulled an embroidered handkerchief—masculine in style, rather than feminine—from a pocket in his trews. “A friend of mine left this here by accident last night. I’d like you to take it back to him. He lives at a rather grand place on Hoberd Hill. It’s the one with the wyvern gateposts; you’ll know it when you see it.”

  Alberich took the handkerchief and the penny, successfully concealing his surprise. Because he knew that address; knew it very well indeed.

  It was the location of the Rethwellan Embassy.

  All the time he was on his way, he wondered what exactly, he would learn when he got there. He knew what the handkerchief business was about, of course, for sewing a packet of papers between two identical handkerchiefs to conceal them was an old play. The bit of fabric had been neatly folded, but he’d felt the thin papers when he put the object in the belt pouch that had lately held the letters. Myste had written these last night, he was certain of it, for the paper was very thin and light.

  So this time Norris was prepared to send his—whatever he was sending—openly. Probably more instructions to the Prince on how to handle a woman. Couple that with Myste’s certainty that Norris had found a “backer,” and it was clear that Norris was under the impression that his job was complete. So maybe he was willing to take a risk he would not otherwise have dared.

  Or perhaps he doesn’t care now.

  Or both. Or—one more possibility—Norris knew that his “handler” would be as busy with the wedding preparations as everyone else, and figured he could afford to be lazy this time, for he wouldn’t be caught.

  When Alberich reached the Embassy—he went around to the “tradesman’s” entrance. Not for the likes of him, those wyvern-carved doorposts and the imposing worked-iron gate. Oh, no.

  He followed a narrow passage between the walls until he came to the back of the property, where there were signs of life. Quite a bit, actually, which was hardly surprising considering that the Prince was marrying the Queen of his host country. It took Alberich a while to get the attention of someone who looked as if he was in charge of things.

  “What do you want, fellow?” asked the harried-looking man in Rethwellan livery—who then interrupted himself to shout, “look, how many times must I remind you, the Prince does not like lilies!”

  “Actor by the name of Norris sent this,” he said, thrusting the folded cloth at the man, who took it, then gave it a second, startled glance. “Says someone up here left it down at his inn.”

  “Ah—yes. Of course.” From the man’s expression, Alberich knew that they must be the Prince’s own handkerchiefs—and that the man had not expected to get them in quite this way—and that he knew very well there was something inside them. “Thank you, my man; I’ll see it gets to the Pr—owner. Ah—” he fumbled in his belt pouch, came up with a couple of coins, and thrust them at Alberich without looking at them. “Here. For your trouble.”

  So you think about the tip and forget about wondering why I needed to march up here to return a handkerchief. “Thankee, sir,” he said, with a little bow. “I’ll be off out of your way.”

  “Yes, yes, of—No! No, no, no!” The man was off, chasing down a couple of fellows with what looked like a rolled-up carpet. Alberich absented himself.

  Quickly.

  Because he didn’t want anyone here to get a good look at him, he didn’t want the man to think about questioning him, and above all, he wanted to get back to talk this over with Talamir.

  For what the man had almost said was, “I’ll see that it gets to the Prince.”

  17

  It would have been a satisfactory end to the tale for Selenay to have realized, at the very altar, that the Prince was a cad who was manipulating her for his own purposes. It would have been equally satisfactory for Talamir and Alberich and Myste to have presented her with the evidence they had gathered, including the decoded papers outlining—well something rotten—in time for her to come to her senses and send the blackguard packing.

  In fact, nothing of the sort happened.

  The papers were still not decoded, and even if they had been, Selenay would neither have looked at them nor believed what was in them. No one who saw her could have doubted that she was insanely, deliriously happy. The Prince appeared to hang on her every word, she certainly did on his. The wedding plans swiftly turned into preparations, without even an incident that could have been thought of as ill-omened, and with no more problems than any other major undertaking. In the end, of all things, it was probably the Tedrel Wars that were due the credit for organizing so much, so well, in so little time. After putting together armies and encampments and battle plans, then seeing to it that everything was smoothly executed, Selenay’s people had more than enough experience to pull off a Royal Wedding in a moon.

  Alberich stayed away from the Palace as much as possible; during the last week he never even left the salle. Myste brought him some meals from the Collegium kitchens, for there were no servants to be spared to bring them to him; others he simply prepared for himself. They assiduously avo
ided the topic of the wedding, concentrating instead on any other matters that could possibly be considered useful.

  And in a curious and careful exploration of each other. In fact, with the shining example of what not to do so blatantly in front of them, somehow they had both come to the conclusion, simultaneously, that they ought to take a very long time in simply talking about things. It was very curious. Alberich suspected that their Companions had a hand in it. But he wasn’t going to object. . . .

  These long talks provided the pleasant interludes in what was otherwise a period that was not so much ridden with anxiety as resignation.

  He knew that he wasn’t the only one who felt this way. Most of the other Heralds that he knew, if they were not actually supposed to be taking part in the proceedings, were avoiding the Palace altogether. The feeling that they all seemed to share was most adequately described by one of the fellows from the south, who had seen some terrible mudslides when he’d been a child. “You see it start,” he said, “and it’s so slow, and so big, it seems impossible that it can be happening. And then you realize that it’s actually impossible to stop—and impossible for you to get out of its way. And if you aren’t in the path, all you can do is stand there and watch, knowing that there isn’t one damn thing you can do except try and pick up the pieces when it’s all over.”

  He had simply made sure that the Guards he trained as the Queen’s bodyguards, who were suffering no such misgivings, were at their absolute peak of performance and knew in their guts as well as their heads that no matter what happened, they were always to protect Selenay from anyone that threatened her. Including her husband. When people came to the salle looking for a workout, if they were up to his level of expertise, he gave them one. If they were not, he found them partners, and supervised.