by Jo Zebedee
Rinharte’s heart skipped a beat.
“Why did you bring them aboard, Rizbeka? What were you thinking?”
“They could be useful,” Rinharte managed to say.
The Admiral scowled angrily. “What you learnt on Kapuluan was useful.”
Rinharte had not been asked to brief the Admiral, so how she knew of the events on Kapuluan was a mystery. Someone else must have reported to her. Not Marine-Captain Kordelasz—Rinharte was sure of that much. And Boat-Sergeant Alus’s squad made unlikely spies.
Gripping the lectern’s angled top, the Admiral leant forward, a preacher exhorting her congregation to obey Chian’s laws or face damnation. “They are knights sinister, Rizbeka. They will tell you nothing. They are… dangerous.”
“We need them,” Rinharte protested. “We need their help with Casimir. He trusts them.”
“After the knights sinister took him captive? Come, Rizbeka, you want me to believe the farmboy is no fool, so why would he do anything so foolish?”
There was no answer to that.
The Admiral shook her head sadly. There was a thump as she closed the Book. “Rizbeka, what happened? You were my good right hand. You appear to have come under this farmboy’s spell. Are you his princess?”
“No! Ma’am!”
“Then explain it to me, Rizbeka. Tell me why. This boy runs rings around you, he has an OPI officer at his beck and call, and now he has you leading me by the nose to where he wishes me to be. I won’t have it, Rizbeka. I told you before, I will not abrogate my responsibility. And certainly not to a mere slip of a youth, a prole, a data-freighter cabin-boy.”
“I… can’t.” And she could not. She had made decisions on the spur of the moment for what felt like the right reasons. Ormuz had promised her he would tell her all when they met up on Kapuluan. It was not the boy’s fault he failed to make that meeting. But his failure to appear had made her look foolish in the eyes of her commanding officer. Bringing Lotsman, Dai and Tovar aboard Vengeful had not, perhaps, been the wisest thing to do, but… If she were being honest, she knew full well why she had taken the crew of Divine Providence captive. The debt she owed Murily Plessant was one reason but perhaps not the chief one.
The Admiral straightened and let go of the lectern. Her face was an unreadable mask. “For now,” she said coldly, “I will continue to believe you know what you are doing, I will continue to believe that you hold my aims dear. I will see this farmboy, this Casimir Ormuz, when we reach Linna. It would surprise me indeed should he find the duke as easy to sway as yourself and the inspector. We shall see then who should apologise to whom.”
There was a moment of silence.
“Dismissed.”
Rinharte scrambled to her feet. She clutched her scabbard, afraid she would trip over it. She felt lost—she had failed the Admiral. It was there in the Admiral’s gaze. And the meeting had begun so… amicably. Saluting shakily, she stumbled about and strode stiff-legged to the open hatch. For moment, she halted on the threshold, feeling the Admiral’s eyes still upon her. She hung her head… and stepped out into the gangway.
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
The ducal aerodrome sat in the middle of a windswept steppe some thirty miles from Rusko Palace. Built for the private use of the Duke of Kunta, its runway was long enough for the ducal yacht and more than ample for Lantern. It boasted little in the way of amenities: a control blockhouse, a handful of armoured hangars, barracks for troops and a terminal built to resemble an over-sized nomad’s circular tent. A desolate landscape of scrubby grass and scattered boulders surrounded the aerodrome in every direction. To the north, a line of low undulating hills marked the start of tundra. West, the jagged wall of the Vuor Mountains loomed on the horizon, their peaks lost in a haze of distance and low cloud.
It had been a long trip to this winter world. Lantern had broken its journey at Salikop and Yuotos but even so the trip had taken seven weeks in the toposphere. During that time, 124 days had elapsed. Everything could have changed. Finesz doubted it. The speed of communication was the speed of topologic travel and the time-lag affected all. Norioko, she calculated, would be only weeks away from Shuto. Almost a year had passed since she arrived on Darrus, although she had only directly experienced— She scowled: seventeen weeks of that year. That damn topologic time-lag. It played havoc with sense of time.
Although wrapped in her black uniform great-coat, Finesz immediately felt the chill when she stepped out of Lantern’s airlock. She flicked her collar up, the better to protect herself, and clattered down the steps onto the aerodrome’s apron. The OPI sloop was the only starship in evidence, although two orbital fighters were visible through the open doors of a hangar at the edge of the field. A pair of technicians in orange overalls worked on the nose-mounted sensor of one.
Heavy footsteps sounded on the sloop’s stairs behind her and Finesz glanced back. Troop-Sergeant Assaun, also swathed in a great-coat, descended to stand beside her. The climate appeared not to affect him at all: he remained as unperturbed as ever. Varä and Ormuz trailed after him, a pair of gaudy birds beside the two black-clad OPI. The marquess’ white coat was trimmed in slick grey fur and stitched across the torso with designs in silver. Ormuz’s was a dusky red and trimmed with black fur. Both wore round fur hats, Varä’s black and bearing the device of his family, three upturned green cups on a field of blue; Ormuz’s white hat was bare. Ormuz, Finesz noted disapprovingly, had also styled his hair in two intricately-knotted braids, aping the marquess.
Turning back to gaze at the terminal, Finesz wondered at the absence of a welcome. The duke’s staff had been informed of her arrival. Why were they not here to meet her? Why was the duke himself not here to greet her? She frowned, clapped her gloved hands together, and blew out a cloud of breath.
“Damn it,” she muttered.
Perhaps she was an unwanted guest. How embarrassing. After telling Ormuz and Varä the duke was an old friend and sure to be delighted to see her…
“Assaun,” she said.
The troop-sergeant nodded brusquely.
“Go and see if you can rouse someone from the terminal. I don’t plan to stand here in this cold all day.”
Assaun marched away.
“Sliva?”
Finesz turned to Ormuz.
He continued, “What are we waiting for? Can’t we go somewhere warm?”
“In a moment,” she muttered absently and turned back to gaze at the terminal, watching Assaun reach the entrance, pull the door open and step inside.
Moments later, he reappeared, with a man in livery of white, pale blue and pale green: Yalosukinen colours. The two crossed the apron to Finesz.
The servant came to a puffing halt before Rinharte, his breath pluming the air between them. He bowed. “My Lady Finesz?” he asked.
“You took your time,” Finesz snapped.
“Apologies, my lady. A last-minute change of plan.”
“His grace didn’t see fit to meet us himself?” Finesz asked, disappointed. She had not expected a ceremonial welcome but she had thought his grace would at least have the… grace to greet them himself.
The servant blinked. “No, my lady. The, um, ‘change of plan’… He has been taken busy and sent me in his stead. I have transport.”
“A fine welcome,” she muttered. Had she meant so little to the duke? A thought occurred to her: “Is her grace in residence?” she asked.
“Yes, my lady.”
“Ah.” That likely explained it. Vetlina mar Yalosukinen had never been comfortable around Finesz. While she accepted her husband’s dalliance, the duchess had never been eager to socialise with the objects of the duke’s affections.
The servant led the four of them from the field, fawning over the two young men as if they were princes, through the terminal and out to a large coach sat bobbing on its chargers. It was not an elegant vehicle, although well-suited to the climate: pronounced prow and keel, sharply raked roof,
thick windows. The entrance was at the rear, a wide door that lifted up to form a protective portico. The coach’s cab was occupied by two soldiers in dark green jackets with dark blue frogging. Finesz raised an eyebrow in surprise. The Duke of Kunta’s Imperial Winter Rangers. The duke was colonel-in-chief of the regiment, but that was a purely ceremonial post. For the Regimental Staff to assign regimental troops to their colonel-in-chief was… unusual.
Finesz followed the servant into the vehicle and settled into a chair. The interior was heated and she immediately felt the weight of her great-coat. She was tempted to remove the garment but guessed she would need it at journey’s end. So she unbuttoned it and spread its wings wide across the chair’s arms.
Varä and Ormuz had immediately stripped off their fur-trimmed coats. They threw them onto the banquette seat against the front of the cabin. Their hats quickly followed.
After lowering the rear door, the servant pulled down a jump-seat and sat. Assaun pulled down a similar seat on the other side of the coach.
With a whine of engines, the vehicle glided forward.
As she descended from the coach, Finesz halted and gazed up at Rusko Palace. She had seen photographs and landscape paintings depicting it, but this was her first view of the real thing. And its size, more than its architecture, struck her first. She could see nothing but the palace. It rose before her, a vast endless wall of red stone some ten stories high. For the first seventy-five feet, the wall was completely featureless. Above that, balconied windows dotted the façade. Just visible on the roof were a number of narrow towers, each a different height and each topped with an onion-shaped dome painted with gold leaf. She turned about. The area before the palace was an enormous walled courtyard. The gateway through which they’d entered was at least five hundred yards away. Rusko Palace was built to a grand scale. It was hard not to be impressed.
As Ormuz promptly proved by whispering “Dear Lords…” when he descended from the coach. Finesz watched him spin around, taking in the plaza in which they stood, the mountainous palace sitting in its centre.
“Close your mouth, Casimir, dear,” Varä said, appearing beside Ormuz. “It’s unbecoming.”
“This place is… gigantic,” Ormuz replied in awe.
Varä tittered at Ormuz’s wide-eyed amazement. “Wait until you get inside. The palace is built to a traditional Linni pattern: a square with in a square within a square… and so on.”
“Inside?” asked Ormuz faintly.
“Inside,” Finesz ordered sternly. The youth had gawked enough—she had gawked enough.
The servant appeared. As he approached, a loud rumbling noise behind Finesz drew her attention. She spun about. A section of the palace wall was slowly grinding aside, revealing a long tunnel.
“My lady,” the servant said, gesturing towards the entrance that now pierced the wall.
The tunnel was not wide enough for the coach, which was why they had to travel the rest of the way on foot. Or perhaps not. Just within the tunnel mouth, the servant led the four onto a platform for a small land-train. A carriage, richly decorated in the Yalosukinen white, pale blue and pale green, floated lightly above a single rail. Finesz climbed in, followed by Varä and Ormuz. Troop-Sergeant Assaun and the servant stepped into the open box on the rear of the carriage. The land-train shifted smoothly into motion. Soothing music began to play at an unobtrusive volume.
Finesz sat back and enjoyed the ride. The land-train sped along the tunnel and out into Linna’s weak sunshine. As Varä had said, the palace façade hid yet another courtyard, this one landscaped and gardened and a mile across. Grass, an insipid green in colour, and bushes, shrubs and trees ranging from white through to a pale bluish-green, gave the grounds a wintery aspect. An ornamental lake glittered to one side, surrounded by a balconied promenade punctuated at intervals by onion-domed pavilions. The water was so flat and motionless, Finesz thought for one brief moment the lake was iced over. On the bench-seat across from her, Ormuz peered out of the carriage windows and oohed and ahhed. Varä maintained a blasé nonchalance.
The land-train curved gently to the right and Finesz saw their immediate destination: a red stone keep, festooned with balconies and domes, fifteen stories high. Within that, no doubt, was another courtyard, although the keep only measured four hundred or so yards on a side. And within that? And within that? Somewhere deep in the centre of Rusko Palace, there was likely a thick-walled vault, impervious to whatever historical weaponry the Yalosukinens’ ancient enemies could possibly throw at it.
The entrance to this second keep was no hidden gate masquerading as a stretch of wall but an ornate pair of towers with an archway between them. The Yalosukinen device—a square beneath a castle, and a crown above both—was prominently carved in stone at the apex of the arch. The land-train’s rail sank until it was embedded in the stone road. They zipped along it through the gatehouse…
And into a third courtyard. This was no garden but a flat expanse of dressed stone, and prominent in its centre a six-sided chapel. The centre vault, then, thought Finesz, was a safe haven for the ducal family’s spiritual well-being. The chapel itself was a tower of pale golden stone, with sweeping buttresses at every corner and large circular windows on each of its six faces. At the very tip of the needle-spire shone a perforated golden globe fashioned to resemble a sun.
The carriage had come to a halt. The door lifted open. “My lady, my lords,” the servant intoned, bowing.
“Heavens, Sliva. What have they done to you?” Afveni mar Yalosukinen, Duke of Kunta, had chosen to meet his guests in his office, a large room overlooking the central courtyard and its chapel. The walls were panelled to head-height and clad in pale blue-and-green striped material above. The furniture was sturdy, old and polished to a high gloss.
Kunta was behind his desk, which was huge and heavy, intricately carved and covered in papers. He rose to his feet and grinned. He had not changed at all with the years, Finesz saw.
“Done, Afi? Nothing.”
“They must have done something, love. You’re not the sweet young thing I remember.”
Finesz heard someone titter behind her.
“And you’ve changed too, Afi: you’ve turned senile. I was never a ‘sweet young thing’.”
Kunta laughed. “No. I can’t say you were.” He grinned again. “Oh, but you burned brightly, Sliva, you burned brightly.” His grin turned wistful. “I’ve never forgotten that.”
He came from behind the desk and she stepped into his embrace. His arms crushed her through her great-coat. Once he had let go and stepped back a pace, she added, “I would be disappointed if you had forgotten: it was why you sent me away. Remember?”
“It was the wife, you know it was.” His impish smile, however, gave the lie to his words.
“Umph.” Finesz stepped away to reveal her two charges, and performed introductions: “Your grace, may I present His Lordship the Marquess of Varä, and Lord Ormuz.”
“Varä, eh? Uskolin’s youngest?”
The viscount gave a flourishing bow. “Your grace.”
“Heard you got caught up in some scandal and dropped out of sight.”
Varä’s smile stiffened.
The duke turned to Ormuz, who responded with a bow, arms straight down at his sides. Kunta raised an eyebrow. “Ormuz? Don’t know the name. Where are you from?”
“Shuto,” Ormuz said flatly.
Finesz held back a retort.
“Never heard of an Ormuz on Shuto. Who’s your— ?” The duke broke off and peered intently at Ormuz. “Remove your hat,” he ordered.
Puzzled, Ormuz did so. He held it before him in both hands.
“You’re a damn fool, Sliva,” Kunta snapped. “This is not the time for one of your jokes.”
“Joke? What joke?”
“Passing off a damn by-blow.” The duke was furious. He turned and glared at Finesz. “Is this some kind of revenge? I treated you well, Sliva. I won’t have t
hat thrown back in my face. Even after all these years.”
“I’m not—”
She was not permitted to finish. “Vartio!” the duke roared.
The door to the salon opened and a man in the uniform of the duke’s household troops stepped into the room. A captain, Finesz saw by his insignia of rank. Captain Vartio saluted his duke.
“Take this boy,” Kunta ordered, gesturing in Ormuz’s direction. “Put him in the… Vankila Room and lock the door. Have two men on guard outside.”
“Afi!” protested Finesz. The duke had clearly recognised Ormuz and guessed the identity of his father. He also plainly knew the boy’s father had no sons—or none that resembled Ormuz. Again, she rued the fact she still didn’t know the Serpent’s identity. But she would before she left Linna. Kunta—someone—would tell her.
Captain Vartio grabbed Ormuz’s arm and pulled him from the room. The boy left silently, casting a beseeching look at Finesz. She winced. There was nothing she could do. For now. She only hoped his imprisonment was comfortable.
The door closed with a frightening finality.
“Your grace,” said Varä. “You’ve made a terrible mistake. Casimir is—”
“Quiet!” snapped Kunta. “Your reputation precedes you.”
“And what about my reputation?” demanded Finesz angrily. She peeled off a glove and slapped it against the duke’s shoulder. “What about my reputation, Afi? You know full well who I work for.”
“Norioko,” growled Kunta. “Not the best alliance you’ve ever made, Sliva.”
“Afraid I’ll arrest you? I have the authority,” she replied sarcastically.
“Not here, you don’t. Vartio has three companies—”
“Don’t forget your Winter Rangers, Afi.” They weren’t his, of course. Historically, the regiment had belonged to the Yalosukinen family, millennia ago when they had been mere earls and the regiment had been the Earl of Kunta’s Winter Rangers. Edkar I had changed all that when he seized the Imperial Throne. Now the Imperial Winter Rangers answered only to the Regimental Staff.
