A Conspiracy of Truths

by Alexandra Rowland

  My breath caught in my throat. “That’s kind of you to say, lad,” I said carefully. “If you liked that, you’d probably like the tune that goes with it. Ylfing could sing it for you—ask him if he remembers the ‘Song of the Two Firesides.’ ”

  “I will,” he said.

  “It’s a song I often sing when I’m crossing a border into somewhere new.” This was, of course, a lie for the benefit of the guards. “It brings luck and protection to travelers. Perhaps one day you’ll go abroad and remember it.”

  “Perhaps.”

  “Ylfing can teach you,” I said again, trying not to sound too much like I was stressing it.

  “I’ll ask him. But do you have my slate? It’s past curfew and I need to get home.”

  I patted around in the dark and found it, found the chalk, scribbled a line or two the same way we had done earlier—Nuryeven transliterated to Hrefni runes: Cross the Tegey Pass. Find the city of tents and sing. Go soon.

  It was the fastest trial I’ve ever seen,” Consanza said, a few days later. That day they brought me a cushion and a blanket (carefully inspected by my guard, as usual). The blanket was woven in stripes of scarlet and maroon, and had been washed so often that the wool had turned almost to felt and had begun to wear thin in places. There were a few stains, too, but it didn’t smell of horse and blood, so that was something. I had the guard take away my old horse blanket and the last of my old clothes, and folded the new blanket to lie under the cushion in front of the door. There were crunchy rolls of dark bread today, but that was about all. “Pastry vendors out sick?” I asked, picking one up.

  “No, they’ve all shut down. Enjoy these; they were all we could get. Wouldn’t have gone to such trouble, but Ylfing insisted. I hope you appreciate him like you ought to. He’s a good assistant.”

  “You can’t have him,” I snapped. “Tell me about the trial. Fastest ever?”

  “Yes. Six hours, start to finish. Taishineya Tarmos had one of the most prestigious advocates in Vsila, obviously—it was Brina Sekos Lankat Mestyrin. Ylfing, has Ivo told you about her? He’s worked with her a few times.” Ylfing mumbled something around a mouthful of bread, and Consanza continued. “Zorya Miroslavat barely let either of them speak. She’s extremely good at what she does, and she’s good at twisting mostly innocuous evidence into something that looks gruesome and monstrous, at least. The worst thing Taishineya Tarmos did was to use treasury funds for a gala in honor of the trade agreement with the Cormerran merchants, which . . . It’s not outside the bounds of what’s allowable, but the gala was more frivolous and excessive than necessary—which is not surprising; considering it was hosted by Taishineya Tarmos, no one should be shocked—and Zorya Miroslavat was able to scrape together a case for gross laxity and neglect in the pursuit of duty to a public office. That usually carries only a fine, but Taishineya Tarmos’s lackadaisical attitude towards the running of her offices and financial policy in general infected the rest of her Ministry, and several serious errors were found in her books, including a few instances of actual embezzlement, even if Zorya Miroslavat couldn’t prove that Taishineya Tarmos did any herself. Anyway, start to finish, six hours, and most of it was monologuing by Zorya Miroslavat. And now Taishineya Tarmos has been officially exiled. She was shoved on a boat that was sailing out on the afternoon tide, so she’s already gone out of the city. I believe it was bound for Tornasse in Ezozza. It’s south of here. About two weeks’ voyage.”

  “Yes, I know where it is,” I said. “I’ve been there.”

  “So they’re scrubbing out all the corrupt clerks from Coin, and then they’re going to hold the Coin election early. Speaking of elections—you’ve heard all the candidates want you dead?”

  “So I’m told.”

  “Have you been saying something to Vihra Kylliat? She’s publicly resisting them.”

  “She says you’re still useful,” Ylfing added.

  “She comes in drunk every few nights and we just talk. We trade stories.”

  “Drunk? Vihra Kylliat?” Consanza said. “Seriously?”

  “Yes. You’re surprised?”

  “She always seemed as sober as steel. Being regularly drunk enough to talk to you . . . doesn’t seem her style.”

  I could have told them about the visits at that point, but sometimes people tell things to Chants that should be kept in confidence. I can tell you now, of course, because . . . well. We’ll get there. “Ylfing said she and Zorya Miroslavat have been arguing?”

  “Yes. About you. About whether or not to kill you. Miroslavat is all for it. She’s in great support of some of these new candidates for the Primes. . . . Why do you think there’s this guard right outside your door every moment of the day and night? And another down the hall?”

  “Guarding this cell block, I thought.”

  “Guarding you. Vihra Kylliat can’t have another raid to . . . kidnap you or assassinate you, whatever that was. She obviously thinks there’s some advantage to keeping you alive. She doesn’t want to give that up—not when eliminating your game piece from the board might be exactly what her enemies wanted.”

  “Hmm,” I said. I didn’t think it was about advantages for her. She had seemed lonely. Why else would she stumble drunk into my cell a few times a week and do nothing but talk to me? It was precisely because I didn’t matter at all that she wanted to keep me, no other reason. I didn’t fool myself about that.

  “They’ve been the closest of friends and allies since Vihra Kylliat took office. Since before that, even,” Consanza said. “And you’ve somehow driven a wedge between them. What have you been saying to her?”

  “It’s none of your business,” I said, because it wasn’t. “How’s your family?”

  “Worried. Frightened. Stressed. The riots, you know. We live in a fairly good part of the city, but there are houses burning only a few streets away. And now the banks are only open for a few hours a day, until Coin gets their whole mess sorted out. I’d take us away to the countryside for a few weeks, if only this were summer, but travel in winter with small children is too difficult to bother with. Especially with Helena pregnant too.”

  “You could have left on the same ship that Taishineya Tarmos went on,” I said.

  “I’m Nuryeven. I belong here. And if I had put my family on a boat by themselves, then I wouldn’t have anything to come home to. And the sea is dangerous in winter.”

  “I’m not criticizing you.”

  The only reply was a soft muttering and the eventual snap and flare of a flick match, and the faint smell of her tobacco. “So,” she said, “now that Taishineya Tarmos is done, I expect we’ll be called in for your appeal one of these days. And then I’ll know whether I can wash my hands of you or not,” she added, more viciously than was strictly necessary, I thought.

  It wound down into our usual bickering, while Ylfing made a few small noises trying to convince us to back off from each other—it was about as ineffective as usual. I could tell she was about to storm off in a huff again when Ylfing suddenly said, “Oh. Consanza, it’s—”

  “Am I interrupting?” I heard Vihra Kylliat ask, her voice uncharacteristically (for my recent experiences of her) sober and cold.

  I watched Ylfing and Consanza’s feet as they scrambled up. “No, Your Majesty,” Consanza said, instantly slick and polite. “Not at all. We were just about finished here.”

  “Good day, then,” Vihra Kylliat said, then banged on my door. “Chant, are you paying attention?”

  “Aye,” I said. She didn’t bother having the guards open the door. I could just see Consanza’s shoes still—she was lingering all she could. Horrible woman, but a decent advocate, I suppose.

  “Your execution—five weeks from today.”

  “Five weeks?”

  “That is how long it will take for Zorya Miroslavat and I to run the election for Prime of Coin. We desperately need one, ideally one who isn’t planning on being an incompetent, criminal idiot. Since all the candidates support your
execution anyway, we’ve concluded that whichever of them is eventually elected would continue to support that, so I’ve agreed to schedule your execution. And if they are elected and they change their mind, then we’ll cancel it. But they won’t.”

  I had to remind myself to keep breathing. I watched Consanza’s shoes as she finally drifted off down the corridor—she’d heard. She’d undoubtedly heard. Five weeks was . . . well, it wasn’t enough time, but it was something. Ylfing hadn’t mentioned that Ivo had left town, and that seemed like the kind of thing that would be immediately on his lips. And whenever the message arrived to you, you’d need time to arrange things, even if you’d had everyone ready to go. Supplies must be gathered, riders raised, weapons sharpened, and then everything packed, and unpacked, and repacked. These things take time, and it’s difficult to buy time if no one is selling. “Five weeks more of life is very generous,” I said, after swallowing several times to find my voice. “I appreciate it.” Perhaps Consanza’s appeal would buy us a few more weeks—just a few more, that’s all I needed.

  “I didn’t do it for you,” she said.

  “No, of course. I apologize. The election, of course.”

  “The election, yes.” She ground the heel of her artificial foot into the floor. “If you had been more useful,” she snapped, “I might have been able to convince Zorya Miroslavat to make some other ruling.”

  “But I haven’t been.”

  “You haven’t been. You’ve been the opposite of useful. You’re bad luck.”

  “I wouldn’t have pegged you as the superstitious type, Your Majesty.”

  “All soldiers are superstitious. My general would have been.”

  I paused and considered this. “Yes, I guess you’re right. Ger Zha had her little good luck charms too.”

  “How blessed she must have been to not have been saddled with you.”

  “Have I angered you?”

  “No,” Vihra Kylliat snapped, and turned sharply. Stormed off up the hall until I couldn’t hear her steps anymore.

  I sighed and rearranged my cushion and blanket beneath me. “Zdena?” I called to the guard. I had spent enough time staring at their shoes and hearing the occasional brief exchange between them that I could match each name to the scuffs on their toes and heels. “I know it’s you. I thought I’d tell you another story today.” Zdena never answered. None of them ever did. I squinted at the ceiling and wondered whether they’d fall for some amateurish trick like telling a story wrong—like telling them about Vanya and the Four Iron Swans, where Vanya sells them to the villagers immediately because he’s greedy, and gets so much money he can buy the biggest anvil anyone has ever seen. Maybe then they’d speak. If they spoke, then I could begin to turn their hearts towards me. Anything to buy just a little more time.

  Five weeks to live, a little voice in my head reminded me. Five weeks to live. And I had to make that into eight, at least, if I had any hope of living to see you ride over the horizon. That was assuming you were where I thought you would be this time of year, and that your horses were well rested and your saddlebags full of grain. I want to apologize now, because I know I was asking you to cross the mountains in the coldest, stormiest part of winter. You’re not the type to shy away from a little blizzard, but I know it must have been hard going, regardless.

  You must have ridden your horses as if they had wings. One day I’ll make it into a story for you. I’ll tell the Great Khar that your wizards made the horses’ steps so light that they danced down the avalanches, and that you sang off the storms until you’d safely passed the mountains.

  So there I was, imprisoned, with five weeks to live. I had at my disposal a useless advocate, a nigh-useless apprentice, an inexperienced would-be revolutionary, a Queen who had condemned me, a Queen who wanted to keep me alive for some reason, though she had made her career of killing, and an exiled Queen. . . . Taishineya Tarmos, I thought, might have done me a favor or two if she’d still been around. There would be no new Prime until it was too late to turn them to my side. And so, I thought, if I couldn’t turn them to my side, it was time for me to turn to someone else’s side again. Order had exhausted its usefulness for me, Justice was unassailable, Law was unreachable, and Pattern had evaporated like mist in the sun. I turned my attentions, then, to the exiled Queen. She, of all of them, was the only place where any gamble I took had a chance of paying off—and she would know about paying off on gambles. She was, after all, the rightful Queen of Coin, and I intended to let her know that I thought so. I hadn’t a clue what she might do or how she might help, but . . . She had power. She had money. She had resources. And she might be persuaded to help me if she thought I could give her something big in return.

  It was done the same way: by pretending to practice languages with Ivo and Ylfing. The guards were so bored with me by then that they never suspected. Ivo had taught the song to a friend and sent her off to cross the mountains, which I wasn’t terribly happy with. I’d thought he would do it himself. He seemed a sensible, competent sort.

  When I explained to him that we had to write to Taishineya Tarmos and bring her back to Nuryevet, Ivo scowled and Ylfing clapped his hands over his mouth.

  “Stop that,” I hissed in Nuryeven, loud enough for the guard to hear. “It’s not that shocking of a word. You’ve heard worse.” And then, in Hrefni: “Ylfing, for gods’ sake, act better.”

  “Sorry,” he replied in the same language. “Ivo really hates her.”

  I huffed. “I figured he would, but we don’t have time to be fussy about these things.”

  Ivo shoved the slate through the slot. Good riddance to her. I’m glad she’s gone and I won’t help her come back.

  I rolled my eyes and wrote back: The next Prime of Coin will be newer, stronger. They’ll have public opinion on their side. Taishineya has power now and I know how to get her to use it. He didn’t reply, only wiped the slate clean and shoved it back through. Trust me. You’ll only have to endure her for a little longer, and then it’ll all be over.

  Fine, he wrote.

  I thought for a long time. Do you have another friend to carry the letter? Someone from the Stonecutters’ Guild, for preference. Or the Carpenters’.

  “The . . . the what?” Ylfing said. He must have been reading over Ivo’s shoulder. “Why?”

  “Because I said so, boy, and because I know how stories work,” I snapped. “Now, attend, this is too long to relay on the slate, so here is what you’ll have Ivo write later. . . .” And I told him in detail. And I told Ylfing the secret sign the stonecutter or whoever should give Taishineya Tarmos that would make her do whatever I told her to.

  And that was that. Five weeks while the weather got colder, five weeks with just enough warmth to keep me from freezing to death. I don’t know how the prisoners in the lower cells survived. At least my little isolated chamber didn’t have the airflow to keep it terribly cold, and the cloak and clothing that Ylfing had brought me, not to mention the cushion and the ratty old threadbare blanket, made all the difference in the world. There was a tiny window—even an arrow slit would have been wide and expansive by comparison, and it was covered in wire mesh pasted over with paper, so only a thin, feeble light could get through. I was cold, but not unbearably so, and in the daytime I sat with my back against the wall so I could be warmed by the firepot. I think the guards went out of their way to keep it topped up with fuel—it kept them warm too, after all.

  I spent those five weeks talking through the flap at the bottom of the door to whoever was standing outside. Zdena, with the heel of her right boot worn thinner towards the back than the left one (I noticed her scuffing her right heel against the floor when she was bored); Durko, with the boots that were never polished at all, and probably had never been polished since the day he had been issued them; Vidar, with the deep scratch across the outside of his left ankle, which couldn’t be hidden even with polish; Anysia, with her custom-cobbled shoes that were just barely within regulation, but somehow far mo
re stylish and attractive than her peers’; Vasileva, with her flawlessly polished boots that never had a scuff or a scratch on them; Mihalei, with the threads beginning to pick loose on the back of both his heel seams . . . I knew their boots like the lines on the palms of my hands, and I had never seen their faces, that I knew of. I talked to them, called them by name, and never once in five weeks did they speak to me. To Ylfing and to one another? Yes, sometimes. That’s how I learned their names one by one. I don’t know if they ever guessed how I knew, or if they were puzzled and bewildered the whole time. Perhaps they, too, thought I was a blackwitch.

  I tell you, though, five weeks is a long time to be telling stories. I was combing through the dregs of my repertoire by the end, telling stories that weren’t very good, stories that I had never found interesting, stories that didn’t generally get a warm reception, although they were excellent in their own right. . . . I was telling stories that I hadn’t told in sixty-odd years, if I’d ever retold them at all. Somewhere in Vsila, or elsewhere in Nuryevet if they’ve fled the city by now—somewhere there are six guards who have, between them, heard the better part of a century’s worth of stories. Who could, between them, be a damn good Chant. And they, like Vanya with his thirty iron swans, have no idea of the wealth they’re carrying with them. Isn’t that sad? Isn’t it funny?

  I told them one of yours, one of the ones you told me. Actually, it’s been so many years since you told it to me, I’d like to make sure that I remember it correctly.

  THE THIRTEENTH TALE:

  How the First Woman Tamed the Horse

  Woman woke in the snow at the beginning of the world. She sat up, she looked around, and for miles and miles, all she saw was empty steppe billowing off to the horizon. She wandered for the day until the sun went down and she began to grow hungry. She ate the snow and it melted on her tongue, and she dug through it and found earth below, and a sharp rock. She cut into the frozen dirt with the rock and scraped it up, and rolled it between her fingers and on her tongue until it melted too, and from this she shaped Rabbit.