There were some maps up in that storage room I used as a lookout, but after rifling through them, I realized that they weren’t what I needed. Maps are useful when you already have some context, and I knew nothing of Nuryevet’s western marches. But one of the Thieves did: Flat-Nose, my occasional bodyguard. He’d grown up in Nuryevet before he had left to seek his fortune in fairer climes.
“I was hoping to write a few letters,” I said to him brightly.
He groaned. They were thoroughly fed up with me, and I’m sure they wondered how many more people I’d need to write letters to. “Fuck off,” said Flat-Nose.
“Don’t be rude, young man. You don’t have to carry it anywhere for me.”
“What the fuck do you want, then? You’ve got paper, and I don’t much care whether you use it to write letters or wipe your arse.”
“I’ve traveled around so much that I’ve gotten the names of places all mixed up. There was one little village, towards the west end of the country. . . . Not all the way out in the country, but not very near a big city either. . . . Do you know of anywhere like that? I’m sure I’d remember the name of it if I heard it. So that I know where to send my letter. A sort of smallish hamlet.”
He grunted. “Menova? Seneb? Semynsk?”
“Semynsk! That sounds right. There was another place, a fairly large town? Again, out in the western marches, quite near the mountains? A mining town, I think it was?”
“Probably Derisovet.”
“Possibly . . . And one more, it was a middlish town on a river? Sort of in the middle of the country, I think? There was a mill with a large waterwheel and a—”
“Czersdo,” he said instantly, and then peered closely at me. “I grew up there.”
“Oh, did you?” I chuckled, trying to disguise my nervousness, hoping that he wouldn’t ask me about who I knew from Czersdo, because of course I knew no one. I had never heard of the place in my life, nor either of the others. “How nice. It seemed a pleasant town, there on the river.”
“Sure, if you like boring,” he said.
“My lad, after the last few months, I would take to boring like a farmer takes to his bed after a long day.”
I left him alone after that and wrote down the names he’d given me. And then I wrote you that letter, the one with all those instructions about which of those towns you should terrorize and in what order.
After all, I had some prophecies to give Taishineya Tarmos, didn’t I? It’s easiest to tell the future when you already know what’s coming.
I would have been all set to dump the bag of coins on Ylfing. We weren’t allowed to take large amounts of coins out of the bank, but I could have had him swallow them or smuggle them somehow, or fill his boots with them. I was all ready. I had the coins, I had a letter for you—except that the next day, he brought Consanza with him.
Damn fool child.
He was in trouble with the guards, of course, because he’d taken her to the place where he met with them whenever he wanted to come into the bank, the same place they released him whenever they brought him back out, and he hadn’t told them he was going to be bringing her. So they had no choice but to bring her in to see if Taishineya wanted her killed or imprisoned or what.
Of course, I got dragged into that mess too, even though none of it was my fault, because she’d been my advocate, and therefore was somehow my responsibility.
Consanza came over all simpering at Taishineya Tarmos when we were dumped in front of her, and she immediately went on and on about how much she believed in Taishineya Tarmos’s cause, how much she had always supported her when she had been the Queen of Coin, how Vihra Kylliat was running the country down into the mud. . . . I stared at the floor hard so that I wouldn’t roll my eyes and ruin whatever damn game Consanza thought she had going.
Ylfing had caved. He’d told Consanza he had to go on an errand out of town, and she’d instantly and logically concluded that he’d seen me somewhere and that I was the one who had assigned him the errand in the first place.
Gods know why Ylfing thought it was a secret at all. I didn’t care whether he told her where I was, but somehow he’d gotten it into his damn fool head that he wasn’t supposed to say anything about it. And Consanza? She was one of the finest advocates in Nuryevet, and he was but a seventeen-year-old boy. To boot, she was a mother. Of course he had no chance of keeping a secret from her. I believe she had it out of him in less than five minutes of sustained interrogation. Once he told her about me, well. The dam had broken, and all the rest came spilling out too.
Specifically, he’d told her about the food. Things were dire enough that Consanza was clearly willing to throw her lot in with the person who would keep her children fed, which I supposed was understandable. It’s just that, as usual, I had objections as to how she went about it. The woman only ever had dignity when it was inconvenient for me, you know!
Taishineya Tarmos kept shooting me these suspicious looks, like it was my fault that Consanza was here. I just kept spreading my hands as if to say, What do you want me to do about it? until finally she asked outright if I’d sent Ylfing to bring her.
“You wanted me to come up with propaganda for you, right?” I asked blandly. “I had to test it on someone.”
Consanza’s skin was too dark for her to go purple with rage like Ylfing might have, if he’d ever been that angry. She breathed sharply through that awful ax-like nose of hers. “So it was a trick? A lie?”
“No,” said Taishineya. “I wasn’t expecting you to take to your work with such . . . enthusiasm, Chant.”
“What can I say? It’s a tactic for the new draft I’m working on. I hope,” I said, looking at Ylfing, “that my apprentice didn’t tell anyone else.”
“Um,” Ylfing said. “No, of course not.”
“See? No harm done, Your Majesty. And it’s clearly effective,” I said, waving towards Consanza. “She’s infuriating, but she’s willing to take your side, so accept the help. That was what you wanted me to do, wasn’t it? Have everyone willing to take your side, offering to help your cause?”
“Hmm,” Taishineya Tarmos said flatly. “Fine. Welcome. I’m so grateful for your support. So very grateful.”
“I need protection,” Consanza said in a rush. “And my family. It’s still dangerous out there for—for your loyal supporters.”
“You can be sure that those who take the path of righteousness will persevere,” she said, which rather surprised and flattered me—that was a line from one of my little pamphlets, almost verbatim! “And mine is the cause that is just and true.”
“Yes, ma’am,” said Consanza promptly. “But I was hoping to really get involved in what you’ve got going on here. You know, volunteer work. Because I’m so devoted to, ah, the cause. I can be useful, Your Majesty. I’m sure you’ve heard of me; I studied at the House of Justice, and I received my preliminary certification from, ah, Judge Liezanska Liezanskat, and then I received my secondary certification from Ivan Vetos only a year later. I’ve never lost a case, Your Majesty. I could be very useful in whatever legal situations you may find yourself in.”
“Legal situations?” Taishineya said dubiously.
“Yes. You know. All the paperwork. There’s quite a lot of paperwork, being Queen—particularly if you’re Queen of All. Five times as much paperwork as you’re used to, I imagine.”
We could both see how uncomfortably that struck Taishineya. She was the sort of person for whom paperwork was abhorrent.
“It’d be so much more convenient if you had an advocate of some kind to keep track of everything for you, don’t you think?”
“And you’re offering to do that as volunteer work,” Taishineya said slowly. “You’re offering to work for free?”
“Well,” said Consanza, drawing it out into six or seven syllables. “Free-ish, at least for now, until we’ve triumphed over our enemy, the Pretender Vihra Kylliat. For now, I would love a roof over my head and some food. You have room here, don’t you?
” she said. “Allow me to move some of my things here. I’m at your service, madam, any hour of the night or day.”
“All right,” Taishineya said, still somewhat disgruntled by the mere mention of paperwork. “I’ll have someone show you a room.”
“Although, madam, I would be worried sick about my family. They are all enthusiastic supporters of your cause as well, and perfectly willing to put themselves to work however they can. My husband Velizar, for example, an accountant! Surely you’ll need a, um, secretary of some kind to attend to the financial matters of the realm. Nothing as powerful as a Prime of Coin, of course, but just an overseer. And then there’s my wife Miriana, a very shrewd businesswoman—much like your own mother, I’m told, ma’am! My whole family is willing and able to advance your cause and secure your power.”
“How many are there in your family?” Taishineya Tarmos growled.
“My three spouses, and our four children,” Consanza said promptly. “Soon to be five.”
“And your personal secretary,” I said, clearing my throat pointedly. “Ivo what’s-his-name, right? Her Majesty may have met him in passing recently.”
“A copyist! A trained court scribe. He’d make a wonderful assistant for you,” Consanza said fervently. “He has lovely handwriting.”
“Three spouses, five children, and your secretary?” she said, blinking. “That’s all? That’s your whole family?” She relaxed. “Well, that’s fine. The way you were asking, I thought you had a big one.”
Nuryevens. I tell you.
So Consanza’s family was smuggled into the bank and given two nice rooms on the floor above mine. I met Miriana and Velizar in passing, but I didn’t think that we would get along very well, so I kept out of their way—they were very much like Consanza, and I could see why the three of them had been friends since their youth. They all three had that same wryness to them, the same dry humor, the same sharp attention. The three of them in a room together moved like a pack of rangy hunting dogs—or wolves, perhaps.
It seemed like I kept running into Helena every five minutes, though, no matter where I went in the bank. She’s a nice girl. Soft face, soft eyes, looked like she’d been soft and plump all over before food got so hard to come by. She was huge-bellied with child, and I remembered Consanza said it was due in late winter or early spring. She spent much of her time playing with the children, reading books to the older ones and making paper dolls with the younger. She was nothing like the other three. If anything, she reminded me of Ylfing.
In the tension and minor chaos of moving Consanza’s family in, I managed to slip a handful of coins and the fateful slip of paper into Ylfing’s pockets. It was just our luck that Ivo walked in right as we were whispering together.
He looked Ylfing up and down, took in the cloak and the satchel at his feet. “Are you going out?”
“Actually, I . . .” Ylfing glanced at me, and I shrugged.
“I’m sending him off for a little while. The whole nation needs to hear about the evils of the Pretender. It won’t work if it’s the city folk against the country folk. So he’ll be taking the pamphlets with him and spreading them about in some of the smaller towns. And he’s sending some more through the post.”
“Oh,” said Ivo. “How long?”
“A couple weeks. Two or three.”
Ivo nodded mildly. “All right.” He did not seem to be much bothered about this, and then he turned away.
Ylfing went to him and took his hand. “Aren’t you going to say good-bye?”
“Oh, you’re leaving now?” He still did not seem much bothered. “Good-bye, then.”
Ylfing beamed and leaned forward to kiss him.
Ivo didn’t kiss him back. I couldn’t help but notice. I busied myself and my attention with some things on the other side of the room and held my tongue.
Off Ylfing went, and I went back to waiting. At least this time I had something to do—lots of things to do. I wrote articles and essays about how Taishineya Tarmos would . . . I don’t remember what I said, exactly. Something about free the people of Nuryevet from the tyranny that has too long oppressed them, more of that kind of thing. It was all pretty standard stuff, as revolutionary propaganda goes. With every passing day, there were fewer Order guards standing siege outside. They tried to storm the bank a couple more times, and bless their stubborn little hearts for trying. In general, we were left well enough alone. A severe blizzard all but crippled the city—more than it already was, of course. I know many people left for the country. I wrote speeches about how Taishineya Tarmos would bring stability and serenity back to Vsila, and I sipped tea and ate a hot dinner every night while the city struggled to survive. This part is all a little muddy and vague for me because, obviously, I’d sent my primary source off into the backcountry.
One day Taishineya looked out the window and said, “I’m sick of all the snow in the courtyard. I want to go for a walk. Don’t we have anyone to clear all this away?”
There were exactly three Order guards on duty outside. At that point, we could have overtaken them, but then what? We couldn’t take the city with fifty people, no matter how weak it was. And Taishineya felt it wasn’t dignified, and I rather agreed. We would be handed the city on a silver platter, and we would wait smug and patient in our fortress until such time as that happened.
But because Order was so light then, Thieves floundered through the snow out to the gates and, so I hear, found a few city kids trying to break into the shops across the street. Even with Order standing right there! But of course the guards didn’t give a shit—to do a job, you either get paid in money or in passion and personal satisfaction. The ones who were left were the ones who really, really believed that someone had to guard the bank. The siege was an ideological thing for them. The kids on the street, though? Fuck it. That wasn’t part of the ideology.
“How would you like to earn a little money?” said the Thieves to the kids.
“Doing what?” said the kids, rightfully suspicious.
“Shoveling snow. We’ll pay you.”
Pay! Pay! People came out of the woodwork to shovel our courtyard, to Order’s frustration and chagrin, but the Thieves just kept a cheerful crossbow trained on every soldier they could see and they had to stay out of range or step up to their deaths.
The courtyard was clear in an hour, and we paid the thirty people who had gathered a penny apiece, and sent them away singing the Queen’s praises.
Taishineya lost her patience from time to time. She’d decide suddenly that dignity was not at all important to her, and that she wanted to take the city right now, immediately, as soon as possible. So what that she had only fifty people? The city supported her, she said. Everyone in the city supported her tremendously.
I held her back. “It’s not time yet. It’s not time,” I said.
Thing was, hardly anyone was coming into the city in those days—no one was clearing the roads, and there wasn’t a great system of information. It was pure chance that we heard that a band of riders had ransacked Seneb—Nine-Fingers heard about it one night when she snuck out, I think. There was some brothel that she liked to go to, somewhere on the other side of town.
I didn’t know if it was you. I hoped it was. I took a chance.
I was lucky that I overheard the Thieves talking about it amongst themselves—Nine-Fingers had just gotten back, and she was emptying the snow out of her boots in the kitchen. Off I whirled to Taishineya Tarmos and banged on the door as loud as I could. She opened it, and I fell at her feet as if in a dead faint. “Gods above! What’s the matter with you?”
I groaned and rolled onto my back. “It’s happening,” I gasped. “It’s time!”
“Time?” she said, and fell to her knees next to me. “Time for what?” she gasped. “Is it a prophecy? Tell me!”
“The enemy bites at our flanks!” I wheezed, clutching at her hands. “You must rise up and repel them! The furious wind comes from the west!” I garbled a bit after that and roll
ed my eyes back in my skull, frothed at the mouth for dramatic effect, and pretended to fall senseless.
I heard Taishineya Tarmos’s skirts rustle as she got to her feet. “Ugh,” I heard her whisper to herself. “If he dies in here, I’ll have to move to a different room.” She pushed the door farther open and called for the Thieves. I kept moaning and lolling my head about as they picked me up and dragged me into the kitchen, propped me up next to the stove.
“Where . . . am I?” I creaked after a few more minutes of this. “What happened?”
“You fainted on Her Majesty, apparently,” Nine-Fingers said.
“F-fainted?” I accepted a cup of weak broth. “Did I say anything?”
“Hell if I know, we’re only the ones who dragged you in here. Someone go tell her he’s awake, would you?”
Obviously Taishineya Tarmos would never step foot in a kitchen—gods forfend!—so there was a bit of foolish back-and-forth that I had to endure in subdued silence until someone decided to just carry me back to her room so she could question me herself. I remained obstinately vague and pathetic, despite her increasingly frustrated queries, even after she called Consanza in to help her, supposing (I suppose) that Consanza knew me best out of anyone in the building and might be able to get me to be more useful. She wasn’t able to, of course, and she seemed deeply disturbed by my pathetic, feeble-old-man act.
“But what did I say? I don’t remember what I said! Where’s Ylfing? I want Ylfing,” I quavered.
“Oh stop,” Consanza said. “He’s out on that errand you sent him on.” Ivo might not have particularly cared that Ylfing was absent, but Consanza? Oh, she was furious. I’d explained to her in simpering tones that it was all for Taishineya’s glory, because weren’t we all servants of the Queen now?
“Chant, focus!” Taishineya Tarmos hissed. “What ferocious wind from the west? What enemy?”
A Conspiracy of Truths Page 33
