by Tad Williams
“Which is exactly why they might believe lies spread about you,” said Brone.
Briony frowned. “But even so, aren’t you stretching for an answer? If Gailon is truly lost and not just hunting, as people thought, there are a dozen explanations more likely than him preparing to accuse us of trying to harm him.”
“Perhaps.” The big man stood slowly, putting his hand on the seat of the stool to steady himself. He picked up an oil lamp and the room’s shadows writhed. “But now we come to the next part of my concern. Will you come with me?”
They followed him out of the sitting room and down a narrow, unornamented hallway Brone paused outside a door. “This is why I am not in my own bed tonight, Highnesses.” He pushed the door open.
The room was lit by many lamps and candles—far more than would seem normal in a bedchamber. At first, even with all this light, Barrick had trouble making sense of the knot of shapes at the center of the bed: only after a few moments had passed could he see that it was one man kneeling atop the bed next to another, the kneeling one with his head pressed against the other’s chest in a pose almost like a lover’s embrace. The one on top held a finger against his lips, asking for silence. His lined face was familiar to Barrick, something he thought he had seen in one of the nightmares, and he had to suppress a gasp of fear.
“I think you two must both know Brother Okros of the Eastmarch Academy of scholars,” Brone said. “He came to help you when you were ill, Barrick. Now he is caring for… for one of my servants.”
There was blood on the bed, on the sheets; Brother Okros’ hands were wet with it. The monk gave them a quick, distracted smile. “You will forgive me, Highnesses. This man is not yet beyond danger and I am very occupied.”
The man on the red-smeared sheets had a dark, untammed beard, and his skin, hair, his clothes were all very dirty, but even groomed and clean he would not have made anyone look twice. His eyes were open, staring at the ceiling, his teeth clenched as if to hold in his straining, rasping breath. His shirt had been pulled open and Brother Okros had his fingers deep in a ghastly hole in the man’s chest just below the shoulder.
“Just a moment,” said the physician-priest, and finally Barrick recalled the voice if not the face, remembered hearing it float through one of his fever dreams, talking about correct alignments and improved balances. “There is a broken arrowhead still lodged here. I . . ah! There it is.” Brother Okros sat up, a pair of bloodied tongs clutched in his fingertips with a small piece of what looked like metal between the tines. “There. At least this will not now make its way to his lungs or his heart.” He rolled his patient over, gently but firmly—a deep groan came up from the wounded man, only partially muffled in the bed linens—and began to wipe at another bloody hole above the man’s shoulder blade. “This is where it went in—do you see? I will need to pack the wound with comfrey and a willow bark poultice…”
Briony’s face was pale, as Barrick felt sure his own was, but his sister swallowed and spoke calmly. “Why is this man lying bloodied in your rooms, Lord Brone? And why is Brother… Brother Okros… tending him? Why not our castle doctor? Chaven has been back several days.”
“I will explain everything in a moment, but I wanted you to hear this from the man’s own lips. Turn him back over, Okros, I beg of you. Then we will leave you alone to bind his wounds and give him whatever other physick he needs.”
Together Brone and the little priest got the bearded man onto his back again. Okros held pieces of cloth tightly against the wounds on both sides.
“Rule,” said the lord constable. “It’s me, Brone. Do you recognize me?” The man’s eyes flickered across him. “Yes, Master,” he grunted.
“Tell me again what you saw at Summerfield Court, Rule. Tell me what sent you riding back here in such a hurry, and probably earned you an arrow in the back.” Brone looked at the twins. “This man should have died on the road. Clearly someone thought he would.”
Rule groaned again. “Autarch’s men,” he said at last. “In Summerfield.” He fought to moisten his lips, swallowed hard. “The cursed Xixy bastards were… honored guests of the old duchess.”
“The Autarch’s men… ? With the Tollys?” Barrick couldn’t help looking around as though at any moment the shroud-faced men of his nightmares might appear from the shadows.
“Aye.” Brone was grim. “Now come and I will tell you the rest of the tale.”
Paying the cold night its due, Brone had wrapped a blanket around his massive shoulders. Half his beard was covered. He looked like a giant from an old story, Barrick thought, like something that gnawed bones and toppled stone walls with his hands.
How much do we really know about him? Barrick was struggling to keep his mind straight. He felt light-headed, as though fever were plucking at him again with fingers both hot and cold. Our father trusted him, but is that enough? Someone has killed Kendrick. Now Brone tells us that Gailon Tolly has disappeared, and also that Gailon’s family makes alliance with the Autarch What if the criminal is our lord constable himself? I might not like Tolly —in fact, I never liked him or his bloody father, with his red nose and his shouting voice —but is it enough just to take Brone’s word or the word of his spy that he’s some kind of traitor?
As if she shared his thoughts, his sister said, “We are certainly grateful for your efforts on behalf of the crown, Count Avin, but this is a bit much to swallow in one mouthful. Who is that man on the bed? Why didn’t you summon the royal physician?”
“More to the point, where’s Gailon?” Barrick asked. “It’s convenient that he’s not around to defend himself and his family.”
What Barrick felt sure was an angry light glinted for a moment in the lord constable’s eye. Brone paused to drink more wine; when he spoke, his voice was even. “I cannot blame you for being surprised, Highnesses, or for being mistrustful. And for the last question I have no answers. I wish I did.” He scowled. “This has gone cold—the wine, I mean.” He stumped to the fireplace and began heating the poker. “As to the other matters, I will tell you and then you must make up your own minds.” He grunted, flashed a sour smile. “As you always do.
“The man Rule is, as you’ve guessed, a spy. He is a rough fellow, not the sort I would prefer to use in a place like Summerfield Court, but I have had to make shift. Do you remember that musician fellow, Robben Hulligan? Red hair?”
“Yes,” said Briony. “He was a friend of old Puzzle’s. He died, didn’t he? Killed by robbers on the South Road last year.”
“By robbers… perhaps. He died on his way back from Summerfield, within a few weeks after we heard that your father was a prisoner, although even I did not think much of it at the time, except the inconvenience to me. It may or may not surprise you to learn that much of what I knew about the Tollys and Summerfield came from Hulligan. He was close with many in the court there and the old duchess loved him. He was allowed to roam where he pleased, like a pet dog.” “You think… you think he was killed? Because he was your spy?”
Brone grimaced. “I do not want to jump at every shadow. The only certain thing is that since Robben’s death I have known little about what happens in Summerfield, and it has bothered me enough that I sent Rule. He has many skills and usually has little trouble finding work in a great house— tinkering, fletching, acting the groom.” “These spies,” Barrick said slowly. “Do you have them in all the great houses of the March Kingdoms?”
“Of course. And to save you a question, Highness—yes, I have spies in this household as well. I hope you do not think I could do without them. We have already lost one member of the royal family.”
“Which your spies did nothing to prevent!”
Brone looked at him coolly. “No, Highness, they did not, and I have lost many nights’ sleep thinking about just that, wondering what I might have done more carefully. But that does not change what is before us. Rule is a careful man. If he says there are agents of the Autarch at Summerfield Court, I believe him, and I suggest very strongly you do n
ot dismiss what he has to say.”
“Before we go on,” Briony said, “I still wish to know why that priest was seeing to him, not Chaven.”
Brone nodded. “Fair enough. Here is the answer. Brother Okros was not in the castle when your brother was killed. Chaven was.”
“What?” Briony sat up straight. “Do you suspect Chaven of my brother’s murder? A brutal stabbing? He is the family physician! Surely if he wanted Kendrick dead, he could poison him, make it appear an illness…” She broke off, looking suddenly at her twin. It took him a moment to understand her thoughts.
“But I’m alive,” Barrick said. “If someone tried to kill me, they failed.” All the same, he did not feel well. Barrick shook his head, wishing he had never come to the lord constable’s rooms, that he had stayed in bed, struggling against nightmares that were at least arguably imaginary. “Brone, are you saying that Chaven might have murdered Kendrick, or been in league with whoever did?”
The old man slid the poker into his flagon, then blew the steam away so he could watch the wine bubble. “No. I am saying no such thing, Prince Barrick. But I am saying that I trust almost no one, and until we know who did kill your brother, everyone who could come near to him is suspect.”
“Including me?” Barrick almost laughed, but he was furious again. “Including my sister?” “If I had not had you watched, yes.” Avin Brone’s smile was a grim twitch deep in his beard. “The next in succession are always the likeliest murderers. Take no offense, my lord and lady. It is my duty.”
Barrick sat back, overwhelmed. “So we can trust no one except you?”
“Me least of all, Highness—I have been here too long, know too many secrets. And I have killed men in my day.” He looked hard at them both, almost challenging them. “If you have no other sources of information than me, Prince Barrick, Princess Briony, then you are not being careful enough “ He stumped back to his stool. “But whatever else you may learn tonight, this news of the Autarch’s men in Summerfield is very grave, and of that there is no question. I cannot but fear that Gailon Tolly’s disappearance may have something to do with it. And certainly someone took enough of a dislike to Rule to put an arrow in his back as he rode up the Three Brothers Road, heading back here. If he were not a tough old soldier and made mostly of sticks and leather, we would not have this information.” Briony drank her wine. She was pale, miserable. “This is too much What are we to think?”
“Think whatever you like, as long as you do think.” Brone grunted in discomfort as he tried to find a more comfortable position. “Please understand, I have no serious reason to doubt Chaven’s loyalty, but it is an unfortunate fact that he is one of the very few people in the castle who knows much about the Autarch. Did you know his brother was in the Autarch’s service?”
Barrick leaned forward. “Chaven’s brother? Is this true?”
“Chaven is Ulosian—you knew that, I’m sure. But you did not know that his family was one of the first to welcome the Autarch into Ulos, the first conquest of Xis in our lands of Eion.The story is that Chaven fell out with his brother and father over just that matter and fled to Hierosol, and that is why your father King Olin brought him here—because he knows many things more than just how to physick the ill, not least the gossip that his own family brought back from the Xixian court. He has never shown himself to be anything other than loyal, but as I said, from my point of view it is unfortunate that he is one of the few who knows much of the Autarch. One of the few others with any direct knowledge is locked in the stronghold even as we speak.”
“Shaso,” said Briony heavily.
“The same. He fought the Autarch and lost—well, in truth he fought against this Autarch’s father. Then, later, he fought your own father and lost. Even if Shaso were not in all likelihood your brother’s murderer, I do not know how much use his advice would be—almost anyone can advise on how to lose battles.”
“That is not fair,” Briony responded. “No one has beaten Xis—not yet. So no one can give any better advice, can they?”
“True enough. And that is why we are speaking now,just you two and I. I fear the threat from the south more than I do any fairies on our doorstep.” Brone reached into his pocket and pulled out a pile of creased papers. “You should read this. It is your fathers letter to your brother. He mentions the Autarch’s growing power.”
Briony stared at him. “You have the letter!”
“I have only just discovered it.” Brone handed her the papers. “There is a page missing. What is gone seems of little import—talk about maintaining the castle and its defenses—but I cannot be sure. Perhaps you will notice something I did not.”
“You had no right to read that!” Barrick cried. “No right! That was a private letter from our father!” The lord constable shrugged. “These days, we cannot afford privacy. I needed to see if there was anything in it that might speak of immediate danger—it has been missing for some time, after all.”
“No right,” Barrick said bitterly. Was it his imagination, or was Brone looking at him oddly? Had there been something in it that had made the Count of Landsend suspect Barrick’s secret?
Briony looked up from the letter. “You said you found it. Where? And how do you know there is a page missing?”
“The letter was in a pile of documents Nynor left for me in my workroom, but he says he knew nothing of it and I think I believe him. I believe someone crept in and slipped it among the other papers on my table, perhaps because they wanted to make it look as though Nynor or myself had taken it in the first place—perhaps even implicate us in…” He frowned. “I also read it because I wondered if it had something to do with your brother’s death, of course.”
“The missing page… ?”
He leaned over and shuffled through the pages with his thick forefinger. “There.”
“This page ends with Father talking about the fortifications of the inner keep…” Briony squinted, turning between the two pages of the letter. “And the next page he is finishing up, asking us to have all those things done. You are right, there is something missing. ‘Tell Brone to remember the drains.’ What does that mean?” “Waterways. Some of the gates on the lagoons are old. He was worried that they might be vulnerable in a siege.” “He was worrying about a siege?” Briony said. “Why?”
“Your father is a man who always wishes to be prepared. For anything.” “For some reason, I don’t believe you, Lord Brone. About that, anyway.”
“You wrong me, Highness, I assure you.” The lord constable seemed almost uninterested, too tired to fight.
Barrick, his worst alarm past, was also beginning to feel lethargic. What good all this posturing and imagining? What difference in what their imprisoned father might have written, or what it might have meant? Whoever killed Kendrick had ended the prince regent’s life in the midst of all the power of Southmarch, such as it was. If it was the Autarch, who has already conquered an entire continent and now begins to gulp at this one as well, bite by bite, how can a tiny kingdom like ours hope to save itself? Only distance had protected them so far, and that would not be a bulwark forever. “So one way or other, there is a traitor in our midst,” said Barrick.
“The person who had the letter may have no connection to Prince Kendrick’s death, Highness.”
“There is another question,” Briony said. “Why return it at all? With a page missing, it is as much as proclaiming that someone else has read a letter from the king to the prince regent. Why make that known?”
Avin Brone nodded. “Just so, my lady. Now, if you will pardon me, I will ask you to take the letter with you. You may think of some suitable punishment for my reading it as well, if you choose. I am old and tired and I still must find someplace to sleep tonight—I doubt Brother Okros will let me move Rule out of my bed. If you wish to talk to me about what it says, send for me in the morning and I will come at once.” Brone swayed a little; with his great size, he looked like a mountain about to topple and Barrick could not h
elp taking a step backward. “We are come on grave times, Highnesses. I am not the only one relying on you two, for all your youth. Please remember that, Prince Barrick and Princess Briony, and be careful of what you say and to whom.”
Courtesy was the victim of exhaustion. He let them find their own way out.
* * *
It was not proving easy to make a fire. The forest was damp and there was little deadfall. Ferras Vansen eyed the small pile of gathered wood in the center of their ring of stones and could not help a longing look at the great branches stretching overhead. They had no ax, but surely an hour’s sweaty work with their swords and he and Collum Dyer might have all the wood they wanted. But the trees seemed almost to be watching, waiting tor some such desecration he could hear whispers that seemed more than the wind We will make do, he decided, with deadfall.
Collum was working hard at the pyramid of sticks with his flint. The noise of the steel striking echoed out through the clearing like the sound of hammers deep in the earth. Vansen couldn’t help but think of all the stories of his youth, of the Others who lurked in the shadowy woods and in caves and burrowed in the cold ground.
“Done it.” Dyer leaned forward to blow on the smoldering curls of red, puffing until pale flames grew. The mists had cleared a little around them, revealing sky beyond the distant crowns of the trees, a sprinkling of stars in a deep velvety darkness. There was no sign of the moon.
“What time of the clock is it, do you think?” Dyer asked as he sat up. The fire was burning by itself now, but it remained small and sickly, shot through with odd colors, greens and blues. “We have been here for hours and it is still evening.”
“No, it’s a bit darker.” Vansen raised his hands before the fire, it gave off only a little heat. “I can’t wait for bloody daylight.” Dyer chewed on a piece of dried meat. “I can’t wait.”
“You may not get it.” Vansen sighed and sat back. A wind he couldn’t feel made the tops of the trees wave overhead. The campfire, weak as it was, seemed a kind of a wound in the misty, twilit clearing. He couldn’t help feeling the forest wished to heal that breach, to grow back over it, swallowing the flames and the two men, scabbing the injury over with moss and damp and quiet darkness. “I do not think it is ever full daylight here.”
