by Sharon Shinn
Jasper Paladar pursed his lips. “Indeed, I do know that. I had the opportunity to meet Cammon a couple of years ago when he decided I was the one who should be installed at Karryn’s side.”
“Did you not want the job, then?” she asked curiously.
“Let us say, I did not expect the offer,” he replied. “I was happy enough on my own estates following my own pursuits. Seeing Karryn through the tangle that is Fortunalt politics—that has been a challenge I would have been perfectly happy to miss.”
“You could have refused.”
“I get the feeling people do not often refuse the royal consort,” Jasper said. He read her look of surprise and smiled. “Oh, no, he offered me no threat. Merely, he presented the situation to me in such a way that I could not turn him down. I could not—so precisely had he judged my convictions and my honor. Some other man might have told him no and felt not the slightest guilt.”
“He’s a good man,” Wen said in a subdued voice. “And Amalie a good queen.” Though both of them were too young to be ruling the country. So much better, for so many reasons, if Baryn still wore the crown.
“Yet they have inherited a mess in Gillengaria! They do their best, better than I would have expected, but—” Jasper shrugged, then he smiled again. “But that is not what you came here to discuss with me. A mystic boy. You want me to hire him to—what? Be my advisor? Sit in on my discussions with the serlords and merchants and disgruntled landowners? The idea is quaint, my dear Willa, but impractical, don’t you think?”
She held on to her temper. “I hadn’t really thought about how he might aid you, my lord. Just that he might be useful.” She gave him a sharp look. “Or are you one of those who despises magic?”
“I wouldn’t stone a mystic in the streets, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“Well, these days, no one would, since the act has been made a criminal offense,” she replied.
“And I never condoned such actions in the past. But I’ve never had any dealings with mystics. Frankly, I’m not sure what good it would do me to employ such a boy.”
She leaned forward. “He’s a weapon. You never know how you’ll employ a weapon until the situation arises.”
He settled back in his chair and gave her a long look. “Well, now,” he said at last. “What an interesting thing to say. A soldier’s perspective, I must suppose. I have done my share of research, but I always had an end point in mind. I was trying to discover a fact, or understand a culture, or prove a theory. When I came across something that did not materially affect my investigation, no matter how unexpected it might be, I put it aside. I did not want the distraction. Sometimes I went back to it, if it was unusual enough, but then it merited its own review. I did not keep it on hand just because I thought it might be valuable someday.”
Wen preserved her silence, but privately she thought that was an unforgivably shortsighted way to function. Who didn’t pick up the odd bit of leather, the random stone, the sharp scrap of metal that might one day be turned to good use? Who didn’t always think about how something or someone might prove helpful or might turn dangerous? How could anyone survive with such narrow focus?
“So. This boy. What can he do, besides read emotions?”
“The usual chores that you might have in a kitchen or stable,” she said.
“And his sister? Her skills? How old are they, by the way?”
“I haven’t actually asked them, but Bryce looks to be about ten and Ginny three or four years older. She can cook and clean and garden. They’re both farm children. They’re used to farm chores. But they’ll both work hard at any task you put before them.”
“And they’re important to you why, exactly?”
She took a deep breath. “Because I found them and they trust me. And because they don’t have anybody else.”
“And did you approach me because you truly thought I could use this boy’s services, or because you thought I owed you a little charity?”
Now she was angry, and she came swiftly to her feet. “You owe me a favor, but hiring these two wouldn’t be charity,” she said coldly. “They’ve already had an offer, and anyone who hires them will have a good bargain. I thought to match a skill with a need, but I didn’t expect to be mocked for it. I’ll find them other positions. Thanks for your time.”
During this speech, he had come rather more leisurely to his feet. “Please don’t go,” he said, as she turned for the door. “I’m willing to take in your charges on one condition.”
She’d taken two strides toward the exit, and she wanted to keep going. But even more she wanted to find a secure place for Bryce and Ginny. So she halted and swung around to face him, making no effort to hide her scowl. “What condition?”
“You come to work at Fortune as well.”
Her expression darkened. “I told you I don’t need a job.”
“Maybe not, but obviously I have a job that needs you,” he said. “My guard is a shambles and I fired the captain as soon as I brought Karryn back. I’ve been making inquiries into bringing more soldiers into the House, but I haven’t a clue how to choose them or train them. You’re right—Karryn’s in as much danger today as she was two weeks ago, and I clearly don’t know how to protect her. You do. Take the post, hire who you like, make the House safe. I’ll take in your orphans. I think it’s a good deal.”
Her mind was in such a whirl she was almost trembling. She hadn’t stayed in one place more than a few weeks since she’d left Ghosenhall, and the very thought filled her with both longing and dread. Even if she accepted his offer, would she be able to honor it? Would her restlessness drive her out into the night before she’d fulfilled her contract?
“How long?” she asked stiffly.
“How long would it take to get my House guard in shape?”
“Six months at least.”
“Then will you stay a year?”
“No!” The word jerked out of her.
He tilted his head again. “How long would you stay?”
She took a shallow breath. Her chest hurt too badly to allow a deep one. She could not possibly put herself in a position where people were counting on her to keep them alive. “I’m not—It’s best not to rely on me,” she said, almost panting the words.
He had to see her agitation, but he seemed intrigued, not alarmed. “And would your young reader agree with that assessment?” he asked. “Or would he urge me to hire you at any price?”
She glared at him and did not answer.
At that moment, there was a quiet knock on the door and a servant entered bearing a tray. “Ah. Our refreshments. Thank you very much,” Jasper Paladar said.
The interruption left her confused, with emotions still at a high pitch, but some of her panic lessened as the servant arranged the tray and Jasper Paladar motioned her back to her seat. Once the footman exited, Wen perched back on the edge of her chair.
“You don’t know me,” she began.
“I don’t,” he said, handing her a fragile plate filled with a large slice of buttery cake. The dainty china looked perfectly reasonable in his elegant long-fingered hands, and perfectly ridiculous in her hardened stubby ones. “But I, too, am trying to match a skill with a need. You did not go to all the trouble of saving Karryn just to see her endangered again. I do not know how to protect her. You do. You are obviously uncomfortable at the thought of committing yourself to any long-term enterprise, and clearly not about to tell me why. So I ask again, how long would you stay? Take a bite and think about it.”
Not sure she’d be able to choke down a mouthful, she obeyed. Oh, now, that was a most excellent taste—rich and sweet, flavored with some spice that didn’t seem to have made its way to Ghosenhall. She had a second bite. “I don’t want to make a promise I can’t keep,” she said at last.
He seemed unconcerned. “I’m sure you wouldn’t. How long? Three months?”
“No.”
“One month?”
“Maybe,” she said rel
uctantly.
He considered her. “Would you agree to a month and then, at the end of that time, consider extending your contract? If the work was not done? Would that make you feel less like you were choking, to leave the terms so open-ended?”
How could he know what it felt like? She would have stared openmouthed, except she was chewing another forkful of cake. “I don’t know,” she said at last.
“But the month you will agree to?”
It was a long time before she answered. “The month I will agree to.” She gave him a sharp look. “But you have to keep Bryce and Ginny even after I go.”
He was smiling broadly. “Of course. They are only hostages to your acceptance, not your continued employment.” He laid aside his plate and held out his hand. “Welcome to Fortune.”
Chapter 7
SENNETH DIDN’T BOTHER KNOCKING ON THE DOOR OF Cammon’s study before she strolled into the room. He had requested her attendance, and of course he knew she was on the way—he knew the exact location of his closest friends at every moment of the day, so it was impossible to come upon him by surprise. That had led some of them to rather uncivil behavior, she feared. She and Kirra, at least, would just walk in on him without ceremony, and Justin would storm into the room as if planning to throw Cammon out the window. Donnal would enter silently, sometimes shaped as the smallest of insects, and wait for Cammon to address him first. Of all of them, in fact, only Tayse showed Cammon any deference, knocking on doors and waiting to be acknowledged. But a lifetime of serving royalty had made it impossible for Tayse to be rude to anyone near the throne.
Cammon had his back to her when she entered, and he was staring out the floor-to-ceiling window that was one of the many charms of this small study. It had been Baryn’s favorite room, when he was alive, and its rich colors and plush decor still reflected the old king’s taste. Amalie had been too comfortable in her own pink-and-gilt study to relocate once she inherited the crown, so Cammon had taken this room as his own. Not that you could find him there very often. He was a wanderer, just as likely to be on the streets of Ghosenhall or down at the training yard watching the Riders work out as he was to be inside the walls of the palace itself.
“You wanted to see me, liege?” Senneth asked, trying to make her voice obsequious.
The question made him turn around, a scowl on his face. “Don’t call me that.”
She was wearing trousers, of course, so she couldn’t manufacture a curtsey, but she gave him a very deep bow, just to annoy him. “But you’re my king.”
“I am not! I’m the royal consort.”
She stayed in a subservient posture. “The common people all call you King Cammon. It’s very mellifluous.”
“Well, the marlords and the serlords have too much respect for titles to do anything so foolish. I order you to stop calling me that.”
At that she couldn’t restrain her laughter anymore, and she straightened up and lounged against the door. “You’re quick enough to claim the privileges of royalty when you want something! You order me!”
He gave her his familiar boyish grin. Two years of being royal consort to Queen Amalie had changed Cammon in indefinable ways, but unless he worked very, very hard at it, he still looked like a vagabond two days off a tramp ship in some backwater harbor town. Unless his valet had styled it just ten minutes previously, his nondescript brown hair still made a rather shaggy halo around his head, and his clothes tended to magically wrinkle within an hour of being donned. His eyes had an old and hard-won wisdom to them—but they always had, Senneth reflected. Cammon had probably been born knowing things none of the rest of them would ever learn.
“Yes, I order you to treat me casually. Now sit down and tell me anything interesting that’s happened.”
She draped herself across one of the chairs set against the wall and he collapsed in another one nearby. “You know everything interesting that’s happened,” she said. “You know it before I do. There’s no point in having a conversation with you.”
He gave her a reproving look. “I know what’s happening with all of you,” he said. “But I can’t keep track of everybody.”
“Well, let’s see. I heard from my brother Kiernan, and all’s well in Brassenthwaite. My brother Will wrote from Danalustrous—I assume you know he and Casserah are expecting a baby?”
He nodded. “Kirra told me. Well—” He shrugged and then he laughed.
“Well, Kirra was excited to learn she’d be an aunt, and you could feel that even though she’s two hundred miles away, and so you knew it,” Senneth filled in. “See? I don’t have to tell you anything.”
He tried to assume an inquiring look. “Are the Riders back? Kelti and the others?”
“You know they are! You met with them yesterday!”
“Amalie met with them. I didn’t see them. What was their news?”
Senneth eyed him, leaned back in her chair, and didn’t answer.
He failed to keep a smile from his face. “All right, I wanted to talk to you because of the information the Riders brought back from the southern Houses.”
She sat up a little straighter. “At last. My king is honest with me.”
“I’m not the king!”
She waved a hand, grinning. “You’re too easy. What about their report intrigued you?”
“Did you talk to them?”
“Tayse did. He said they reported all was mostly well from Gisseltess to Fortunalt, except that there still seemed to be a high number of outlaws. Travelers complain that it’s not safe to journey in small parties on minor roads. His guess was that a lot of these bandits are soldiers from the war who’ve fallen on hard times.”
“That was Amalie’s opinion, too.”
She tilted her head to one side. “And so? What? You want to expand the amnesty programs?”
Cammon frowned and tapped his fingers against his thigh. “I wonder if there’s more to it than that,” he said. “More reasons for unrest in the southern Houses.”
Now he really had her attention. “You think there’s instability? Like there was two years ago? Mutiny?”
His face creased; he appeared to be having trouble articulating vague impressions. “I’m not sure. I don’t have a sense that anyone is plotting against the throne, but—I keep thinking it would be worthwhile to make a visit. Get a closer look.”
“I thought that’s what you just sent the Riders to do.”
“I wouldn’t want to just send Riders this time.”
She opened her eyes wide. “You think you should go?”
He nodded. “I’m the one most likely to pick up accurate impressions of what is really going on.”
Neither Cammon nor Amalie had strayed far from Ghosenhall since the war ended—not that they didn’t want to. Their advisors were united in thinking it was a bad idea for the queen or her husband to travel too far outside of the well-defended, walled compound that housed the palace and a few hundred acres of property. But Amalie had refused to let herself be so confined. She made a point of walking the streets of the royal city at least once a week, and subjects from throughout Gillengaria crowded along her known routes to curtsey to her and throw flowers. Ever since she had taken the throne, she had threatened to travel the circuit of all of the Twelve Houses, just to prove she was not afraid to do so. So far Senneth and Tayse and Amalie’s uncle Romar had convinced her that it was wiser to stay at home where her Riders knew every alley and hazard.
