by Tanya Huff
“If the Cemandians are able to work around Command, Majesty.” Liene’s tone suggested that the king could believe what he wished. While she’d give him the rest, she wouldn’t give him this. Not without a fight.
“If they can do it, I’m sure you can as well.” It was less an observation than an order. “We’ll need a way to undo it and a way to guard against it ever happening again. I’m sure His Grace will be eager to help when he’s returned to the capital.”
Her lips had thinned to a pale line and she barely opened them as she spoke. “Yes, Majesty. And if it can’t be done?”
His smile held a warning. “Assume it can. You’ll find the two dungeon guards with my four. I want all six of them Commanded not to speak of the escape but explain why before you do it—they may not have a choice, but they’ll at least have the reason.”
“That won’t stop them from speaking the truth if they’re Commanded, Majesty.”
“I know that, Captain, but who’s going to Command them? I’m not. You’re not.” His smile suggested she drop the subject. “Leonas, get the blood, then return here. You’re roughly the same height as the duc and no one looks too closely at the person in the Judgment robe. I’ll take you into the Duc’s cell by way of the so-called secret passageway, then you, Captain, will show up with the dungeon guards to escort him out.”
Liene bowed and turned on her heel, muttering, “I am not singing a dirge for a bucket of chicken blood,” as she left.
Leonas bowed as well, with the air of a man who knew his duty even if he didn’t like it.
Theron allowed them both to leave and sat staring down at the two half circles of wood at his feet.
Stasya stared at a point just over his head and wondered why he hadn’t dismissed her with the others.
Finally, he glanced up. “I know you’re worried about her. I wish I could send you after her.”
“Thank you, Majesty.” This wasn’t what she’d expected. And he looked as worried as she felt. “She really wants this baby, Majesty. She won’t do anything to endanger it.”
“Perhaps you’d better reassure Leonas.”
“Yes, Majesty.”
“Stasya …” He paused, uncertain of how to go on. “Did Annice deliberately challenge my authority with this?”
“She didn’t get pregnant on purpose if that’s what you’re asking, sire.”
“An accident?” Sighing, he bent and picked up the broken button, his tunic gaping at the collar. “Trust Annice to have an accident this complicated. Is she happy about it?”
“Stasya, when I think about this baby, I feel the way I feel when the Song works; that sense of everything snapping into place and being, if only for a little while, absolutely right.”
Stasya smiled. “Yes, Majesty.”
“Is she healthy?”
“Yes, Majesty.”
“Do you really believe she did this just so I would send for her?”
“Not consciously, Majesty, but, yes; I really believe it. She misses you, misses her family, misses her past.”
“I wish I’d known this sooner.”
Stasya sighed. “So do I, Majesty.” Because then she wouldn’t be on her way to Ohrid, almost eight months pregnant, a hunted fugitive, protecting a man she wouldn’t eat breakfast with. No point in saying it; there was nothing the king could do, no way he could find her. No way I can find her. Shit.
Theron remembered a little sister who followed him like a shadow. When he met Stasya’s eyes again, his own were bright. “I sent for her, about eight years ago, but she wouldn’t come.”
“It still hurt too much, Majesty.”
“I know.”
Stasya bit her lip as she realized why he understood about Annice’s pain, but before she could think of something to say, he continued.
“And then, when I heard that song, all I could think of was how she’d taken something that should have been private between the two of us and deliberately used it to undermine my authority throughout Shkoder.”
“‘The Princess-Bard’?” Stasya was so astonished, she took a step toward the king. “Annice had nothing to do with that, Majesty, and I doubt you hate it more than she does. If you’ll forgive me, the two of you are a lot alike. I think that’s your biggest problem. You were both too proud to bend first.”
“A king cannot appear weak before his subjects. A weakness in the king is perceived as a weakness in the country.” Theron sighed and his shoulders slumped. “I did what I could.”
“Leonas?”
“He watched over her for me. Kept me informed.” He drummed his fingers on the desk. “Apparently not as well informed as I thought.” A baby. He couldn’t deal with the concept. The Annice of his memory was fourteen. Or five. But he didn’t know this Annice at all. “I missed her.”
Stasya snorted, sounding remarkably like Liene. “Tell her, Majesty, not me.”
Theron nodded. “When this is over.”
Recognizing a dismissal, Stasya bowed. Her hand was on the door when the king’s voice stopped her.
“I’m going to want you to go to Ohrid, but we’ll speak again before you leave. This deception must be closely planned if it’s to work.”
* * * *
Annice woke, aware something was wrong but unable for the moment to determine what. Where am I? The rocking motion suggested riverboat, then the cart hit a bump and she remembered.
“Heard they had terrible trouble with mice over Fourth Quarter,” Bartek the carter confided, slipping the two gulls they’d settled on for the fare into his pocket. “I got oats, barley, spring wheat, and some corn. Just so much extra here, but if I get it to market in Vidor by the new moon, I figure I can make a killing. Climb on board, make yourself comfortable. You both look like you could use some shuteye.”
With the sacks of seed grain molded to her aching back, Annice fell asleep before the cart was out of Riverton.
Now she was awake and she wanted to know why. The baby was quiet. Nothing hurt. The sun poured heat over her like molten gold.
The sun.
Directly overhead.
Noon.
She opened her eyes and looked for Pjerin.
He was sitting rigidly upright against the side of the cart, one leg raised, his forearm resting across his knee. The shirt that Stasya had found for him was a bit small and with the fabric pulled tight across his chest, Annice could see each shallow breath. There were hollows in his cheeks that hadn’t been there in Third Quarter and the bruising around his eye made him seem achingly fragile. She had the strangest desire to go over to him and let him rest his head on her shoulder while she stroked the long fall of dark hair.
Out of the Circle with that! I refuse to get maternal about him.
His other hand worked against the bag of corn beside him, grinding the kernels together.
The grinding was the sound that had woken her.
Reaching out one arm, she poked him in the calf of his outstretched leg—all she could touch without moving. “Hey. You’re alive.”
Violet eyes found hers, dark with anger, not pain.
“And I’m going to stay alive.” It was more a threat than a promise. “And when we find out who did this to me, I’m going to make them wish they’d never been born.”
Ten
“Traders in the pass!”
The voice drifted down from the high watchtower, echoing off the stone of the mountain and sounding remote but clear in the lower bailey.
Olina shook her head at Gerek’s questioning glance. “That’s only first warning. You’ve time to finish your practice.” When he was old enough to learn the sword, she’d hire an armsmaster—as her father had done for her and Pjerin’s for him—but the Ducs of Ohrid trained with the mountain bow from the time they could walk, the bow growing taller as they did.
The boy sighed and set another arrow to the string.
* * * *
“Traders at the wall!”
If Gerek squinted, he could just make out
the tiny figure waving from the top of the wall-tower. Responding to the cry, the men and women of the keep began to make their way toward the gate. Gerek turned and looked hopefully up at his aunt.
“If you hit the target with this last arrow, you can come with me to meet them,” she promised.
Brow furrowed with concentration, Gerek pulled and released. Although the target wasn’t far, it was at the edge of his range and the arrow wobbled a little in flight. Perhaps pushed on by the intensity of the violet stare locked onto it, it managed to just reach the lower edge of the bundle of straw.
“It hit! It hit! And it stayed,” he added, just in case his aunt hadn’t noticed.
“That’s very well done, Gerek.” Olina smiled down at the boy. “I’m very proud of you.”
Gerek preened. “I’m gonna shoot like my papa. My papa can hit anything.”
“Your papa is dead, Gerek.” She’d tried being gentle, she’d tried discussing it with him—she’d finally given up and merely repeated the bald statement as often as she was given cause.
His lower lip jutted out and Gerek prepared to do battle.
“No.” Her hand chopped off his protest before it began. “I am not going to argue with you. Your father is dead. You are now the duc. Gather up your arrows, and put your equipment away. You should be finished long before the traders reach the gate.” He hesitated, obviously still considering a defense of his absent father. “Or would you rather not see the traders at all?”
The threat worked where reason stood no chance. Olina watched the boy run to the target and wondered how much longer she was going to have to put up with his nonsense. The boy isn’t quite five, surely he’ll soon forget.
With the First Quarter rains over and the roads passable—Or what stands for roads in this unenclosed part of the world …—Olina expected a courier from the king with the official notification of the Judgment. Not that she needed to be told what had happened; the part of the plan that removed the stewardship of the pass from her nephew’s hands was foolproof. The penalty for treason was death and she knew that Pjerin would rather die than throw himself on anyone’s mercy. Therefore, Pjerin was dead.
But if the child won’t believe me, maybe he’ll believe the king.
She smiled and stretched in the sun like a cat. Gerek had been repeating to everyone his version of Pjerin’s last words. “They made a mistake. The king will make everything better and then my papa will come back.” He had half the village and most of the keep partially convinced as not even those who personally found their duc somewhat arrogant and overbearing had wanted to believe the evidence they’d heard. When that piping cry changed to a howl of “The king killed my papa!”, neither His Majesty nor the thought of Shkoder rule would be very popular in Ohrid.
Gerek bounced out of the armory and raced toward the gate of the keep, short legs pumping. “Come on, Aunty Olina! Come on!”
Still smiling, she followed the boy to the gate.
* * * *
“You want to set up a what outside the village?”
“A fair, gracious lady.” The portly trader swept off his hat and managed to actually bow more-or-less from the waist. He spoke the local dialect with a Cemandia accent. “Why, we asked ourselves, should we travel to distant foreign cities to sell our wares when there is a market eager to buy just over the border.”
Eager? Olina snorted silently. Try slavering. The villagers seldom reaped any benefit of the scanty trade that traveled through the pass; sheep and timber being in abundance on both sides. The pass itself was their only worthwhile commodity, and Pjerin, the fool, had refused to take advantage of it. Nor would he have allowed so many Cemandians to remain so near the keep but would have insisted they move on and provided an escort to see that they did.
“We have strong markets in Cemandia for both fleece and timber,” the trader continued as though reading her mind. “And I have a client who has interest in strong mountain rams for cross-breeding purposes.”
“My nephew was recently executed for conspiring with a Cemandia trader. He planned to allow a Cemandian army through the pass.”
The trader blanched and his hand rose to trace the sign of the Circle over his heart as the small crowd of villagers began to mutter. “War, gracious lady, is so bad for business. I assure you, we have no ulterior motive but profit.”
It was impossible not to believe he was sincere. “If you wish only to trade in peace,” Olina raised her voice so that those watching would hear and pass it on, “I will bring the matter up with my duc.” Her fingers closed around Gerek’s narrow shoulder. “Shall we let them have their fair?” she asked him.
He looked up at her, brightly colored caravans reflecting in wide eyes. “What’s a fair?”
“Like a market day, only better.”
Gerek bounced. “Fairs are good,” he declared.
The trader bowed again and produced from the pocket of a voluminous trouser leg a small crimson top which he presented with a flourish. “So we have your permission, Your Grace?”
“Yes.” Gerek took the top quickly, before any of the adults standing around could decide he wasn’t to have it. “ ’Cause I am taking care of things till my papa comes back.”
A slender man with short blond curls, who leaned negligently against one of the smaller wagons, smiled.
* * * *
“… your duc was accused by bards, was he, lady? We don’t have much use for bards in Cemandia. Now you won’t find finer pins than this anywhere …”
“… fine-looking young ram and I can give you a good price for him, too. Folk in Cemandia appreciate the work that’s gone into breeding for him, let me tell you …”
“… save you an incredible amount of work, they will. I can’t imagine no traders from Shkoder have brought them in. Well, never mind, I can beat their prices right out of the Circle …”
Olina walked slowly around the small fair, admiring the subtle—and occasionally less than subtle—working of Cemandian influence. She stopped for a moment to watch a fair young man keep half a dozen clubs in the air in a spinning cascade. His golden-blond curls gleamed in the afternoon sun and a breeze chased itself through the gilt. Below the pushed-up sleeves of his cotton shirt, the muscles of his forearms danced under the pale sheath of skin. As the small crowd gathered around him gazed open-mouthed at his skill, Olina dropped her eyes to the fit of his breeches.
“He’s no more than a mountebank really.” The portly trader stood suddenly by her side, wiping his jowls with a huge square of linen. “But we’ve found that a little free amusement makes people less willing to argue a price.”
“He looks very …” Her brows dipped speculatively. “… coordinated.”
“Yes. I suppose.”
“When he’s finished, could you tell him I’d like a private performance. Tonight. In the keep.”
* * * *
“He warned me that you’d eat me alive.”
Olina laughed. “Maybe later.” She stretched out her legs and crossed her feet at the ankles. “I like you with those short blond curls. It makes you look younger, more vulnerable.”
Albek helped himself to a cup of beer. “Thank you.” He wore a rough homespun vest over his wide-sleeved shirt and his manner echoed his clothing; his voice less polished, his speech less subtle. “Rumor says the king accused Pjerin of treason, sent a bard to condemn him, and a hundred guards to drag him away.”
“There were twenty guards, but rumor got the essentials right. It was too much for poor old Bohdan. He’s tottered off to his daughter’s and taken to his bed.”
“So the new duc will need a new steward. Unless you intend to do the job yourself.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I have someone suitably sympathetic to Cemandia in mind.”
“You’re certain Pjerin is dead?” Albek asked, leaning against the mantel.
“It probably happened some time ago, but you know what the roads are like at this time of the year. I’m expecting the official mes
sengers to ride up any day now, covered in mud and glad to be done with it.”
“I told you it would work.”
“Yes, you did. Now, tell me why you’ve brought so many little friends with you across the border?”
“Two reasons.” He turned a chair and sat straddling it, arms resting along the top of the back. “Albek always traveled alone so Simion does not. Albek was an aristocrat of traders, polished and urbane. These people are as far from that as I could stand traveling with. And …” He took a long pull on the cup and wiped his mouth on the back of his hand. “… as I had to check out the situation anyway, I thought I could use the opportunity to stir up a little sedition. Nothing overt, just a bit of Cemandia good, Shkoder bad.”
Olina looked thoughtful. “So these traders work for you?”
“Not directly. But the Cemandian crown will be buying more fleece and timber than it really wants this year.”
“The crown seems to be spending a lot of money on this considering the pass is open to them now.”
Albek/Simion shrugged. “Wars are much more expensive and the longer they take to win, the more they cost. We have a saying in Cemandia that the word is not only mightier than the sword, but it’s cheaper, too. By the time Her Majesty’s army comes through that pass, I want the only resistance to come from parents who don’t want their children to join up.”
“That might not be so difficult to accomplish.” She told him how Gerek had unwittingly been adding to the Shkoder bad opinion. “By the time the child’s finished, Pjerin will be a martyr to half of Ohrid.”
“But Pjerin was anti-Cemandia.”
“Cemandia good, remember? We’re looking for an emotional response.” Olina slowly stood. “They were left so emotionally flayed by his betrayal that they’re very open to suggestion and will only remember that Shkoder killed him.”
“It sounds as though you’ve been busy.”
“I may have dropped a word or two in the right ears.”
He could feel her strength, the heat of her focus, from across the room. “And the other half?”
