She grinned back. “I look forward to finding out how fun that can be.”
“Go rest up and get your folks settled in and we’ll talk tomorrow morning. We’ve had seventy new recruits arrive so far, and twenty of them say they want duty with you, so you can start picking your folks when you’re ready. We’ve built rooms above the stable for the cavalry to be able to bunk together here,” Alec said. He shook her hand and watched her set about the business of organizing and directing. She showed great comfort with being a leader, Alec sensed, his spirits buoyed.
The next day was confused and busy as cavalry moved out of the stable in the morning and workers moved in. Tarpa, Streed, Imelda, and Alec sat down to talk about the schedule. “We’re about two weeks away from completion,” Tarpa told the group as they stood in the stables. “We’ve left this wall incomplete so that we can bring materials in from the yard, and the roof isn’t done. We planned on stone stalls as well.”
“Is the smithy done?” Alec asked.
“Yes. Neill came by several times last week and he’s satisfied with what we’ve got. Says he’ll produce as much quality work as any two from Stronghold!” Tarpa answered.
“What would you suggest we do to speed it up?” Imelda asked. “I’d like my lads and gals to feel at home as quickly as possible.”
“Could you put in wooden stalls to reduce the amount of work that Streed has to do?” Alec asked. “We can have some carpenters in there today beginning that work and let you concentrate on the other stone work.”
“That would save us several days,” Tarpa agreed after looking at Streed.
“Good; Tarpa go ahead and get the carpenters in there and working on the stalls. Can we be done in less than a week?” Alec asked.
“If you allow me to skip sword practice, we’ll be done in five days,” Streed said. Alec laughed and nodded his agreement, and the meeting broke up. “Imelda, can you join the colonel and Duke for lunch tomorrow? I’d like him to hear your report on the cavalry horses and how fast you can travel,” Alec called to the cavalry officer as they started to part.
Alec went back to the armory to join in the sword training for the recruits, but a half hour later was startled to see Ellison walk in the room looking for him.
“Welcome back, Ellison,” Alec greeted him. “Let’s go back to the office and hear your report.”
“How are you? What happened on your trip?” Alec asked as they walked back to see Colonel Ryder in the offices.
“We’re all well and suffered no losses,” Ellison reported. “I learned that sailing on the water in the winter is cold, and you can never get warm.”
“I also learned that some of our girls and boys can sail a boat when they have to. We’ve got a captured privateer sitting in the docks at Natha’s yard, and I thought you might enjoy seeing it,” Ellison said.
“You’ve captured a ship?” Alec asked excitedly. “Tell me what happened while we go to see it.”
“Nice stables,” Ellison commented as they walked past the building, presently full of activity as carpenters began arriving to carry out the construction of the stalls.
“Imelda brought back fifty horses last night. We hope to have this done in less than a week for the cavalry to take over,” Alec told him. “They spent the night there last night anyway.”
Once they sat down with the colonel and exchanged greetings, Ellison told his story. The journey was an uneventful one all the way down the Giffey to Three Forks, as they had expected. The Guard members had remained out of sight as much as possible, and had dressed as regular sailing crew members at all times. Tarkas’s captain felt that a ship from Three Forks had followed them down river on the Carmen from that point, maintaining a fairly wide distance so that it was barely visible. The first night out from the city, an alarm arose well past midnight.
“The other ship, the one we’re going to Natha’s to see, came up on us pretty fast that night, and launched an attack,” Ellison explained. “We knew that any attack would come after Three Forks, so we had three Guards on watch that night. Still the attacker was dark without any lights, and it was right on us before we spotted it.
“We think there were about twenty on board the attacker, the Woodline, and they all came over onto our ship. When we threw a dozen experienced Guard members at them, plus the rest of Natha’s crew, we won pretty easily. A couple of them got away, or at least swam away from us, although we don’t know if they got to shore in the darkness.
“Their ship had no cargo in it at all. They apparently planned to transfer all the barrels to their ship and then sink Natha’s so that there’d be no clue to its disappearance,” Ellison continued. “We placed a few Guard members and a few sailors on each ship then, and turned around with this one and brought it back, while the other took its cargo on down to Oyster Bay. The rest from our squad should be back when the ship returns in just a few days.”
“So you had no captives or clues about the origins of the ship?” Alec asked.
“No, we took no captives. We have the entire ship, but there are no papers. There are some crew belongings left on board, and one of them includes ingenaire clothing,” Ellison said. “There’s a white band on the arm of several of the shirts.”
“That would be an air ingenaire, which would explain how their ship managed to come up rapidly on you at night. I’d thought about putting air ingenaire’s on Natha’s ships as a way to protect them, either by blowing the attacker away or by aiding an escape,” Alec told Ellison. “But we’ve not got enough air ingenairii to do the job, nor enough trained Guardsmen to protect every water barge on the rivers.”
“Thank you Ellison. You did well. You saved one ship, you proved that Oyster Bay has a hand in this and you’ve given some folks something to worry about now that they’ve seen our ship come in and they’ve lost one of their own,” Ryder said. “Do you have time to join me for lunch with the Duke today? I’d like him to hear from you and Imelda about what’s happening.”
Ellison agreed to meet for lunch, and the conversation turned to domestic matters for a brief discussion while they walked to the dockyards. When they got to the ship they found Tarkas and several of his men onboard the vessel exploring it thoroughly.
“Good to see you Alec,” Tarkas said as he emerged from a small cabin. “Quite a happy turn of events, isn’t it? We get to keep our own shipment of water and gain a new vessel to boot!”
“I think it’s very interesting,” Alec agreed. “Do you know anything about this boat, or have you found any papers?”
“No, it doesn’t seem to carry anything to identify it, and there are scores of craft like this in the water,” Tarkas answered.
“It may be best to keep this off the Carmen River. This boat may just be best used to travel up the Giffey so that it stays out of sight of whoever its former owner is,” Alec said. “We’ll talk to the duke about how best to provide security to your shipping. Maybe we can work out an arrangement to have a squad stationed at Three Forks for shipping just on the Carmen going south; that way we wouldn’t waste a lot of time for the Guards having to constantly ride up and down the Giffey. That’s not where the problems are.”
While Ryder and Tarkas discussed possible payments Natha could make for the costs of the Guards, Alec walked through the boat to examine it, then left the dockyards with Ellison. Alec returned to the palace, while Ellison detoured briefly to visit Ellen at Alec’s shop.
Back in the Guard quarters Alec returned to the armory to help with further training of the recruits that constantly occupied the building. When lunch time arrived he saw Colonel Ryder head to the palace to have lunch with the Duke, Ellison and Imelda.
“Between Ellison’s adventure on the rivers and Imelda’s activities on land, we’re going to be using our troops to take battles to our enemies in locations far from Goldenfields, and that’s what we want. The farther away we fight the battles, the safer the city will be. It takes more effort on our part to have forces that can move around in
such a manner and fight effectively,” Ryder afterwards told Alec was the message they delivered to the Duke. “The Duke is pleased with the tactics. He almost doesn’t mind paying for all these things when we have some tangible results like these!”
The next afternoon more news came. Bethany arrived at his office shortly after Cassie’s training was complete. The visit from Bethany was an unusual event, and Alec looked at her in surprise. “I thought you’d like to know that the ingenaire delegation to Oyster Bay has returned,” she told him with a serious expression. “They arrived this morning and have been meeting with others from the Cathedral group all day.”
“Have they made up their minds to go back then?” Alec asked her.
“We’ll know later tonight, I imagine,” Bethany told him. “Tomorrow is more likely to be when everyone knows what they want to do.”
“Let’s go talk to Merle about this,” Alec suggested to her. He stood up and they walked through the palace together.
Inside Merle’s quarters they waited for half an hour while the elder ingenaire finished a previous appointment. They spoke with some of the other apprentices who were training or socializing in the palace ingenaire’s rooms, none of whom appeared to be aware that the delegation of ingenairii had returned from Oyster Bay.
“Alec, Bethany, it’s a pleasure to see you both,” Merle said upon his arrival. “It’s been a little while since I’ve seen either of you here. What portentous event do I owe this pleasure to?”
Bethany told him what she had told Alec previously. “So they’ve returned, they’re caucusing, and they haven’t bothered to invite us to join their conversation,” Merle said tersely. “That gives us a pretty good confirmation of what they’ve already decided, doesn’t it?”
“Should we go visit them to hear it from them directly?” Alec asked.
“That seems like the prudent thing to do,” Merle agreed. “And I suppose there’s no time like the present. Would you like to go now?”
Alec agreed to do so, and together the two outcast council members walked with Bethany off the palace island. They parted ways in the Riverfront Market, Bethany returning to the shop while Alec and Merle turned left to go to the cathedral. Alec had not visited any of the ingenairii at the cathedral in the time they’d been at Goldenfields, and followed Merle across the grounds to a chapel building that had been set aside for the refugee ingenairii. Inside the chapel, the bright and cheery atmosphere of those inside noticeably chilled around the intrusion of the two naysayers who did not plan to return to Oyster Bay. They were shown to a room where Genia, Straynon, Suffett, and Cabine were already meeting.
The four looked up in surprise at their entrance. “It’s a surprise to see you here,” Genia commented without malice.
Alec decided to skip pleasantries and address the heart of the issue. “I presume you have decided to return to Oyster Bay?”
“Our plan is to leave the day after tomorrow,” Straynon answered.
“And you believe you’ll be safe from murder by the usurpers?” Alec followed.
“They are not usurpers. They have stepped into the void when no one else did so after the King was murdered. They’ve apprehended the ruffians who killed him; they were just common criminals who were looking for plunder when they got into the palace, and they’ve already been executed,” Cabine explained to Alec.
“I was in the palace, and there were enough guards there I find it hard to imagine that common criminals would have found their way close enough to the king to kill him during a botched robbery,” Alec said wryly.
“Did they find common ruffians who also killed Persephia and the others on Ingenairii’ Hill too?” he asked ironically.
“Alec, they admit that in the confusion and distress of those times they made some bad decisions and acted wrongly. But we all agreed, them and our group as well, that the ingenairii need to be united and ready to work together to help the new king serve the whole Dominion effectively,” Suffett retorted.
“What new king do they have in mind to serve?” Merle asked with interest.
“There’s no particular person they mentioned. The council of regents is trying to restore good relations throughout the Dominion so that there will be a positive atmosphere when the time comes to convene the assembly that selects the new king,” Suffett answered. “In the mean time, they have the crown secured in the palace and can move at the pace they so desire.”
“And they will accept all ingenairii back with no conditions? They’ll agree to face spiritual ingenairii to put to rest questions about their actions and motives,” Alec persisted in asking.
“There is no need to fill the Ingenairii’ Council with feelings of ill-will and distrust by doing something like that,” Genia answered. “In fact Alec, the only condition that any of us may agree to is that your allegiance to Duke Toulon and your antagonism towards the other members of the Council is the biggest stumbling block to reconciliation, so the Healers House will for the time being not be represented on the Council. Since you have only a single ingenaire anyway, it hardly seems appropriate for you to have as much say in our governance as Cabine with all the Plant ingenairii. Merle, your place as Spirit leader will need to be confirmed on Ingenairii Hill by the full membership of that House.”
“I think you’ve taken care of everything very well for the usurpers,” Alec said angrily. “And I’m sure they’ll take good care of you, provided that you remain placid, subservient, loyal stooges to their criminal actions. You’re no more than going to get back there that one little thing after another is going to concern you, but you won’t raise a note of protest until it’s too late and you’re up to your waist in supporting people you find are reprehensible. There’ll be no escape for you next time, understand. I suspect that for the sake of your security there will be more guards on the Hill and you’ll be ‘advised’ not to leave the Hill for any purposes unless approved by Dosta or someone else. Enjoy your lives as inmates while you have them.”
Merle laid a hand on Alec’s arm to halt his diatribe. “While Alec speaks hastily, I think he speaks very accurately. If you do manage to escape your prison a second time, there will still be a refuge here for those who want freedom, and are willing to stand up for it. Please remember that we are interested in saving all the Dominion, not just our duchy.” With that he turned and pulled Alec with him out of the building.
“That ended up about where I thought it would, but got there sooner than I expected,” Merle said with amusement. “I suppose it’s just as well that you didn’t beat about the bush. There’s no sense in wasting our time listening to them justify what they are doing. I just hope that enough of them live to see the errors of their ways.”
“They’ll get what they deserve,” Alec said with still simmering anger. “I suppose I’ll feel sorry for them when the time comes. Now we’ll just have to see how many of them are so determined to regain the sweet taste of home at Ingenairii’ Hill, regardless of the poison that coats it.”
“We didn’t ask what they intend to do about those who don’t plan to go with them,” Alec realized.
“That’s probably better left quiet. If we brought it up they’d get their backs up and try to act as though they could force people to go with them. As it is, they’ll call in all they can, and those who show up will ride the boat down the river. I expect you’ll have more trying to crowd into your place in the next day or two,” Merle suggested.
“Would you tell your folks that they are invited to have dinner at our home tonight if they’d like a chance to talk to others. I expect the best thing to do will be to announce to everyone at once what we’ve heard,” Alec said. Merle agreed to pass along the invitation.
When they arrived back at the palace, Merle returned to his quarters while Alec stopped by the stables. The roof was finished and the carpenters were nearly done with the stalls inside. Streed was overseeing and strengthening sections of the last exterior wall. “We’ll be done tomorrow,” he promised Alec. “
Everyone’s pulled together to get this done in a hurry.”
“Good work on this project. At least now you know you’ll have the joy of returning to sword practice with your fellow ingenairii,” Alec chided him with a laugh. “Some of you are getting fairly good with a sword these days. You’ve put your time here in Goldenfields to better use that the folks heading back to Oyster Bay.”
“Do you believe they will go back to Ingenaire’s Hill, Alec?” Streed asked. Alec filled him in on the conversation he and Merle had just participated in, leaving Streed shaking his head. “I don’t trust the folks who stayed behind, and our lot is going to be sorry they tucked their tails between their legs to run back so fast.”
“I think so too, but that’s something they have to learn for themselves,” Alec agreed. “In the meantime you go ahead and finish up here and we’ll prepare for whatever is going to happen next.”
Alec stopped in to report to Colonel Ryder on the news. “Alec, there are a great many people in the world who only learn hard lessons the hard way,” Ryder consoled him. “How many ingenairii will stay here do you think?”
“I’ve been wondering about that. We’ll have some idea tonight; several of us are going to get together for dinner and discuss this,” Alec told him.
That night at dinner the crowd grew considerably larger as not only most of Merle’s apprentices, but some from other spots came as well. Alec called everyone together in the front parlor, many sitting on the floor or standing to make room for everyone, as the crowd spilled down the hall. “I wanted to share with you what I understand,” Alec began.
“The ingenairii delegation who returned to Oyster Bay came back this morning, as most of you know. They went to find out under what conditions they might be able to return to Ingenairii Hill. Their report is that almost everyone is welcome to return. They have been told that the king was killed by common criminals and that the murders on the Hill were regrettable accidents,” Alec recounted in an even tone.
The Loss of Power: Goldenfields and Bondell Page 15
