Limits of Power

by Elizabeth Moon

  “I have a son,” he said. “In Valdaire. His mother died of fever, years back.”

  Her brows went up. “Well, then. You know children must eat.” A noise in the house behind her; she turned her head just as two children tried to squeeze past her in the doorway. One escaped and launched himself at Regar; the other, the woman caught by the arm and held fast.

  “Da! Supper’s ready. I’m hungry!” The boy wasn’t even hip high on Regar and skinny as Arvid’s own son. He wore a ragged shirt that hung to his knees. The girl the woman held back wore the same, but with a patched vest and skirt as well.

  “We’ve not enough for the both of you,” the woman said, eyeing Arvid. “If you must eat together, let him feed you. And what are you going to tell Invarr, when he comes in the morning to see your progress?”

  “I’ll go there now and tell him,” Regar said.

  “Do, then. Come, Carn, don’t be making a scene in the street.” She turned away; the boy hugged Regar and ran after her into the house.

  “There’s an inn—” Arvid began.

  Regar shook his head. “I must find Invarr; she’s right. He comes once a hand of days, and tomorrow’s his day. I must not lose this contract.”

  “How many children do you have?” Arvid asked.

  “Seven,” Regar said. “Two from my first wife, one of them ’prenticed out. Five of Lia’s.”

  They had crossed back to the main street and now came to a much larger house in the area Arvid recognized as wealthy. Regar tapped on a door; a servant opened it. “What do you want?”

  “I need to speak to Invarr,” Regar said. His hand moved toward his waist, where his purse hung.

  The servant wrinkled his nose. “About what?”

  “About a matter concerning Invarr,” Arvid said. “Pray inform him.”

  “Who are you?”

  Arvid said, “Arvid Burin, a merchant associated with Fox Company and with Mason Regar.”

  The servant withdrew, shutting the door.

  “Why’d you interfere?” Regar said.

  “Because he’s playing you,” Arvid said. “You were going to bribe him, weren’t you? Just to do what he’s hired for: tell this Invarr you need to speak to him.”

  “It’s not a bribe,” Regar said. “Exactly…”

  “It is a bribe exactly. You’re a master craftsman in good standing, right? And a Girdish yeoman? You deserve respect; you don’t have to bribe another man’s servants.”

  Regar chewed that over for a moment. “You think I deserve respect?”

  “Yes,” Arvid said firmly. “He’s coming back.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I have very good hearing.”

  The door opened again. The servant glared at them. “Master Invarr will see you when he has finished eating. You—”

  “We will come in and wait,” Arvid said. He stepped forward; the servant gave way, sputtering.

  “But you’re—and he’s—”

  “It’s honest sweat,” Arvid said, having more fun than he’d had since he’d left Valdaire. “We’ve been to drill at the grange. Aren’t you Girdish?”

  “Me? Uh … no.”

  “Well, we are, and it’s because of events at the grange that we must speak with Master Invarr.”

  “Both of you…”

  “Yes.” Arvid looked around the entrance hall of the house, which was lit by oil lamps carved of alabaster, and spotted a padded bench a few strides on. “We will wait here,” he said, moving past the servant and waving at Regar. The look on the faces of both Regar and the servant was, he decided, delicious. His conviction that the Marshal would not have approved of all this made it even better.

  Regar sat on the edge of the seat. “You’ll lose me the contract,” he said in a hoarse whisper when the servant had left again.

  “No, I won’t,” Arvid said. “We’re here on legitimate business. You will assure him the work will not suffer.”

  “But it—”

  “It will not suffer,” Arvid said. “Hate me if you will, but I do not break my word.”

  Far down the passage a door opened. The servant, hovering outside it, bowed; the man who came through it turned, saw them, and came forward. Neither lean nor fat, neither old nor young, he wore a merchant’s robe open over a thin white pleated garment belted at the waist with links of silvery metal.

  Arvid rose, and beside him Regar lunged upright.

  “I have seen you,” Invarr said to Arvid. “You’re that merchant attached to Fox Company. You were at the grange, my servant said. Are you Girdish?”

  Arvid bowed slightly. “Indeed I am, sir, and my name is Arvid Burin—a northern name, as you will recognize, from Tsaia come last fall.”

  “Ser Burin.” Invarr bowed in return, equal to equal. “And you, Master Regar,” he said to Regar. “You both have business with me? I hope you have not been hired away by this man because he is a Girdish comrade.”

  “Not at all,” Regar said.

  “It is a grange matter,” Arvid said. “Marshal Porfur, whom I’m sure you know—”

  “Indeed I do. He has more than once urged me to join his grange.”

  “Well, tonight at drill he bade Regar and me to spend ten days no farther from each other than an armslength and to alternate the days of work—both of us on each man’s task, day by day, so that neither’s work would suffer.”

  “Why would he do that?”

  “It is a long tale,” Arvid said. “And more my fault than Regar’s, but in short—we quarreled, and as Regar has such distinction in the grange—which he of his modesty would not tell you—the Marshal chose to make an example of us to the others.”

  “You quarreled … and I see no marks on you,” Invarr said. “Regar is—you will pardon me—a man more strongly built than you.”

  Arvid smiled. “I am perhaps quicker. Of tongue as well as body, and therein lies my fault. It is a northern thing; I do not know customs here as I ought.”

  “It is not all your fault,” Regar said. “Marshal knows I have a temper.”

  Invarr chuckled. “Everyone knows you have a temper, Regar. But I know you to be an excellent mason. So long as my warehouse is built and you do not strike me, I am content. Will you need more time, then?”

  Regar’s “Maybe” overlaid Arvid’s “No.”

  Invarr nodded at Regar. “As your contract is with me, I thank you for your honesty in coming this evening and admitting the building may be delayed. If you must spend every other day learning merchanting—for how many days?”

  “Ten, if we satisfy the Marshal that our quarrel has ended,” Arvid said.

  “Not much delay, then, even if Ser Burin proves an inept pupil,” Invarr said. “It is well. Shall I come tomorrow or the following day? Or wait until the end of ten?”

  “The following day, ser, if you could,” Regar said. “Tomorrow the Marshal declared I must assist Arvid.”

  “Fine, then.” Invarr had an expression Arvid feared was pure mischief, and his next words proved it. “Perhaps tomorrow I will see what commodities Ser Burin might have to trade with me: two merchants should know each other.”

  “Thank you, ser,” Arvid said, bowing again. “You are most gracious, and I would welcome the chance to learn local customs. You should know I am contracted as sutler to Fox Company.”

  “We’ll see,” Invarr said. He opened the door for them himself and bade them a pleasant evening.

  They had hardly walked past the end of the house before Regar stopped. “That was … that was not entirely honest.”

  “No? But we are not cheating Invarr. I will work honestly for you, and his warehouse will be built, will it not? Do you think his concerns really run to every detail of our quarrel?”

  “No, but—”

  “His servant will hate me and not you,” Arvid said. “Clearly I am the one to blame for your resistance this day, though frankly I think you might refuse to give another bribe. Especially since his master clearly does respect yo
u.”

  “He does?”

  “He called you Master Regar and hired you to build a warehouse,” Arvid said. “That’s not a small commission; he would not hire someone he did not respect. Not a bad man, Invarr.”

  “He’s rich.”

  “If you think rich is bad, you will never be rich, Regar, and with all those children you should not despise money. Come—I need to let Count Arcolin know you’ll be staying with me in camp.”

  At the end of that street the four soldiers waited, propped against a wall. “You all right, sir?” asked one.

  “Fine,” Arvid said. “Making sure we get to camp or that we follow the Marshal’s orders?”

  “Might be a bit of both.”

  “Is Cela’s still open?”

  “Nah—only the Blue Mule.”

  Arvid fumbled in his belt pouch. “Will one of you go to the Mule and bring back two meals to the camp? I need to speak to the Count.”

  “ ’Course,” one of them said. He took the coins and set off; the other three walked with Arvid and Regar to the camp and gave the countersign at the sentry for them.

  “You live in the camp?” Regar murmured.

  “It’s easier,” Arvid said. “I have a tent. We go this way, to Count Arcolin—he’s the commander. He has the big tent.”

  Arcolin was not best pleased to find his protégé in trouble at the grange, but after a glance at Regar he gave permission for the two of them to share Arvid’s tent. “I’ll have Dattur bring you a pallet for him,” he said. “And what about mess? Will you need something—?”

  “One of yours went to the Mule and will bring back food for tonight,” Arvid said.

  “Good. Tomorrow you’ll need to take a wagon over to Garmead and fetch those hogs we ordered.”

  Regar ate his meal in silence; Arvid could not tell from the way he ate whether it was better or worse than the food his wife prepared at home. For himself, he found the Mule’s cooking merely acceptable. After the meal, Arvid showed him where the jacks was and then took him back to the tent they would now share, leaving Regar there while he fetched a yoke and buckets of water for bathing.

  Regar did indeed snore, great snorting, gurgling snores. Arvid was sure he himself did not, and he finally stopped his ears with wads of the wool he kept for oiling his blades.

  The camp was up by dawn, as usual, and Arvid woke reluctantly. Regar still snored. Arvid stared across the still-dark tent at the vague shape on what had been his bed and wondered how he was going to survive the next ten days.

  After breakfast, he hitched a team to one of the Company supply wagons and put coils of rope in the wagon bed. Regar helped, his expression showing he hadn’t expected Arvid to know how. He and Regar climbed to the seat. Regar said nothing during the trip. By midmorning, they arrived at Garmead, where Arcolin had contracted for the future delivery of four hands of young hogs and two of cattle.

  Arvid knew at once something was wrong. He saw no animals penned in the village square, only a group of men, all looking tense and unfriendly. The village headman, glowering, said, “What do you want?”

  Arvid showed him the paper with Arcolin’s seal on it, countersigned by someone in this village. “You’re holding livestock for Count Arcolin of Fox Company; I’ve come to take them and make final payment.”

  “No.”

  “No?”

  The man spat too close to Arvid’s boots for courtesy. “No stock for sale here. Sold ’em all. And anyway, you’re not Fox Company. No uniform.”

  “You sold them to Count Arcolin,” Arvid said. “And yes, I’m a civilian. He hired me to come here. I’m his agent. This is his wagon.” He pointed to the foxhead insignia painted on the side of the wagon.

  “Fox Company no good,” the man said. “He pay too little. Got better price.”

  “You signed this contract,” Arvid said.

  “Not me. Looks like my cousin Vili’s mark, when he’s drunk.” He guffawed; the men behind him did the same. “And he’s not here,” he added. “No pigs here. No cows here. You go.”

  The Thieves’ Guild knew how to handle situations like this. In Arvid’s enforcer days, he could have turned the village upside down for such insolence. But now he was Girdish, and Girdish yeomen did not, he was assured, take out their swords and beat sullen peasants into submission. Exactly why he’d thought less of Girdish all these years. And he had Regar with him, so reverting to his former self, even on such good grounds, would not be good strategy.

  “Count Arcolin paid you to hold those animals for him,” Arvid said. “You owe the money now. Give it back.”

  “He didn’t come soon enough,” the man said. “He’s not getting a niti back. They kept eating.”

  Arvid glanced at Regar. He looked angry, but was he willing to help?

  “You are in Foss Council jurisdiction,” Arvid said. “A complaint will be filed with the nearest judicar, and you will be hailed to court. We have the proof that this vill contracted to supply animals, that a deposit was put down. Do you really want to be hailed to court and end up paying a fine?”

  The men looked at one another but said nothing. Arvid could feel the tension rising. Six men there before him, and how many others nearby? They didn’t have swords, at least not these six, but what about those he couldn’t see? As he was thinking what best to do, Regar said, “Look out!” and pushed Arvid off the wagon seat. The men on the ground let out a nervous laugh, but the unmistakable sound of an arrow hitting the seat back caught Arvid’s attention. He had rolled off the wagon with the push; Regar was on the wagon floor, behind the dashboard.

  “This side, Regar,” he said, hoping the other archers weren’t all around them. Before the villagers had quite recovered—they had not expected that arrow either, he could tell—he had reached the headman, yanked him around, and held him between himself and the direction from which the arrow had come, one of his knives at the man’s throat.

  “Call them off,” he said in the man’s ear.

  “Got another one,” Regar said. “Can’t lead the horses while holding ’im, though.”

  Arvid and Regar dragged their captives back toward the wagon; the other men broke and fled to the huts around the small square. Regar threw his to the ground and sat on him. Arvid forced his to his knees, keeping the knife pressure on him.

  “Both hands on your head,” he said. “If you move, I’ll stick you.” The man complied. Keeping the point of the knife at the man’s neck, Arvid fished a thong out of his pocket with the other hand. No more arrows came while he and Regar finished with their captives—one hand tied behind to a choke-thong at the neck. That worried Arvid. Where was the archer? Creeping around to take them in the flank?

  “Who’s shooting?” he asked the headman.

  The man paled even more. “I can’t tell!”

  “You’d rather die?” Even as he said it, the man’s answer suggested a more serious problem. “Someone’s here—not your people. Did they take the animals?”

  The man nodded, lips pressed tight.

  “How many?”

  “I can’t—”

  “They’ll kill us all if you don’t. I can save us if you do.”

  “They left two,” the man said. Tears streaked his face now. “I can’t—”

  “Say more. Fine.” Arvid looked around. Two archers could shoot them where they crouched now, beside the wagon, one to either flank. Or they could be waiting to see if the villagers revealed anything about them. Two archers—only part of “they”—and the stories about last year’s campaigns in Vonja … It didn’t take a soldier to put that together. The town was an ambush, and an ambush aimed at Fox Company. They’d be lucky to get out alive.

  Unless he could convince the watchers he had nothing to do with Arcolin but as a hireling and not one valuable to Fox Company.

  “So you’re telling me I wasted a whole day on a fool’s errand? That Fox Company sent me here as some kind of joke? Damn them all, I say!” Loud enough to be heard through the
vill. “They promised me a nis when I brought the animals back, and now I’ll get nothing!”

  He stood up, skin prickling with awareness of danger. “Come on, Sim,” he said to Regar, giving him the first name he could think of. “Those bastards in Fox Company set us up, and for all we know it’s them shot the arrow. They can go hungry until winter for all I care. This is what we get for trying to make an honest day’s wage with mercenary scum.”

  Regar, for a wonder, followed his lead. “I told you yesterday—”

  “So you did, and I should’ve listened. Last time I’ll take a job like that, but I thought it’d be easier than hauling freight to Valdaire.” To the headman, Arvid said, “Help us turn the team, will you? Do you think your friend will stick an arrow in us?” He unfastened the choke-cord as he spoke.

  “N-no,” the man said.

  Nothing happened while the team was being turned, convincing Arvid that the enemy didn’t have the manpower to attack, just enough to scare the villagers. Someone’s wife or child was probably a hostage.

  “Get in, but stay low,” he said to Regar. “Down in front of the seat. It’s going to be rough.” Instead of mounting the wagon, he took the reins, as if inspecting the harness, then stepped on the trace and threw himself on the wheeler’s back, yelling and laying a whip on the lead pair. They squealed and bolted, as did the wheelers.

  Nobody followed, somewhat to his surprise, but back at the Fox Company camp, he found four arrows in the tailboard and the back of the driver’s seat. He had slowed the team once he was sure they weren’t being followed but continued to ride the wheeler until they were in sight of the camp. Then he dismounted, climbed up onto the driving seat with Regar, and proceeded at a walk. Arcolin wasn’t going to like what he had to say.

  “We could have died,” Regar said when the team had moved on.

  “Yes. It was close,” Arvid said.

  “You knew what to do.”

  “I knew some things to try. I didn’t know they’d work. We were lucky.” He sighed. “Regar, I’m sorry you got dragged into this. You have family—”

  “You said you had a son—”

  “I do. But he’s in Valdaire—well, actually not in Valdaire but near it—being cared for by a grange. Your family’s here, vulnerable, and there are more of them.”