He had successfully completed the first part of his plan—to shield his thoughts and activities from Malken. Now, he and Sigfrid would be able to make some inroads into Malken’s criminal activities. Once those loose ends had been tied up, Tristan would again absent himself and concentrate on another problem—separating himself from Malken.
Tristan laid his head on his hands, whispered “Thank you” to Terza and Ailsa, and immediately fell into the first truly refreshing sleep he had experienced since the mists and Malken had come into the land.
The following day, Tristan showed up at Sigfrid’s office. Sigfrid fixed Tristan with an unhappy look as the young sergeant showed him in. He waited until the sergeant left, then said, “Bad news, I’m afraid.”
“What?” asked Tristan.
“I had to release the prisoners we captured at the racetrack day before yesterday,” Sigfrid replied glumly. “Your son is very close with Othmar these days, and he persuaded our dear prince to leniency. I was told that the Claws would reprimand their own. We can’t touch the bastards. Here’s the order.” He pushed a piece of parchment toward Tristan, who read it silently.
“Did you get any information out of them before you had to let them go?” asked Tristan.
Sigfrid shook his head. “Close-mouthed lot, all of them. Not a word.”
Tristan swore.
“But, on the brighter side, you’re not going to believe what I found in Cavell’s ledgers.”
“The real tragedy is, I probably will believe it,” Tristan replied grimly. He seated himself, and Sigfrid handed him the first heavy book.
There were several of them, dating back over the last few months, and they housed a wealth of information. “Look at the names,” Sigfrid pointed out in a whisper. Tristan slowly nodded with recognition.
“If you and I were blackmail-minded, we could make a tidy fortune,” he said. Many implicated on the pages of these notes would indeed pay dearly to have the books simply vanish—along with those who dared read the pages. “This is dangerous ground we’re walking on,” he said softly.
“Tell me something I don’t know,” Sigfrid replied.
“Well, let’s not let ourselves get carried away. We’ll leave those whose names are in here alone, for the moment. Did you notice a pattern? Something we can get our hands on and do something about?”
Sigfrid nodded. “This information implicates the captain of the night watch. Several payments were made, once each week, to Captain Voldar Karlssen.”
“What are Karlssen’s duties?” Tristan demanded.
Sigfrid didn’t like the anger in the other man’s voice and replied carefully. “He checks in who or what goes in and out of the Great Corral area.”
“Including horses.”
“Right. He also supervises the patrol route between the hours of midnight and dawn.”
“Damn it!” Tristan brought his fist crashing down on the desk. “Giacomo was right.”
“It looks like it. The Vistani bring in a dozen horses. Karlssen notes it, sees to it that no one is around, either smuggles the horses out himself or at least gives someone the opportunity, then tampers with the book. On paper, the crime never even took place.”
“But someone would see the horses leaving,” said Tristan. “And where would they go?” His enthusiasm renewed, Tristan returned his attention to the books. “Maybe Cavell was involved with that end of it, too.”
Sigfrid rose from his chair and went around behind Tristan. Leaning over the older man’s shoulder, his quick brown eyes skimmed the entries. Triumphantly he pointed to the ledger and read aloud, “Payments Received: Twenty G., H. Turnd.—transp. Black Swan.”
Tristan looked up, his eyes glowing with anger. “Twenty gold pieces received from Hollin Turndach for transportation aboard the Black Swan,” he translated. “It makes perfect, diabolical sense. Who better than the dockmaster to see that things go where they should? Two Vistana-bred horses once a week; twenty would be a pittance next to what someone would pay for them.”
“But enough to content a bookmaker able to buy off the guards,” finished Sigfrid miserably. “Tris, where is all this going to take us?” He was suddenly frightened, as frightened of the criminals as, once, he had been frightened of the law.
Tristan did not answer. He already knew where one road led: the Black Swan was owned by Lord Bevis of Blacktower Heights—one of the five regents of Prince Othmar, and one of Tristan Hiregaard’s oldest friends.
“Here’s what we do,” said Tristan at last. “I want you to get a few men you trust and arrest Captain Karlssen this afternoon. Be as rough with him as you like. You and I have worked hard to build up the reputation of the city guards; if this man’s involved in criminal activity, I want to make sure he pays for it. Find out as much as you can. Once you’ve done that, confiscate the ship. We’ve got enough evidence here to impound the ship for a search, and I’m certain we’ll find illegally run horses. Report back at Faerhaaven tomorrow.” He sighed, and rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands.
“It’s as good as done, Tris. Are you sure you don’t want to come along?”
Tristan shook his head and rose. He felt very old. “No, I have some other business to take care of this afternoon. I’m going to talk to Bevis and find out how much—or how little—he knows.”
The view from the main parlor of Blacktower Heights was breathtaking. The rock that gave the castle its name was across the river from Bergovitsa. On a clear day like today, one could even catch a glimpse of the colorful vardos in the gypsy camp.
“These windows are new, aren’t they?” Tristan asked as he took in the view. He didn’t need to ask. All of this parlor was new within the last year or so. The sumptuous furniture, the large extravagant windows, the carpeting, the trinkets on the mantelpiece.
“Yes, they are,” replied Lord Bevis shortly. He eased his bulk into one of the well-cushioned chairs. “Now, why have you honored me with your presence today?”
Tristan turned to face his host. “I am unfortunately here on business. Bevis, we’re going to be confiscating one of your ships this afternoon. I have it on irrefutable authority that the vessel was running illegal cargo—stolen horses.”
The lord’s eyes flew wide. “No!” he said, in a voice that was just a shade too shocked to be convincing. Tristan fingered the coin in his pocket; it grew warm to the touch. But he already knew that Bevis was lying. “I assure you, Tristan, I had no idea. Which ship?”
“The Black Swan. Nothing implicates you directly.”
Bevis relaxed slightly. “How horrible! I hope you jail the blackguard of a captain!”
“We will. As I said, we’re confiscating the ship.” Tristan sat down in one of the too-comfortable chairs and fixed his friend with a sharp eye. “Bevis, you and I go back a long way together. I know what kind of pressure you’ve been under—damn, we’ve all been under—since Kethmaar’s death.” He hesitated, then continued. “I would think it was particularly difficult for you, as your gambling debts—”
Bevis’s bushy black brows drew together slightly, and his voice dropped to a warning growl. “My luck has changed,” he said.
“Ah, yes,” said Tristan, his own voice taking on a sarcastic tinge. “Seems the luck of many has changed since Sehkmaa came to the land. I understand that you contribute quite heavily.”
Bevis was truly agitated now, but hiding it as best he could. Tristan mourned inside. The man was ill suited for intrigue. “All contribute to Sehkmaa. And yes, you’re right. My luck has changed, and for the better. Glory be to Sehkmaa! Will that be all?” Bevis rose heavily.
Tristan rose as well. “There is the matter of a fine, my lord.” He added the title with a hint of sarcasm. “A hundred gold and the Black Swan confiscated.”
Bevis’s eyes narrowed. Color flushed his face. “You always were an arrogant son of a bitch, Tristan. You haven’t even seized my ship yet!”
“But I will.” Tristan’s voice was dangerously, deceptively so
ft, and his blue eyes were bright with controlled anger. “And I’ve told you what I expect to find. You’ve known me for a long time, Bevis. A long, long time. You know I don’t give up easily, and what’s more, you know that I wouldn’t make these accusations if I weren’t positive I could make them stick. Come, now, save us both a bit of trouble and unpleasantness. I don’t want to make another trip out here tomorrow.”
The two former comrades in arms stared at each other for a long, tense moment. Then, wordlessly, Bevis turned and left the room. He returned a few moments later carrying five small bags. He tossed them on the chair in which Tristan had been sitting. “Twenty. Forty. Sixty. Eighty. One hundred. Now, you’ll have to excuse me. The mayor is joining me for dinner tonight, and I must get everything ready.”
The news did not surprise Tristan. He already suspected that Osric Laars was involved in some nefarious activity, but Bevis’s comment cemented Tristan’s certainty. Tristan searched Bevis’s face for any trace of the man he had once called “friend.” In the past, had he shown up early, he would have been invited to dinner as well. The three old friends would have stayed up all night, drinking, talking, and sharing memories. Now, he was all but being ordered to leave.
There was nothing of the friend left now. Now, there was only the Lord of Blacktower Heights, a man whose fortunes had taken a sudden and drastic turn for the better since he had embraced the faith of the cat god.
“Good afternoon,” said Tristan. On his way out, he encountered Laars and his entourage. He did not stop to talk. He didn’t think words could have gotten past the lump of anger, loathing, and grief that had lodged in his throat.
When Sigfrid showed up at Faerhaaven the next morning, he had answers and information. Karlssen had named several guards at the Great Corral who had known about both the gambling ring and the horse thievery. “But apparently no one at that guard post was actively involved in the theft,” Sigfrid said wearily. “The thought unnerved our friend Karlssen. Looks like we cast our net for flounder and caught barracuda.”
“I’m not surprised. Go on.”
“Last night I assembled a group of soldiers and put them in place near the dockyard. We tracked the course of the horses, from theft to the Black Swan.”
Sigfrid paused and stared down at his hands for a long moment. “Tristan, last night was a black moment in the history of the Kantoran city guards. The guards took the horses through the city, and we followed. They cleared every check post with a few words, obviously in code, and each man received payment. As we thought, the thieves brought the animals to the dockyard. We clearly overheard traitorous talk between the captain of the vessel and Hollin Turndach. Then—we attacked.”
“Lose any men?”
Sigfrid shook his head, and for an instant wounded pride showed in his eyes. “My archers and my men in an ambush?” He almost smiled, then sobered as he went on. “We took the crew, the captain, Turndach, and the ship. A successful evening, but how I wish it hadn’t been necessary.”
Tristan empathized. Quietly and succinctly he told Sigfrid what had transpired at Blacktower Heights yesterday when he had visited Bevis. “I’m convinced that the stolen horses, the illegal betting, and the murders are linked. Unfortunately, it seems as though many powerful men are involved here, and we can’t undo any single link in the chain until we can undo it all. Keep up your hard work, Sigfrid, and be very careful. Work only with people you know you can trust. If that means that any particular project will take a little longer, so be it. I, meanwhile, will keep working on my own part of the puzzle here at Faerhaaven. And again, I ask that you not disturb me.”
Sigfrid clearly didn’t like this, but he agreed reluctantly. He rose. “I’d best be getting back to Kantora.” He smiled without humor. “My plate is rather full.”
I’d trade your plate for mine in a heartbeat, thought Tristan morosely. He escorted Sigfrid out, then went to his sorcery room. “Show me Ivaar Hiregaard,” he ordered the mirror. It obliged, and for a long moment Tristan regarded his son. Ivaar was deep in conversation with another Claw, and their heads were bent over an ornate drawing of the future temple. Tristan thought of Ailsa. As soon as possible, he resolved, he would do whatever he could to make peace with his son.
In the meantime, he had established that one cup of Terza’s tea would keep his thoughts shielded from Malken for a full eight hours. He would not have to drink another cup for a while yet, but he assembled the ingredients. It would not do to forget.
With an angry growl, Sigfrid threw his wineglass at the giant map that graced one wall of his main headquarters. It shattered, and the pieces flew. Immediately afterward he hastened to wipe the droplets of red from the map so that the wine wouldn’t stain it. Not for the first time, he cursed his quick temper. Tristan, he was sure, never threw things at walls.
It had been a long and nerve-fraying day. The afternoon and evening had been crowded with a host of petty problems that kept Sigfrid from the task he wanted to follow—helping Tristan figure out the twisting mass of connections between various crimes in Kantora. The map itself seemed to mock his efforts. Although to an observer the map appeared to show the policing forces in control, just the opposite was true. The many red marks on the map of Kantora indicated unsolved murders, not arrests. The green dots that represented the guard stations seemed pathetically few to Sigfrid, and the yellow circles that stood for the known gathering places of the Claws of Sehkmaa revealed no hidden pattern.
Somewhere in the twisting streets of Kantora, those streets that appeared on the map as clean, dispassionate lines drawn by a pen, a murderer lurked. “We should have caught you by now, you bastard,” muttered Sigfrid to himself. “You’ve got more lives than one of the Claws’ cats!”
That there was a connection with the Claws of Sehkmaa was clear, but not yet something he and Tristan could prove. And, as Tristan had pointed out, they dared not go against so powerful and popular a cult without proof. Even with proof, thought Sigfrid glumly, we might not be able to truly expose and defeat this false faith. Othmar practically worships Ivaar and is not likely to turn a willing ear to talk against him or the beloved cat god.
Sigfrid had had enough of uselessly musing on the map and reached for his cloak. Blowing out the lamps, he closed and locked the door behind him.
His route home took him past the buildings that composed the Paw of the Cat. Although both he and Tristan were suspicious of the Claws, there was little to condemn about the orphanage. Orphaned children, as Sigfrid knew all too well, usually found “parents” of a sort in a city the size of Kantora. With an orphanage in operation, it was less likely that the innocents would be snapped up quite as fast as before.
As he walked homeward, Sigfrid recalled his first meeting with the man who would become both mentor and friend, the man who had, in effect, rescued him from the rookeries.
Sigfrid had been fourteen then, an orphan of the streets. Despite his slender physique, he had risen in the ranks of his rookery because he had both an ability to control and conceal his emotions and, at the same time, a temper that knew no limits. Blessed with an earnest, freckled face, Sigfrid’s specialty was gulling wellborns. His favorite trick was to charm nobles into letting him curry their horses, and then steal the animals. Once on the creature’s back, Sigfrid stuck like a burr until they reached the safety of the border. This activity was called “borderbreaking,” and it paid well. There was a thriving black market in horseflesh.
One day Sigfrid had spotted Tristan, and had foolishly pegged him for an easy mark. Tristan had agreed to let Sigfrid curry Kal: “If I like what you do, there could be a permanent position in it for you.”
Sigfrid’s easy smile had suddenly frozen on his face. No one had ever offered him honest employment before. He loved horses, and he knew a job as a groom to this well-heeled man could pay well. Well enough to get him out of the rookeries and the nests of crime in alleyways and beneath streets. Well enough to give up the heart-stopping midnight races to the border
s. Well enough to become an officer in His Majesty’s Army.
When Tristan went into the pub, leaving Kal to Sigfrid, the borderbreaker did not steal the horse. He curried Kal well, despite the urging of a mate to steal the animal and flee. When at last Sig’s friend left, angry and confused, Tristan reappeared. He had overheard it all, and offered Sigfrid a job as a groom. “That’s just to start,” Tristan had said. “You’ve the build for a fast swordsman—if your interests lie in that direction.”
When he heard the soft child’s voice a few moments later, Sigfrid was still trapped in reverie.
“Hey-ya, wee baron, trapped a few vixens?”
Sigfrid froze. The words were a code—what was called the fledgling’s chatter. It was the language in which young thieves communicated with adults they didn’t know. If overheard by an ordinary person, the reaction would be something along the lines of “poor mad child.” But if the nonsensical words were heard by the right person, the adult criminal would respond in kind—as Sigfrid hesitantly did now.
The child had asked him if his night had been successful thus far. “Hey-ya, grand duke, the trap’s lying empty,” Sigfrid replied. The phrase meant, No, young thief, no luck so far.
The child ventured forward. It was a little girl, about ten years old. When she glimpsed Sigfrid’s uniform, she frowned. Fear and confusion played on her face. But she did not run, not yet. “Hey-ya, wee baron, someone be springing the traps?” She wanted to know if he was in some kind of trouble.
“Hey-ya, grand duke,” said Sigfrid, moving closer but not placing a hand near his weapon, “wolf be after the vixens. Where should they go to ground if they run?” He said he was being chased and needed refuge.
The girl looked relieved at his obvious familiarity with the secret language. “Hey-ya, not too far be lair for fox cubs. Dog fox, vixen, they be on their own for two more crowflies.” There was a place nearby for children, but adults had to travel farther.
The Enemy Within Page 19
