"You drive a hard bargain," she retorted, and shook her head, a little of her old humor returning to her eyes. "All right, I promise."
"And so do I," he pledged softly, and basked in her smile.
The wind of a full-scale blizzard howled and whined outside the windows of his suite, and icy drafts forced their way past windows and thick curtains, but Baron Melles didn't care. Enveloped in one of the heavy woolen tunics that had become fashion out of necessity, with a second layer of knitted winter silk beneath that, he brooded pleasantly over the reports of his network of spies within the households of the members of the Court. Virtually every one of those pieces of paper reported a new attitude toward him on the part of anyone of any importance.
Fear. He was delighted at their reaction. They might hate him, they might envy him, they might (rarely) even admire him for his ruthlessness—but they all feared him now, and feared to have even the appearance of opposing him.
He shifted his weight in his chair, and repositioned his feet on the warming pan beneath his desk. His last object lesson was more effective than he had thought it would be, and had spread far beyond the immediate household and friends of his target. Clearly it was much wiser and more expedient to show that the children of his would-be enemies were vulnerable than it was to threaten the enemies themselves. And as for those who had no children, well, there wasn't a single one of them who didn't have some other person for whom they cherished tender feelings. Anyone who would threaten a child obviously would have no difficulty with targeting an aged and infirm parent, or a sibling, or a lover. Even Tremane had dependents he would have been very upset at losing—that old mage, Sejanes, for one.
It was ironic in many ways, for it would have been very easy for any of them to make him or herself invulnerable. There had not been another person besides himself here at Court who had read and understood the lesson old Charliss had given to them in the course of his own life: Trust no one, care for no one, depend on no one. They had all persisted, even in the face of obvious disadvantages, to fall in love, make friendships rather than alliances, and allow themselves the cracks in their armor that relationships made.
Tremane never knew that he made me what I am today, even as he made me his enemy when we were cadets. He betrayed me to the Colonel, and ruined my career in the Army. And for what? Because I was doing what everyone else wanted to do, but didn't have the intelligence or the audacity to try. I trusted him because he said he was my friend, and he betrayed me. Without that, if I had remained in the cadet corps as he did, I would not have seen Charliss' example for what it was.
He had stopped being a sheep that day and had become one of the wolves—as any of them could have. Well, that was all their own fault, and their stupidity, and that was why he was the Emperor's Heir and not one of them.
Not even the memory of that long-ago humiliation of being cast out of the corps could spoil this triumph. He had finally achieved the goal he had set for himself that day—to make anyone of any importance look at him and fear. It was in this mood of unusual good humor that General Thayer found him, and destroyed his mood with a single sentence.
His valet Bors showed the General in; Thayer wore a regulation Army cloak over his uniform tunic, and fingerless gloves to keep his hands warm. Melles greeted him with pleasure, although he did not rise.
But Thayer had not come to make a social call. "Melles, we're in trouble," he rumbled. And as usual, the General came straight to the point without even waiting to take the chair that Melles offered him.
Where had that come from? "How can we be in trouble?" Melles asked, with more than a bit of surprise. "We've got order in the smaller cities, and the larger ones are coming around. Food is getting in, and you're even making a small profit. Rioting has stopped in most places, and the subversives are beginning to be regarded as lunatics. We might have lost the lands Charliss brought under the Imperial banner and some of the provinces, but—"
"But the Army doesn't want you in charge," Thayer replied, bluntly. "That last little trick you played was one too many. The word from the field is that they don't intend to establish order just to put a baby killer on the Iron Throne. Word of your power play has been traveling farther and faster than either of us thought it would. I don't know how, but in spite of everything, virtually everyone I've contacted already knows all about it, and knows that you were the one who put the body in the crib." He scowled. "That was a stupid ploy, Melles. Your average soldier may be a hard man, but the one thing he won't put up with is threatening a baby."
Melles frowned. "But there was nothing to link me with that incident," he objected.
Thayer snorted with utter contempt, as the wind rattled the windowpanes and a draft made the candle flames flicker. "Please. Not everyone is an inbred idiot, especially not in the Army. You're an assassin, however much you pretend not to be; everyone knows it, and everyone knows you're the only one who not only could have done what you did, but who is cold-blooded enough to follow up on the threat if you had to. And I repeat to you; the Army won't support a baby killer, and there's an end to it."
A cold anger burned in the back of Melles' throat, as cold as the howling winds outside. "That's fine sentiment from people who kill for a living," he said with equal contempt. "I'm sure they ask the age of every peasant with a boar-spear who opposes them in the field, and make certain to leave insurgent villages untouched in case they might kill a few children."
Thayer's face flushed with anger, but somehow he kept his temper even in the face of Melles' provocative words. "I could point out that the Army operates under certain laws, and that when a soldier kills someone, he does it openly, under conditions where his opponent has an equal chance of killing him. But that would be specious and we both know it—and it's not the point."
"Oh?" Melles asked sardonically. "And just what is the point?"
"The point is that the average soldier believes all those things," Thayer said, pounding the desk for emphasis. "Whether or not they are true. Truth has no bearing on this, and you damned well know it. The average soldier thinks he is going to defend the honor of the Empire against adult enemies, and that makes him feel superior to any assassin, and vastly superior to someone who not only threatens the safety of a child, but threatens a child of his own people."
"Never mind that this same noble soldier would skewer the children of a rebellious village without a second thought or a moment of hesitation," Melles grumbled, although he saw the logic in Thayer's argument. Thayer was right. The truth didn't matter here, and he, who was a practiced hand in manipulating perception, should have known that. "Very well. What's to be done?"
Thayer sighed, and finally sank into the chair Melles had offered. "I don't know," he admitted. "It's not only the Commanders that are talking rebellion, it's the Generals, and the rank and file, and they aren't amenable to the kinds of coercion you can use on the nobles of the Court. Unless we can do something about this, we're going to loose them, and the moment Charliss becomes a Little God, they're going to put someone of their choice on the Iron Throne and you and me in the ground."
Melles ground his teeth in frustration, for Thayer was right. Although, unlike Tremane, he had never gotten out of the cadets to serve in the military forces of the Empire, he knew the structure and makeup. The Generals were mostly men who had made a career of the military, as had their fathers before them. Their wives were the daughters of similar men, their families all related to other military families. They employed former military men as guards and servants, employed the wives of such men as maids and housekeepers. Their positions were embedded in multiple layers of protection, and they could not be dismissed or demoted out of hand. The High Commanders could be eliminated, for they were mostly nobles like Grand Duke Tremane, but there was no getting rid of the Generals. They were like a wolf pack; you couldn't separate a victim, for none of them stood alone, and if you made a move against one, the whole pack would consolidate long enough to tear your throat out before goin
g back to their own internal jockeying for power.
"You can't touch them, Melles," Thayer warned in an echo of his own thoughts. "If you try, they'll destroy you. They won't put up with that kind of threat, and they'll close ranks against you. Press it too far, and they'll call a coup against you. Not even your personal guard can protect you against an entire Company coming to kill you."
"It's gone right down to the rank and file, you say?" he asked, his thoughts swirling as wildly as the snow outside.
Thayer nodded, and Melles cursed them all in his mind. He couldn't even order every General within reach of the capital to come to a meeting, seal the room, and kill them all at once. If he tried, the entire Army itself would rise up in revolt. It was only when the Generals were corrupt and hated by their men that you could get away with a tactic like that.
"We're only in trouble, we aren't defeated yet," he said at last, as a few ideas began to form out of the chaos. "They might have good communications, but I have better ones. I have a few more throws of the dice coming, and I can pick the dice." He began to smile as he saw how he could completely subvert the entire problem.
Thayer regarded him curiously, and with a certain grudging admiration. "Have you got something up your sleeve that you haven't told me about?"
He nodded. "I'm not even going to try to deny their rumor, instead I'm going to give them something else entirely to think about. I always have more up my sleeve that I haven't told anyone about," he replied smugly. "And you should never underestimate the power of the clerical pen."
"What you can't find, you can manufacture, hmm?" Thayer hazarded. "Just what, exactly, do you have in mind? Are you going to give them a different enemy to concentrate on?"
Melles just laughed. "I won't have to manufacture anything. With enough records to search, I can find just about anything I need, and you know yourself that this Empire creates enough paperwork to fill entire warehouses. Give me a few days and I can find all the right evidence to convince the Army that I'm the one they should be supporting, show them that having a so-called 'baby killer' on the throne is the least of the things they should be worrying about, and in the meantime, I can woo them."
"Woo them? Like reluctant girls?" Thayer made a rude and suggestive noise, but Melles wasn't offended, now that he had the bit in his teeth.
"Wait and see," he responded, plans already growing in the back of his mind that would probably astonish the older man. "Just wait and see."
Thayer was not convinced, but was certain enough of Melles' competence to be willing to buy him some time to work on the schemes that he promised. Thayer stood up, saying so in as many words.
"Just remember that I can't give you too much more time," he warned. "And it's going to take a great deal to overcome the way they feel about the baby incident. I'm still not certain you're taking that seriously enough."
"Just remember what I told you about the common man and what he needs and wants," Melles replied. "Then remember that the Army is composed of those same common men—just with a little more training and a bit of discipline."
"Hmm." Thayer looked thoughtful at that, and took his leave. As soon as he was gone, Melles called in all five of his private secretaries.
They were all men, like his valet, of varied talents and some interesting training. All five of them were so nondescript that no one would ever notice them in a crowd. And all of them were adept at getting into even the most carefully guarded records, simply by knowing how to impersonate virtually any type of clerk in the Empire and how to forge anything but the Imperial Seal. When a clerk arrived with appropriate documentation and a request to see something, or even to carry it away, it took a hardier and more independent soul than existed in the Imperial Civil Service to challenge him.
"You—" he said, pointing to the first in line. "I want you to go over the military pay records, find out all the units with pay in arrears, and who is in charge of their pay." He pointed to the next two. "You and you—go through the records of the units sent to take Hardorn. I want you to match up the requests for supplies and reinforcements with the orders issued to fill those requests. I also want the record of every request that was denied, and on whose authority." He pointed to the last two. "You two get access to Emperor Charliss' private papers, or at least the ones that are in the Archives. I want all the correspondence between Tremane and Charliss from the time he left for Hardorn to his last known message. Go!"
The five clerks departed, scattering like quail before the hunter. He didn't need to give them any further orders about how to get access to those papers; one of the reason that these men were no longer in the civil service was that they had initiative. Neither initiative nor creativity were rewarded in the Imperial Civil Service, and those with both often grew frustrated and looked for employment elsewhere.
Melles next called in his private treasurer.
"You get down to the Imperial Exchequer. I want to know how much out of the military budget can be spared in hard coin and how much in goods. Tell the Exchequer that I suspect the Army's pay has been bollixed up, and we may have to make good in a hurry if we don't want trouble on our hands." He thought for a moment, and dredged up the relevant fact from his memory. "If he balks at telling you, just say something about the road budget; it doesn't matter what, just work it quickly into the conversation."
The man nodded, grinning; every Imperial Exchequer skimmed a certain amount off the top, it was expected, so long as they were clever enough not to get caught at it. But if they were caught, the penalties were severe. Melles knew precisely where the current Exchequer was skimming and even had a rough idea of how much; he had made it his business to know, planning to use the information at the right moment. There could be no better moment than now. A good card was no better than a bad one if you never played it.
The treasurer left, and Melles called in his final choice in this campaign of seduction, one of his odder employees. This rather elegant specimen was ostensibly Melles' personal poet and playwright, but although the man was mediocre creatively, he was an absolute genius at propaganda. Melles didn't use him often, but he was, like the valet, the appropriate scalpel for certain types of surgery. Melles was doubly fortunate in that the man enjoyed the writing of manipulative propaganda almost as much as poetry. He had told his patron once that when he wrote the former, he considered that he was writing a different kind of drama, one in which the words manipulated the actors, instead of the other way around. He enjoyed seeing how his works played out on the larger stage of the real world.
And as a peculiar kind of reward, Melles regularly financed the production of poetry readings in opulent surroundings, seeing to it that the right critics were flattered, fed, and given enough strong and exotic drink to make even the worst drivel seem inspired.
"I hope you aren't in the throes of creation," Melles said cautiously, for this was one individual who could not be coerced, only persuaded. But his loyalty to Melles was based on firm self-interest and was utterly trustworthy. When bought, he stayed bought—and no one aside from Melles himself knew that he was anything other than a peculiar affectation. It was expected that someone of Melles' status patronize the arts in some way, and a poet was the cheapest and least intrusive sort of artist to have on one's staff. "I have a rather extensive job for you," he continued. "I hope you aren't preoccupied."
The man smiled urbanely and crossed his legs with conscious elegance. He was something of a dandy and rather fancied himself as a popular man with the ladies. His salary from Melles enabled him to cut quite a figure of sartorial splendor among not only his peers but also his superiors. "What do you need my skills for? As a repairer of reputation? I've been planning what to do for you since the moment the rumors began to fly." He shook his head, and then waggled his finger in mock-admonition. "My dear patron, you have been very injudicious. This could ruin you yet, if it isn't carefully handled."
Melles did not make the retort he felt hovering on his tongue. The man was worth his weig
ht in gold, and was arrogant enough to be quite aware of it. Instead, he got right to the point. "It isn't the Court I'm worried about; they're ineffectual enough, and like sheep, they'll follow anyone with the right bell around his neck. No, it's the Army that's giving me trouble." He leaned forward over his desk, to emphasize how serious he felt the situation was. "They've decided they don't care for the idea of someone with my ethics on the Iron Throne."
The poet pursed his lips. "That could be troublesome. I don't know quite how to handle the Army—unless you already know what you want to say?"
"I do. Believe it or not, I want you to report the exact truth." Melles smiled thinly at the poet's surprise. "We're going to concentrate on the plight of my old rival, Tremane," he continued lightly. "I want you to spread the story of how he and his command were abandoned out beyond the farthest reach of the Empire. Be creative; go on about the horror of being sent off to die in utterly unknown lands. Find the right words to convince people that I had nothing to do with the abandonment of Tremane and his men in Hardorn. Then convince them that I had no idea that I would be Charliss' next choice for his successor. Say that I feel that the times are so radically changed that I have changed with them. Say I personally am so busy trying to keep the Empire together that I have no interest in pursuing my old vendetta against Tremane himself."
That last could get him in a certain amount of difficulty with the Emperor if Charliss got wind of it, but he was willing to take that particular chance.
The poet pursed his lips in thought. "It's a novel approach," he admitted. "And it just might distract soldiers from the stories of dead bodies in baby cribs. After all, you didn't actually kill the baby, you only dumped the body of an assassin there. Whereas Tremane and his men were abandoned in Hardorn; that's without a doubt and with no particular reason to leave them out there."
"That's exactly what I'm looking for," Melles encouraged. "And soldiers have more in common with other soldiers than with brats in cribs. They will have empathy for Tremane's forces. Why weren't they called back while it was still possible to construct Portals that worked between the Storms? Don't place any blame yet, but raise as many questions in peoples' minds as you can, particularly in the Army."
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