by Peter McLean
The hangman pulled his lever, and Archmagus Reiter dropped to his death.
He, at least, would be spared what was to come.
*
Vogel summoned us all to the house of law immediately after the hanging, which was hardly surprising under the circumstances. I shared a carriage there with Ailsa, who was looking decidedly worried.
‘He’s going to be in an absolute fury,’ she said. ‘He doesn’t want war with Skania any more than anyone else does. Gods, Tomas, what are we going to do?’
‘Can’t we make it look like it didn’t happen, like the fire at the funeral?’
She shook her head sadly.
‘No, I’m afraid not,’ she said. ‘You heard the crowd’s reaction. We might not want war but the idiot people apparently very much do. It will be all over the city by now, and there will be tens of thousands of people under the balcony tomorrow, baying for blood in the name of national pride and the murder of their late queen. All they want is revenge, Tomas, and that ghastly child has just promised it to them.’
To my intense surprise, Vogel was not in a rage. I suppose he had realised there was simply no point. Instead he was planning already.
‘Damage limitation,’ he said, once we had assembled in his office. ‘Iagin, you need to start work on her speech immediately. Make sure no timescales are given. We need space to calm this down before we end up with a total catastrophe on our hands. We can even benefit from it, if we do this properly.’
‘I don’t see how,’ I said, before I could think better of it.
‘Simple manipulation,’ Vogel said. ‘If you want to unite your core supporters, you give them someone to be better than, someone to look down upon. But if you want to unite an entire nation, you give them someone to hate. Make sure that is the Skanians, Iagin.’
‘Aye, boss,’ Iagin said.
‘Ailsa, go to the palace and start preparations for tomorrow’s balcony appearance. Sabine, Tomas, Konrad, get out among the populace and gauge the mood. I fear I know what you will find, but if there is any opposition to this then I want it encouraged.’
We got to work.
Chapter 50
I had found no opposition at all in the jubilant taverns and inns I had visited the night before, and nor had I expected to. As Ailsa said, the people were in a nationalistic frenzy and their blood was up. So quickly had the horrors of the last war been put aside in the minds of those who had not fought.
The Princess Crown Royal was due to give her public address that afternoon, to tell her people to prepare to put the country on a war footing. The speech Iagin had written for her very carefully said no more than that, and that was good even if nothing else was.
‘She will be alone this time,’ Vogel said, addressing us all in the mess at the house of law. ‘Everything has been prepared, and her maids are dressing her hair as we speak.’
All except Ilse, anyway. She hadn’t joined us, but then she seldom did.
Iagin frowned.
‘Alone? Is that wise, sir?’
Vogel made a dismissive gesture. ‘Her thirteenth nameday draws ever closer, and with it the time for her official coronation. She needs to be seen as a monarch in her own right. No longer can she hide in the shadow of her regent, in public at least. She has memorised the speech, of course?’
‘Aye,’ Iagin said, ‘it’s been drilled into her until she could recite it in her sleep. All the same, I think—’
‘Enough,’ Vogel cut him off. ‘She will be our queen soon enough, Iagin, the monarch to whom we are all sworn. The people need to see that, and get used to the idea. A simple prepared statement is not beyond her.’
‘If she can stay awake long enough,’ Ailsa murmured.
‘Mmmm,’ Vogel said. ‘Find her personal physician, Ailsa. This Doctor . . . Almanov, or whatever his name is. Have him take a look at her before she makes her appearance on the balcony. See if she needs her medicine adjusting beforehand.’
Ailsa nodded in assent. What more could any of us do than that?
See if she needs more drugs, or different drugs, or drugs to lessen the effects of the last lot of drugs we gave her, that was what he was saying. I remembered my investiture, and the court reception that had followed. I remembered the queen’s funeral, and what Billy had told me, and I thought of just how unstable the Princess Crown Royal truly was. The cocktail of drugs that kept her at least partially controllable seemed to be something her physicians made up on a daily basis, with success or failure a matter of luck as much as judgement.
She shines.
I pushed that thought away. I dreaded to think, truly I did, what would happen when she took the throne in her own right. If she dismissed her doctors, dismissed Vogel even, who could gainsay her? Who could say ‘no’ to a queen, in a city like Dannsburg?
No one.
I was only trying to make them pretty. Burn, you witch!
It didn’t bear thinking about.
‘Of course, my lord,’ Ailsa said, and gave Vogel a respectful nod. ‘Come with me, Tomas?’
She wanted to talk, I could see that.
‘Aye, if you like,’ I said.
I followed her out of the mess and down the corridor. She walked quickly, and I said nothing until we were halfway down a flight of stairs.
‘Do you think—’ I started, but she cut me off with a sharp look.
‘We’ll take my carriage,’ she said. ‘I dislike riding, as you know.’
‘Aye,’ I said, and only then did I notice the junior clerk standing close to his open office door.
One of Vogel’s, perhaps, or maybe Iagin’s. In Dannsburg the Queen’s Men watched everyone. In the house of law the Queen’s Men themselves were watched closer than anyone, and mostly by each other. I should know that well enough by now, I told myself. This was still Ailsa’s element more than it was mine, even now. This world of intrigue and constant suspicions was a far cry from what I had known.
I was a soldier; I was used to sides and uniforms and knowing at a glance who was your friend and who wasn’t. I was used to the harsh reality of the front line, where those behind you were your support and those before you your enemies, and it was as simple as that. In the house of law, that line could become very blurred indeed.
We headed down more stairs and out into the stable yard behind the great building, where Ailsa’s carriage was waiting. Beast was waiting with our horses, and I had him join Ailsa’s footmen in clinging to the backboard of the carriage. I didn’t know why, exactly, but perhaps some whisper of Our Lady’s told me I wanted him with me.
I held my peace until we were inside and she had given orders to her coachman to take us to the side entrance to the palace.
‘What is it?’ I asked at last, when I was sure the noise of the horses’ hooves on the cobbles and the creaking of the carriage’s springs would cover the sound of my words.
‘When did you last see Doctor Almanov?’ Ailsa asked quietly.
I thought for a moment, and shrugged. I didn’t often mix with the private physicians of members of the royal family, after all. I remembered seeing him at the Jolly Joker a few weeks ago, but that was all.
‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘I’m not exactly close to him.’
‘Well, I am, or at least in frequent contact with him if nothing else, for obvious reasons. And I can’t remember when I last saw him either. With everything that’s happened these last few weeks . . . well.’
‘Aye, we’ve been busy,’ I said, which was something of an understatement. ‘What does it matter?’
‘It probably doesn’t,’ she said. ‘I’m sure I’m worrying about nothing. Do you know what the time is?’
‘No,’ I said. ‘Some time past noon.’
My stomach said it was an hour or more past noon and I should eat something, but as was so often the way it seemed there wasn’t time for that.
Ailsa murmured something non-committal, and craned her neck to look out of the window as we passed a clock tower.
>
‘Gods be good, it’s past the second hour of the afternoon,’ she said. ‘She’s due on the balcony in less than an hour.’
It was no wonder I was hungry, then.
‘What of it?’ I asked.
‘We must pray Almanov is at work in the palace where he should be,’ she said. ‘If the princess needs an adjustment to her medication before she appears in public she will need it soon.’
‘Why wouldn’t he be?’
‘I don’t know,’ Ailsa snapped, and then let out a sigh. ‘As I say, I’m sure I’m worrying about nothing.’
She was worried, I could tell. Worried about the Princess Crown Royal making her first solo address to the public, no doubt, not where this fool of a doctor may or may not be. After the business with the house of magicians it was only natural to worry. About everything. Dannsburg was still unstable, the barrel of powder my sasura had spoken of, and I was sure the least thing could set the hostilities off again if we weren’t very fucking careful about it.
We were admitted at the side gate after only a cursory stop, and the carriage rattled up the long drive to the stables by the palace’s west wing. Minutes later we were in the administrative heart of the palace itself, and Ailsa led me and Beast through the maze of corridors at a pace that said she could have run through them blindfolded. I suspected that perhaps she could, at that. This was her domain, this world of politics and councils and aristocratic power. I might be a member of the governing council but that was a sham of convenience and we all knew it. After two flights of stairs and more turns and doors than I could count, she stopped and rapped on a door that looked the same as the last thirty or so we had passed.
‘Doctor Almanov?’ she called out. ‘Doctor, are you in there? It’s Ailsa.’
As ever with the Queen’s Men, no family name was needed, no title. She was Ailsa, and in the royal palace of Dannsburg that was enough. There was no answer. She tried the handle and hissed in annoyance to find it locked.
‘My picks are in my pouch, and I left the blasted thing in the carriage,’ she muttered.
‘Beast,’ I said.
He kicked the door in without difficulty or hesitation, his massive boot smashing lock and frame alike as he almost took the thing off its hinges. Ailsa was a subtle woman, and sometimes the subtlety of lockpicks is called for. Sometimes, though, sometimes things just need kicking down. Every soldier knows that.
Beast surged through the shattered door like some monster from a children’s tale, and I followed with Remorse in my hand. The room was empty. There was a desk and chair, and rows and rows of shelves lined with bottles and jars and beakers. There were phials in wooden racks, and a long, fire-scarred wooden bench covered in things that looked to my untrained eyes suspiciously like the tools of the alchemist’s trade. There was no bed in there, though, and no sign of clothes or personal effects.
‘Doesn’t he live here?’ I asked.
Ailsa shook her head in annoyance.
‘No, this is just where he works. Where he’s supposed to be, at this time of day.’
She ran a fingertip grimly over the wooden surface of the desk, and held it up to show me. Her rich brown skin was grey with dust.
‘Fuck, he hasn’t been here in days,’ I said. ‘Maybe longer.’
‘A week at least, I would say,’ she said. ‘The doctor is a very tidy man. Gods, Tomas.’
‘Where does he live?’ I asked her.
She gave me an address, and I cursed.
‘That’s halfway across the fucking city,’ I said. ‘I’ll go ahorse, your carriage is too slow. Beast, with me.’
We hurriedly retraced our steps to the stable yard, where I commandeered two fast horses and the grooms to saddle them. We were on our way ten minutes later.
I had a feeling this wouldn’t wait.
*
The doctor’s house was locked too, and for all that his front door was sturdier than that of his office, it still didn’t stop Beast for long. Some of the neighbours were no doubt already sending their sons and daughters running to bring the City Guard, but I didn’t care. I had the Queen’s Warrant and I could kick in any door in Dannsburg I fucking well liked.
It stank in that house.
If the doctor was truly a tidy man, as Ailsa had said, then something had gone horribly wrong. The hall of the modest townhouse was dusty, just as his office had been, and I could hear the buzzing of flies from upstairs.
‘Check the ground floor,’ I told Beast.
I drew Remorse anyway and headed cautiously up the stairs. The smell got worse as I climbed, and by the time I reached the landing the flies were thick in the air. The reek was coming from the door at the end of the corridor. I took a breath and pushed it open, but by then I was fairly sure I knew what I was going to find.
I was right.
Doctor Almanov was sprawled on his bed in his nightshirt, caked in black blood and flies. He was very, very dead, and by my reckoning had been for at least a week. He had been stabbed repeatedly, by the looks of things, and he had voided himself onto his mattress in the moment of his death. The combination of old shit and rotting flesh made me gag, and I turned away before I vomited. It seemed the good doctor’s gambling debts had finally caught up with him.
Beast was halfway up the stairs, his face completely impassive. The smell didn’t seem to be bothering him, but after what he had been through in the slave pits before I found him I supposed that it probably wouldn’t.
‘Back door was unlocked,’ he said. ‘One of the windows onto the yard is smashed. I reckon someone broke in, boss.’
I nodded.
‘Aye,’ I said. ‘Broke in and murdered the doctor. About a week ago, give or take.’
Beast grunted, but he didn’t look like he much cared one way or the other. I dare say he didn’t, at that, but right then I had other things on my mind. I could feel the blood drain from my face as I thought about it.
Doctor Almanov, the Princess Crown Royal’s personal physician, had been dead for more than a week. So who had been administering the princess’ medication in that time? Who had been making sure she stayed drugged for the last week?
The answer, of course, was no one.
No one at all.
I’m glad they’re drugging her. Don’t let them stop. Please, Papa, don’t ever let them stop.
Oh gods.
She was due on the balcony any minute – she could already be up there by now, for all I knew.
‘With me,’ I said, and I shouldered past him and ran down the stairs. ‘Now!’
I ran out of the front door and straight into six of the City Guard with weapons levelled.
‘You’re under arrest,’ their sergeant said.
I simply did not have time to fuck around.
‘Queen’s Man,’ I snarled at him, and Beast came out of the door behind me and punched him in the face at a full run, knocking him to the ground to land the message. I hastily untied my horse from the street’s public hitching rail and climbed into the saddle, and only then did I think to show the warrant to the rest of the charging guardsmen. The sight of it stopped them in their tracks as though they had been poleaxed. ‘Secure that house, on the order of the crown.’
I turned my horse and dug my heels in as Beast rode up beside me. I turned to look at him.
‘Did you ever ride in a charge, Beast?’ I asked him.
He frowned at me.
‘Aye, once, at Abingon,’ he admitted. ‘Nearly shat myself with the fear, but I did it.’
‘Good,’ I said. ‘Do it again.’
I kicked my horse into a ruthless gallop, and after a moment I heard Beast pounding along behind me.
There wasn’t a moment to spare and I knew it.
Chapter 51
We hurtled down the wide mall that led to the palace at the pace of a full cavalry charge. On any normal day someone would probably have been killed, but with half the city packed into the parade ground before the palace the streets were merciful
ly empty.
By the time we were a hundred yards from the gates I could tell we were too late. She was on the balcony already, a tiny child doll in a magnificent dress of martial crimson and patriotic white. It seemed the time for public mourning was finally over.
Now it was a time for war.
War, and the nation’s end.
The parade ground in front of the palace was full to overflowing, and I could see there would be no getting in through that crowd.
‘This way!’ I shouted, and wrenched my horse around and into the road that led past the barracks of the Palace Guard and up to the side entrance to the palace. The poor beast was nearly spent, bloody at the bit and lather on her flanks, but desperate times call for desperate measures. I may be no cavalry officer but I can ride well enough when I have to. Beast was no more than an average horseman at best, though, and his poor mount was carrying a lot more weight than mine was. He was falling further and further behind with every stride, but I couldn’t worry about that now. He would catch up with me or he wouldn’t, and if he didn’t then I would just have to do without him and those were the simple facts of it.
I reached the gatehouse with the Queen’s Warrant already open in my hand, and barely slowed to a canter as I bore down on the shocked guardsmen who hurled the gates wide open before me in obvious confusion.
‘The man behind me is with me,’ I shouted as I passed them, but I didn’t know if they caught my words and I didn’t have time to care one way or the other.
I reached the stable yard at last and threw my reins to a groom before hastily dismounting. My poor horse was completely blown. I felt bad for what I had put her through, but she was a palace horse and we all served the crown, in our own way.
‘Look after her,’ I said, and hurried into the palace through the stable gate.
A startled footman snapped to attention when he saw me.
‘Ailsa,’ I said, still breathless from the effort of my insane, headlong charge. ‘Now.’
He took my meaning and led me hurriedly through the palace, up stairs and down corridors and through passages until I found myself being shown into somewhere I had never been before, a formal drawing room with tall windows that led out onto the royal balcony at the front of the palace. Ailsa was there, with Vogel and Iagin. She turned to look at me with a worried expression on her face.
