Lois Bujold - The Curse of Chalion

"Palli! Sit down—" Cazaril gestured to a stool.

Palli pulled it up across from him and lowered himself with a tired grunt. "Only for a moment, old friend. I could not leave without bidding you farewell. I, dy Yarrin, and our troops are commanded to be quit of Cardegoss before noon today, under pain of expulsion from the Daughter's holy order." His smile was tight as a stretched hawser.

" What? What has happened?" Cazaril laid down his quill, and pushed aside the book of Iselle's increasingly complex household accounts.

Palli ran a hand through his dark hair and shook his head as if in disbelief. "I'm not sure I can speak of it without bursting. It was all I could do last night not to pull out my sword and run the smirking son of a bitch through his soft guts on the spot. Caz, they threw out dy Yarrin's case! Confiscated all his evidence, dismissed all his witnesses—uncalled! unheard!—let that lying, thieving worm of a comptroller out of the cellar—"

"Who has?"

"Our holy general, Dondo dy Jironal, and his, his, his creatures on the Daughter's council, his cowed dogs—goddess blind me if I've ever before seen such a set of cringing curs—a disgrace to her pure colors!" Palli clenched his fist upon his knees, sputtering. "We all knew the order's house in Cardegoss has been in disarray for some time. I suppose we should have petitioned the roya to dismiss the old general when he first grew too ill to keep it all in hand, but no one had the heart to kick him so—we all thought a new, younger, vigorous man would turn it all out again and start fresh. But this, this, this is worse than neglect. It's active malfeasance! Caz, they cleared the comptroller and dismissed dy Yarrin—they scarcely glanced at his letters and ledgers, dear goddess the papers filled two trunks—I swear the decision was made before the meeting was called!"

Cazaril had not heard Palli stammer with rage like this since the day the news of the sale of Gotorget had been delivered to the starving, battered garrison by the roya's stout courier, passed through the Roknari lines. He sat back and pulled his beard.

"I suspect—no, I'm certain in my heart—Lord Dondo was paid off for his judgment. If he is not simply the comptroller's new master—and two trunks of evidence now being used to feed the fires on the Lady's altar—Caz, our new holy general is running the Daughter's Order as his personal milch cow. I was told by an acolyte yesterday—on the stairs, and the man shook as he whispered it to me—he's placed out six troops of the Daughter's men to the Heir of Ibra in South Ibra—as plain paid mercenaries. That's not their mandate, that's not the goddess's work—it's worse than stealing money, it's stealing blood!"

A rustle, and an indrawn breath, drew both men's glances to the inner doorway. Lady Betriz stood there with her hand upon the frame, and the Royesse Iselle peeked over her shoulder. Both ladies' eyes were round.

Palli opened and shut his mouth, swallowed, then jumped to his feet and bowed to them. "Royesse. Lady Betriz. Alas that I must take my leave of you. I return to Palliar this morning."

"We shall regret the loss of your company, March," said the royesse faintly.

Palli wheeled to Cazaril. "Caz—" He gave an apologetic little nod. "I'm sorry I disbelieved you about the Jironals. You weren't crazed after all. You were right on every point."

Cazaril blinked, nonplussed. "I thought you had believed me..."

"Old dy Yarrin was as canny as you. He suspected this trouble from the first. I'd asked him why he thought we needed to bring so large a troop to enter Cardegoss—he murmured, ‘No boy—it is to leave Cardegoss.' I didn't understand his joke. Till now." Palli vented a bitter laugh.

"Will you be—will you not be returning here?" asked Betriz in a rather breathy voice. Her hand went to her lips.

"I swear before the goddess—" Palli touched his hand to forehead, lip, navel, and groin, and then spread it flat over his heart in the fivefold sacred gesture, "I will not return to Cardegoss except it be to Dondo dy Jironal's funeral. Ladies—" He stood at attention and gave them a bow. "Caz—" He grasped Cazaril's hands across the table and bent to kiss them; hastily, Cazaril returned the honor. "Farewell." Palli turned and strode from the room.

The space he had vacated seemed to collapse around his absence, as if four men had just left. Betriz and Iselle were drawn into it; Betriz tiptoed to the outer door and peered around it, to spy the last of his clomping retreat down the corridor.

Cazaril picked up his quill and drew the feather end nervously through his fingers. "How much of that did you hear?" he asked the ladies.

Betriz glanced back at Iselle, and replied, "All of it, I think. His voice was not pitched low." She returned slowly across the antechamber, her face troubled.

Cazaril groped for some way to caution these unintended auditors. "It was the business of a closed council of a holy military order. Palli should not have spoken of it outside the Daughter's house."

Iselle said, "But isn't he a lord dedicat, a member of that council—doesn't he have as much right—duty!—to speak as any of them?"

"Yes, but... in the heat of his temper, he has made serious accusations against his own holy general that he has not the... power to prove."

Iselle gave him a sharp look. "Do you believe him?"

"My belief is not the issue."

"But—if it's true—it's a crime, and worse than a crime. An insulting impiety, and a violation of the trust not only of the roya and the goddess above, but of all who are sworn to obey in their names below."

She sees the consequences in both directions! Good! No, wait, no. "We haven't seen the evidence. Maybe the council was justified in discarding it. We cannot know."

"If we can't see the evidence as March dy Palliar has, can we judge the men and reason backward to it?"

"No," said Cazaril firmly. "Even a habitual liar may tell the truth from time to time, or an honest man be tempted to lie by some extraordinary need."

Betriz, startled, said, "Do you think your friend was lying?"

"As he is my friend, no, of course not, but... but he might be mistaken."

"This is all too murky," said Iselle decisively. "I shall pray to the goddess for guidance."

Cazaril, remembering the last time she'd done that, said hastily, "You need not reach that high for guidance, Royesse. You inadvertently overheard a confidence. You have a plain duty not to repeat it. In word or deed."

"But if it's true, it matters . It matters greatly, Lord Caz!"

"Nevertheless, liking and disliking do not constitute proof any more than hearsay does."

Iselle frowned thoughtfully. "It's true I do not like Lord Dondo. He smells odd, and his hands are always hot and sweaty."

Betriz added, with a grimace of distaste, "Yes, and he's always touching one with them. Ugh!"

The quill snapped in Cazaril's hand, spraying a small spatter of ink drops on his sleeve. He set the pieces aside. "Oh?" he said, in what he trusted was a neutral tone. "When was this?"

"Oh, everywhere, at the dances, at dinner, in the halls. I mean, many gentlemen here flirt, some quite agreeably, but Lord Dondo... presses . There are enough fine ladies here at court nearer his own age. I don't know why he doesn't go try to charm them."

Cazaril almost asked her if thirty-five seemed as ancient to her as forty, but bit it short, and said instead, "He desires influence over Royse Teidez, of course. And therefore desires whatever good grace he can obtain from Teidez's sister, directly or through her attendants."

Betriz's breath puffed out in relief. "Oh, do you think that's so? It made me quite ill to think he might really be in love with me. But if he's only flattering me for his advantage, that's all right."