David Drake - Tyrant

Which was precisely nothing. Jeschonyk had been quite truthful with Demansk. A satyr he might be, but his tastes were simple and straightforward. Granted, his pig-farming ancestors would have looked askance at the oral practices which the modern aristocracy had imported from the decadent Emeralds. But not even they could have complained about the rest of it. No outlandish perversions here — just a surprisingly vigorous old man greeting his concubines gaily and practically pouncing upon them.

They even seemed glad to see him, and to be enjoying what followed. And, who knows? They might have been.

* * *

Jeschonyk found himself wondering, an hour or so later, as he lay in their midst exhausted and sweaty. For a moment, he was even tempted to ask. But. .

Whatever else he was, Jeschonyk was not a fool. There was no point in asking such a question. No slave concubine in her right mind, after all, was going to tell her master anything other than what she thought he wanted to hear. Especially not concubines who lived in such luxurious quarters and enjoyed such an easy life, the worst of which was simply satisfying the none-too-complicated lusts of their owner. A frequent chore, to be sure — but they had half a dozen of them to spread around the work.

Still, it made him a bit sad. He was quite fond of them , and not simply because of the pleasure they gave him. One of them, in particular — the oldest girl, Kata, the one who'd been with him longest.

Strange, really. She was the only Southron in his harem. Jeschonyk was generally not partial to Southron girls. The problem wasn't their appearance. Female Southrons did not sport the grotesque tattoos of the males, for one thing. And, cleaned up and shorn of those absurd hairstyles, he actually found their pale skins and light hair arousing. It was simply that the practice of female circumcision which was prevalent among the barbarians made their women, in Jeschonyk's quite extensive experience, rather unresponsive. But Kata was from the Reedbottom tribe, who — so she claimed, at least, and the evidence seemed to substantiate it — were one of the few tribes which had never adopted that particularly savage custom.

Kata was the smartest of them, that much Jeschonyk had long been sure of. And she was also the one who was most alert to his own moods. So he was not surprised to see the little frown gathering on her face, as she looked down upon him from her cross-legged position at the foot of the bed. The sight almost dispelled Jeschonyk's melancholy. Not the frown, but the posture. The view was. . distracting. Or would have been, if Jeschonyk wasn't so completely and thoroughly satiated.

"Why are you unhappy, master? I thought we—"

"Not that, girl!" He barked a weary laugh. "You were all your usual marvelous selves, I assure you. It's — something else."

He took a slow breath and decided to get it over with. He levered himself upright — two of the girls immediately assisting him in the process — and gave Kata as solemn a look as her pose permitted.

"Things may change soon, Kata — girls. I may. . not be here much longer." He shook his head. "No, no, I'm not going anywhere. I simply may no longer be alive. "

Kata's face seemed to grow even paler than usual. One of the other girls — Ursula, that was, the Emerald — emitted a little gasp.

By the gods, I think they are fond of me! A moment later, less happily: Or, of course, it could just be that they'd miss their comforts and luxuries.

Something in their expressions reassured him. He'd never really know, of course, but. .

A time for decision, just as Verice says. And there's nothing that prevents me from telling the truth, except the old habits of an old liar.

"I care for you, girls. Very much. So I've made arrangements in case something happens to me. Men will come here — soldiers, probably — from Lady Knecht. Do what they say, go with them."

Several of the younger girls began babbling assurances that nothing untoward could possibly happen—! But not Kata. Perhaps because she was older, or smarter — or simply, like any Southron girl by the age of ten, had seen plenty of relatives hacked down in the tribes' perennial feuding.

"Can we trust them, master?"

"Yes. As long as they are from Lady Knecht. No one else, you hear?"

She bowed her head in obedience. As he had so many times before, Jeschonyk found himself admiring the clean lines of her neck and shoulders, the long blond hair spilling over her breasts, the—

"I'll be damned," he said, startled. "Once more — at my age? Come here, Kata."

* * *

He whispered just one thing that night, the rest of the noises he made being much louder. Into Kata's ear, this, so that none of the others could hear: "You have always been my favorite."

"I know," was her reply, whispered back. And there was something in those two words which let Ion Jeschonyk finally realize that, at least in her case, he no longer had to wonder.

* * *

The next morning, at daybreak, half the Council was pounding on his door. He spent the rest of the day — and the next, and the next, and the next — in a whirlpool of deceit and deception and double-dealing. Which had its own quirky pleasure, admittedly. Even at his age — perhaps because of his age — Jeschonyk could lie and deceive and double-deal better than anyone.

All the more so because he knew one secret that none of the other Councillors knew. Of that, he was quite sure. He had not even told Demansk that he knew.

Everyone else thought that Demansk's daughter, Helga, was still in seclusion at their distant estate in the far western province on the coast. Being a female, of course — especially a disgraced one — she was not really of much concern to the great men of Vanbert. But Jeschonyk was no fool. So he, alone, had paid spies to keep an eye on her. And he, alone, knew that she had long since departed for the south, leaving a girl who resembled her a great deal (at least at a distance) to serve as her double.

Where she had gone, exactly, Jeschonyk was not sure. Marange, according to what his spies had been able to learn. Nor did Jeschonyk have any real idea what she was doing down there.

But he could guess. He was one of the few Councillors of Vanbert who had actually seen the bastard. And if that blue-eyed babe with his fuzz of golden hair had been sired by a fat old islander pirate, Jeschonyk would eat his own tunic.

* * *

"So what do you think, damnation? Speak up, Ion!"

The half shout from one of the Councillors in the chamber broke Jeschonyk's little reverie. He looked up and saw that the shouter was one of Tomsien's allies.

Slowly, with great dignity, Triumvir Ion Jeschonyk, former Speaker Emeritus of the Confederacy of Vanbert and without question its most prestigious and respected living statesman, rose to his feet and uttered the finest lie of his life.

"Nothing to fear, my fellow Councillors! The balance of power remains intact, does it not?" He gave the man who had shouted at him a stately nod. "Despite the size of the great force Demansk has assembled — which, I remind you all, has even now set forth to rid us once and for all of the predations of piracy — Triumvir Tomsien still retains a larger force in his southern provinces. And what could possibly threaten that army?"

He sat down amidst scattered applause and a collective sigh of relief so loud it could have almost lifted the great rotunda of the chamber. And, while the Council proceeded to its next round of squabbles, went back to his contemplations on bastardy.

* * *

A week later, by sea, the same news came to Marange.

"That's it, then," said Helga. Adrian was already heading for the door, wanting to reach Prelotta's pavilion as soon as possible. From the room where he and Ilset made their own quarters, Jessep Yunkers was hurrying also.