David Drake - Tyrant

* * *

He left the quarterdeck then, heading for his cabin where others would be waiting for new orders. So he never heard Thicelt's response. The Islander, after watching Demansk's departure, turned and stared at the still-invisible city where he had been born. The "jewel in a cup," as his people called it, the beautiful — and often vicious — city which had been the center of the archipelago's culture for centuries. And which, with one of its own sons as the midwife, was about to give birth to a new world.

"No, lord," he murmured. "In a generation, they will be calling you the same thing as everyone else. Verice Demansk, the Great."

Chapter 19

Demansk's soldiers brought him Casull's corpse before the day was over. The King of the Isles had been aboard one of the galleys stormed by the Confederate soldiers. The crew of that galley, no doubt because the King was there himself to stiffen their spine, had not surrendered. All of them had been killed, either in the fighting or in the massacre of the wounded afterward. Casull's body had been found under a pile of corpses. The soldiers hadn't been entirely sure of his identity — none of them had ever seen Casull in person — but his garments and the accouterments of his office made it clear that, whoever he was, he was someone important. So they brought the body to Demansk.

Thicelt identified him. "That's Casull, all right." He inspected the wounds on the corpse. "Say whatever else you will, he was no coward."

Forent Nappur didn't seem impressed. "I can say the same for every man in my squad — almost every man in the army, for that matter. So why does a fucking king get special credit for doing something any peasant takes for granted?"

There was no particular heat in the words. But the anger simmering beneath them reminded Demansk, if he needed a reminder, how much bitterness and animosity the selfish and ruthless conduct of the Confederation's ruling class had stored up in the hearts of its own citizenry.

Sharlz shrugged. "A peasant doesn't have much choice, Forent. A king does. I guess that's the difference." He straightened up from the kneeling posture from which he'd been examining the corpse, and held up a hand in a little placating gesture. "But I'm not trying to start an argument. I can't say I was all that fond of Casull myself."

He glanced at Demansk and made a chucking gesture with his thumb. "Over the side?"

Demansk shook his head. "No. We'll give him an honorable burial — that's how you do it here in the islands, if I recall? Not cremation?"

Thicelt nodded. But Demansk was really watching Nappur, whose sour expression made clear that he'd personally have been inclined to toss the former king to the sharks.

Demansk understood, and sympathized, with the ex-sergeant's feelings. Still, this was something which had to be settled. In the substance of his policies, Demansk had every intention of setting old wrongs to right. He would favor the poor and downtrodden at the expense of the rich and powerful. But doing so would require, more often than not, maintaining a least a façade of respect for the established order. As long as he could harness the energy and anger of such men as Nappur, they would be of great service. Let that anger break loose unfettered, and unmuzzled. .

He decided this was not the time and place to raise the matter. But he made a note to have a private conversation with Nappur as soon as possible. As head of the army's "internal police," Forent's attitudes — his real ones, not simply his formal agreement — would be critical.

At Thicelt's gesture, the soldiers who had brought the body picked up Casull's corpse and took it away. They'd overheard Demansk, and would bring the body to the ship's chirurgeon, who would do what was necessary to keep the body preserved until it could be buried. Most Vanberts preferred cremation to burial. But there were enough auxiliary nations and vassal states which practiced burial for a naval chirurgeon to be familiar with the basic methods of embalming. Sharlz could be relied upon to let him know if there were any special rites required by Islander customs.

He moved to the rail of his quinquireme and studied the progress of the disembarkation. By now, not long before sunset, most of the triremes had already been beached and their crews were beginning to erect the first temporary fortifications and field camps. They were moving with the speed which long custom gave them in this work — something which always astonished the Confederacy's enemies. The soldiers would work as long into the night as necessary to get the work done.

Not all of the ships and soldiers were engaged in the work. Demansk's officers had skirmishers and sentries out, ready to give warning in the unlikely event that the Islanders managed to send a ship-burning expedition over the crest of the caldera. And there were plenty of triremes still at sea, even leaving aside the great quinquiremes, to keep the defeated Islander fleet bottled up within the harbor.

Forent Nappur verbalized his own thoughts. "It's done for the day, Triumvir. Why don't you get some sleep?"

He was tired. He'd been up since the middle of the night, making the final preparations for the battle. And Nappur was right — there was really nothing left for him to do, until the morrow.

More than anything, however, it was the quite-evident warmth in Forent's voice which allowed Demansk to follow his advice. However much the former sergeant from the hardscrabble east detested royalty and nobility in general, that hatred clearly did not extend to Demansk himself.

It was odd, really. But, as a young man, Demansk had seen the phenomenon at work once before. Marcomann, like Demansk himself, had come from the very uppermost strata of the Confederacy's nobility. That fact seemed to have made the soldiery's adoption of him all the more fierce. We may be scum beneath their feet, but OUR boy is as good as any of 'em. Better!

"It's a strange world," he murmured. He and Thicelt exchanged a little smile. Sharlz, thought Demansk, was really the only one of the men around him who probably understood him fully. Perhaps that was because, as an Islander, he was an outsider to begin with.

Or, perhaps, it was simply because he was Sharlz Thicelt.

Demansk decided that he preferred the second explanation. And, as he made his way back to his cabin on the flagship, wondered if the day would ever come when he would be able to indulge in simple friendship again.

He thought not. And, not for the first time, feared for his eventual sanity. But. . so be it. He was prepared to sacrifice everything else, after all.

* * *

By midmorning the next day, the political work which Thicelt had done prior to the attack started coming to fruit. Working secretly through cutouts, he'd been in touch with his family for months, and, through them, with others on the island. Thicelt's own family was not particularly prominent in the social hierarchy of the archipelago, but they knew a lot of people who were.

A galley set out from the harbor at Chalice, bearing a statue of Opal, the Goddess of Tranquility, on its foredeck. That was the traditional Islander method for signaling a desire for a peaceful parlay. Demansk had been expecting something of the sort, so the triremes blockading the entrance to the harbor had been given orders to let any such ship pass through unmolested.

As the Islander galley approached Demansk's flagship, however, Nappur insisted on keeping it at a distance until a boarding party could search the vessel. He admitted it was unlikely that a band of assassins was hiding in the hold, much less a load of explosives, but. .

Thicelt didn't even argue the point, beyond making a couple of wisecracks. Nor did Demansk. The simple truth was that Verice Demansk was so critical to everything that any chance of an assassination attempt had to be taken seriously.