David Drake: Reformer

"Justiciar Demansk is of your party, my lord?" Esmond strove to put worshipful admiration in his tone. Don't overdo it, he warned himself. But then, dealing with these people it was nearly impossible to overdo it. . on the other hand, the gang bosses were less likely to be taken in. If Demansk was with them, they actually had a chance to bring this off.

"Justiciar Demansk. ." Redvers smiled, "is a man of ambition, shall we say, who has been. . approached. So. What do you say, Esmondi my lad?"

Esmond stood and gave Redvers a salute, fist to chest. "Command me, lord, and success is ordained as if the gods themselves had spoken."

* * *

"Are you serious ?" Adrian blurted, as his brother finished his tale, running his hands through his long curling hair.

"Deadly. Most probably simply dead ," Esmond said.

Adrian stared at him, appalled. "Oh, Maiden of the Stars," he whispered. "They're all going to die."

"That doesn't bother me," Esmond said grimly. "You're right, incidentally. The only reason they haven't gone up the post—" in fact, most of them were of high enough social standing that they'd be offered the knife " — is that the Council and the Speakers are nearly as much a bunch of amateur buffoons as they are."

The tall form of his brother sank to a bench. "How in the name of the gods did we ever end up being subject to these people?"

"They had a better army," Adrian said absently, the eyes of his mind fixed inward. "And in those days they didn't fight among themselves as much as we did. You know the saying: two Emeralds—"

"— three factions and a civil war," Esmond said gloomily. "And the hell of it is, we're involved in this. . this abortion. I wouldn't give them one chance in twenty. The Confederacy may be ruled from Vanbert, but it isn't a city-state or a monarchy. You can't just seize one man or a couple of buildings and rule, or parade a little bodyguard the way. . what was his name, somebody the Tyrant, the one who came into town with a big girl dressed up as the Goddess, way back?"

"Petor Strattis," Adrian said. Strattis had been Boss of Solinga for twenty-three years back four centuries ago, and his reforms had laid the basis for the later democracy and the Emerald League. "Wait — let me think."

esmond gellert's appraisal is remarkably accurate,Center said, a slight tinge of surprise in the machine voice. stochastic analysis indicates that the probability of a successful coup is in the range of 8 % ±3.

Raj's gray eyes opened inside Adrian's head. Remarkable young man, your brother, he said appraisingly. I'd have been very glad indeed to have him as a junior officer; he's got natural talent, and I think men would follow him. Hmm. . that's something to consider. Center?

correct. we must reevaluate long-term plans. . however, esmond gellert's fundamental belief-structure offers impediments to his usefulness as a tool.

My brother isn't a tool! Adrian thought hotly. He's a human being!

Human beings can be the tools of mankind, Raj thought gently. There's no higher honor. Better to serve mankind than some politician's greed or a myth that turns to ashes full of dead children.

Sorry, Adrian thought. What can we do?

Well, Redvers and his friends have one great merit, Raj mused. Two, actually. First, they're corrupt, amoral, shortsighted and utterly selfish. Responsible nobles wouldn't listen to you if you told them about earth-shaking innovations — they'd look beyond immediate advantage and realize that they could destabilize the system, and those of them who're loyal to anything besides themselves are loyal to the system here. Second, they're desperate. They'll grasp at straws, because it's a tubful of very bloody water for them if they lose.

Adrian raised his head. "Did they give you any idea of the time of this. . uprising?"

"Not immediately. They want to get Demansk on their side if they possibly can. Beyond that, at least a couple of months — I doubt if they know precisely themselves. Why? Do you think we can make it to the Western Isles before then?"

"No, I think I have an idea," Adrian said slowly. "But I need some time for it to work."

One of Lady Redvers' maids came back into the alcove where the brothers sat. "Oh, Esmond, I was so frightened—" she began, speaking a pure upper-class Emerald.

Then she saw Adrian, and froze. Esmond went defiantly to her side and took her hand. "Brother, this is Nanya. Formerly of a citizen family of Penburg."

Adrian bowed gravely; Penburg had been sacked after a revolt six years ago, while Wilder Redvers had been governor of Solinga Province. Every adult male sent to the pole, the rest sold into slavery. His eyebrow lifted: Do you know the risks you're taking? it signaled. If Lady Redvers found out. . being flogged to death was the best Nanya could expect. Killing a free resident of Solinga like Esmond wouldn't be legal. . but that wouldn't stop the lady, and she'd get away with it, too.

"And, when the gods allow, my wife," Esmond went on.

Nanya looked up at him with adoration, her large brown eyes going soft. Adrian closed his eyes. Give me strength.

We will, son, Raj's voice spoke silently.

* * *

Vanbert's law courts had grown with the city. The highest of them — the Assembly Courts of Appeal — were housed in a new marble complex not far from the Temple of the Dual God, on the Spring Hill. The building was in an exaggerated form of the classic Emerald style, adapted to the needs of Confederate legal institutions. Two square blocks on either side held long halls where advocates, clients and hangers-on could walk and speak and deal; they were plain as Emerald temples, surrounded by giant columns supporting a Confederate invention, a barrel-vaulted roof. That was coffered and gilded, and tall windows ran around the eaves just below it. Even on a cloudy winter's day like this the light diffused off the hammered gold leaf in a shadowless glow, lighting the pale marble of walls and column and floor.

Joining the two halls to make a square C-shape was a connecting bar, with a covered amphitheater in its center. Juries in Confederate cases were huge — in theory any citizen could sit, although the requirement for a purifying sacrifice excluded the poor — and they sat below the advocates and judges, like spectators at a games fight. Adrian had often thought that the comparison had merit on more levels than one; though more subtle, the clash of wit and quotation below was just as savage as sword and spear, or tusk and fang. The expressions on the jurors were similar too. Except that nobody was paid to attend the games, while jurors received a stipend, not counting bribes of money or patronage.

An important case could be almost as expensive as a municipal election.

Adrian gathered his plain white mantle around him and strode towards the low symbolic metal fence that surrounded the sun disk inlaid in mosaic on the floor of the court. The acoustics were wonderful; he could hear whispered conversations on the top benches, and even sleepy belches from the inevitable seedy hangers-on taking a nap.

A man with a ceremonial whip and axe stopped him at the entrance. "If you come to speak, proclaim your citizenship," he said in a bored voice; his equipment was meant to indicate the magistrates' power to punish and kill, but it had been a long time since they were used on the spot.

"I come not to speak, but to speak the words of another," Adrian said, pitching his voice in the way Center had trained him to do. The computer had also eliminated the last trace of the soft Emerald accent; now his voice had the slow, crisp vowels of a native Confederate — the upper-class city dialect, at that.