L. Modesitt - Scion of Cyador

“It is rather…substantial,” suggests Lorn.

“It be the grandest in all of Biehl. So said my grandsire,” adds Kurbyl, the younger lancer. “Near-on threescore builders worked on it for three seasons.”

“And the villa on the next hill?” Lorn asks.

“That be the olive-grower Baryat,” Helkyt says slowly.

“His daughter is Flutak’s mistress?” Lorn asks.

“Ah…that is rumored…”

As he turns his head, Lorn catches the look between the two lancers, who clearly have not heard that rumor. A faint smile crosses the overcaptain’s lips. “Rumors…one must be most careful with them…If they are untrue, then the innocent suffer, and if true…”-Lorn laughs gently-“then often the innocent also suffer.”

Helkyt frowns.

“Ser?” asks Kurbyl, as Lorn has hoped he will.

“If a rumor is false, then those about whom it is told suffer. If it is true, then those about whom it is told often make those who tell the truth suffer.” He shrugs. “That is why rumors are dangerous, especially about an Emperor’s Enumerator.”

Another look passes between the two lancers, and Helkyt shifts his weight in his saddle once more, most uneasily.

After the group has ridden almost another kay with more explanations of dwellings, and a sawmill, almost in relief, Helkyt gestures. “See! We have circled Biehl, and we ride toward the piers once more.”

As they ride back through the compound gates, Lorn smiles, for he knows how to find Flutak’s villa, and has accomplished a few more tasks.

“Thank you,” he tells the two lancers as he dismounts. Then he turns to Helkyt. “And thank you, Helkyt. Before long, I will know my way around Biehl without guidance.” Lorn looks at the late-afternoon sun, then adds, “I think I’ll work on some things in the study in my quarters. I may not see you until tomorrow. Then, we’ll need to go over the plans for getting the old barracks ready and setting up training sessions for the current lancers.”

“Ah…yes, ser.”

Lorn turns to the waiting Chulhyr. “Thank you.”

“My pleasure, ser. My pleasure.” The ostler takes the chestnut’s reins and leads her back into the stable.

Lorn walks back to his quarters. In the small study, with the shutters closed to dim the strong, late-afternoon light, he tries the glass again, seeking the Emperor’s Enumerator.

This time Flutak is not alone, but ushering a man from a room-and the room is not in the enumerators’ building, but one of white stone-presumably the lavish villa Lorn has seen earlier in the day. The thin man who leaves bears twin daggers at his belt, and a coil of black rope. Lorn does not recognize the man personally, but there is little question what kind of profession he represents.

“So…more than a few rats in the granary.” Lorn laughs harshly, then replaces the glass he knows he will be using more than he ever intended when Jerial had given it to him. He needs to make some preparations for the evening ahead, including using the glass to see how best to approach Flutak’s villa, and in particular, his bedchamber.

Daelya has left a small stew in a pot, and a loaf of fresh bread, for Lorn’s evening meal. Sitting in the breakfast room off the kitchen of his quarters, Lorn begins to eat both, wishing he had even Byrdyn to sip with it, but from what he can tell, there is no spirit factor at all in Biehl, unless the chandler or some other factor also trades in wine or spirits. Then, he has not had time to look, and wine is the least of his problems.

He is not sure whether his posting to Biehl is a test, or another attempt to remove his presence from the lancers-a presence apparently unwanted by some-or both, with different players trying to use him for differing purposes. His thoughts skitter to the questions his father had posed, particularly the first, for which he yet has no truly satisfactory answer: What is it that allows Cyad to exist? Other cities exist without chaos-towers, he knows, and without Magi’i. Other cities exist without emperors or harbors or without the riches that Cyad possesses. He snorts. Biehl exists, wretchedly, without any of those. All cities have people and structures, or they would not be cities, but those are answers far too simplistic, especially for his father.

The second question-“Could all the might of the Mirror Lancers here in Cyad, or all the might of the Iron Legions in Hamor, prevail against the will of those who live in such lands?”-suggests an equally simplistic answer. That answer is obviously no, and the answer is so obvious Lorn wonders why his father asked such a question. “Are those who direct power or chaos the source of either?” The answer to the third question is yet an equally obvious negative.

Yet Kien’elth is far from a stupid or obvious father and magus. So why has he posed such questions to Lorn? What does he wish Lorn to see beyond the questions? And the last unwritten question is so general the answer could be anything. How can the world be simpler and yet more complex than possibly imagined? The complexity is easy enough to see-in people like Maran and Flutak and even his father. The simplicity is something he has his doubts about.

Lorn still has no answers with which he is comfortable when he finishes eating. He washes out both pot and platter in the bucket of soapy water Daelya has left, then rinses them with the clean water in the pitcher and sets them in the rack on the table to dry. He walks slowly from the breakfast room where he has eaten alone, back to the study, where he looks down at the glass, concentrating once more.

Once the silvery mists clear, Lorn can see that the assassin now meets with two other men in a dim room. Lorn watches but for a moment, not wishing to spend energy on the glass when it will tell him little for the moment. As the image fades, he picks up the crude map he has drawn out, of the road and the best way to reach Flutak’s villa. He hopes that Flutak remains alone, for the overcaptain knows he cannot afford to lurk and wait, or to dally.

Lorn also hopes that Flutak’s assassins arrive relatively early in the night so that he can complete his own tasks before daybreak. He has few doubts that Flutak will act quickly, before Lorn can discover how much of the payroll is being diverted-and tell anyone else.

Lorn shakes his head as he considers what faces him. If he does not act against Flutak and the assassins quickly, then he will spend all too much time merely avoiding getting killed, and likely fail in his assigned duties, which will require all his efforts, so deplorable is the state of the post at Biehl. Yet if anyone can prove Lorn has acted to stop his own assassination, he will be considered inept if he fails and ruthless if he succeeds-and coldblooded, either way.

His laugh is bitter. Why is it that people feel that revenge is justified, and acceptable, and that one is hot-blooded and human to undertake it, yet that to quietly prevent it is cold-blooded and ruthless-even if, in the end, far fewer souls suffer? Just from studying the payroll records, from looking at Flutak’s villa, and from seeing the man immediately hiring an assassin, Lorn can tell the depth of corruption. But most would want greater proof. Greater proof will likely be Lorn’s death, and he is unwilling to allow that. So he must act.

While he is uneasy about the decision, he cannot see any other option that will allow both his survival and his success at Biehl.

So…while he waits for the assassins he knows will come, he sits down in the twilight to consider again his sire’s first question-the essence of what allows Cyad to exist. All cities exist because the people wish to live there, and can do so better than elsewhere. Why? Or how? Trade? But trade requires that people produce more of a good than they require, and they must have enough food and shelter to survive.