Michael Stackpole - Of Limited Loyalty

Prince Vlad fought to keep fury from his face. He turned and handed his son to Ezekiel Fire. “If you would be so kind, Steward, to hold my son.”

“Honored, Highness.” Fire accepted the boy into his arms and moved away from the edge of the dock.

Vlad turned to Bishop Bumble. “You will want to attend me. Now.”

“Highness, I think this is so lovely a day, it would be a shame to spoil this party by taking the host away from his guests.”

“That is a consideration that you might have made before inviting yourself, Bishop, or before you arrested a man.” Vlad turned on his heel and stalked off toward his laboratory. He did not wait for Bumble to follow, and did not turn around to see if the man was coming with him or not. The man’s huffing and puffing told him all he needed to know.

Vlad threw open the door and did not invite Bumble in, per se. The Bishop had seen the inside of the laboratory before the new structure had been built, and had barely dared to get more than a step or two from the door. Vlad had the impression he’d sooner march through the gates of Hell than enter a building filled with animals, specimens in jars, a variety of unidentifiable items, and one of the largest libraries in Mystria.

The Prince stopped at his desk and turned. Bumble remained in the threshold. Vlad was about to demand that he come in all the way, but there, hidden behind the door, was the thaumagraph station that connected Prince Haven to Count von Metternin’s River House. There was no way imaginable that Bumble could discern what the device was, but Prince Vlad doubted that ignorance was going to be any impediment to the man’s ability to cause trouble.

Vlad pointed back toward the dock. “What you did out there was rude and unforgivable.”

“I do not need to be forgiven, Highness, for doing the job appointed to me.” Bumble kept his voice even, but his ears burned red, revealing a hint of shame. “That man is a heretic. He blasphemes and traffics in diabolical magicks. He imperils the souls of everyone present. I daresay, were I not here, he would work his foul ways with you and the doom which visited Piety and Happy Valley would destroy Prince Haven.”

Vlad turned to his desk and flipped open a journal. That Bumble knew of Piety and Happy Valley didn’t surprise him. Catherine had reported that Bumble had visited Rathfield. Exactly what Bumble knew, and what he would make of it was important. While Vlad would have loved to have questioned him closely, to do so would reveal his knowledge of Fire’s discoveries, and that would leave him open to the same charges the Bishop was leveling against Fire.

“You have exceeded yourself here, Bishop.”

“I think not. I am well within my duty to arrest Fire. I have long since told you that he would be tried.”

Vlad nodded. “You did, so I did some research. We’ve not burned someone for heresy in the colonies in the last century, and in Temperance Bay we’ve not done it in over one hundred thirty years. In fact, while you can try him, convict him, excommunicate and defrock him, to have him killed requires the approval of civil authority.”

The cleric’s jowls rippled with a low chuckle. “I believe you will find, Highness, that there is not a local magistrate who will refuse to sign a death warrant in this case.”

“But such a sentence would be appealable to me.”

Bumble raised a snowy eyebrow. “And you will sign off on it.”

Vlad stared down at the smaller man. “I should not be so certain of myself, were I you.”

Bumble’s laughter grew slightly, and his grin matched it. “Highness, you and I have managed, for the most part, to have a very good working relationship. You deal with matters of the Crown. I deal with matters of the soul. We both acknowledge that my power comes from a higher realm than yours. And I have seen fit, through the years, to ignore many of the things which others have brought to my attention concerning you.”

Vlad folded his arms over his chest. “Such as.”

Bumble pointed back out toward the dock. “You are known to keep company with a notorious fornicator, Nathaniel Woods.”

The Prince raised his chin. “Is he, now?”

The cleric lowered his voice. “Let us not be coy, Highness, it ill becomes you. I know, from a very reliable source, that Woods and a well-respected woman in Temperance have carried on an affair for many years, despite her being married to another. I know that one of her children is not by her husband. I also know that you threatened her husband were he to take action against Woods or his wife. You are aiding and abetting a pair of adulterers. We both know that Woods has bastard half-breeds among the Twilight People though I doubt even he knows how many are truly his.”

“Even the ruination of a good man, and a good woman, is insufficient motivation for me to put Ezekiel Fire to death.”

“This does not surprise me.” The Bishop opened his hands to take in the whole of the laboratory. “I suspect, however, having yourself exposed for your Ryngian studies, and for having abandoned God and adopting their atheist ways would be. Do you think, standing where we are, that you could not be convicted of such charges and that, once you were, you would not burn beside the heretic down on the dock?”

23 June 1767 Prince Haven Temperance Bay, Mystria

Prince Vlad’s first impulse was to open his desk drawer, pull out the pistol he kept therein, and place a three-quarter-inch-diameter sphere of lead directly between Bishop Bumble’s beetling brows. The Prince knew quite well-from ample studies conducted using rigorous Ryngian methodology-precisely the sort of damage the ball would do. Slightly flattened as it passed through the forehead, it would reduce the man’s brains to the consistency of a pudding, and spray them all over the lawn as the shot exited.

He would have been justified; the man had not so subtly threatened his life. Given those present and their general feelings about Bishop Bumble, were any questions asked, doubtless witnesses would all agree that a Ryngian assassin had managed to kill the Bishop, then escape while the others stood there in a state of shock. Repercussions, were there any, would be minor at best.

And Vlad might have killed him save for two things. First and foremost, he was not a murderer. Though Bishop Bumble might invite killing, though he might deserve it and the world might be a better place without him, it was not Vlad’s place to kill him. He would not even do what another noble might, and order the killing done, or hint to someone that it should be done. With Owen, Nathaniel, or the Count, he’d really not even need to hint. With the least bit of provocation they’d tie a rock to Bumble’s feet, toss him in the river, and claim that they had all told him that swimming after eating was ill advised.

Second, and more importantly, killing the man would not end the threat he posed. Bumble’s remark about Nathaniel contained information that only Zachariah Ward could have supplied. For whatever reason, Ward had confided in Bumble-and the Prince shuddered at the idea that the Bishop might use information he gained while in the confessional to coerce others. Vlad had to assume that Bumble kept notes. Were he to die suddenly and suspiciously, others might find a use for his notes.

So Vlad did the only thing he could do. He sat heavily at his desk and refused to meet Bumble’s dark-eyed gaze. “I see.”

“I thought you might, Highness.” The man ventured another pace into the library, the Prince’s evident weakness emboldening him. “I know that there are people who, when they think of what you do here, consider it as just ‘being the Prince’s way, is all, no harm meant or done.’ I, however, must worry about the souls of the people within my diocese. To be frank, Highness, you set a poor example for our people. When I hold services, your pew is empty save for high holy days or when one of your children has been baptized. While I know you are a learned man, and that you regularly correspond with your sainted father, your neglect of your faith promotes contempt in the general audience.