L. Modesitt - Scholar

“You with the scholars at the Ecoliae? You don’t look familiar.”

“No … I’m a scholar working at the Telaryn Palace for a time.”

“Never knew they had scholars there.”

“They didn’t.” Quaeryt smiled. “Take good care of the mare. She’s carried me a long ways.”

“That I can do, sir.” There was a pause. “What do you do there?”

“I was sent to write a history of what’s happened in Tilbor since the war ended.”

“Not much.” Thayl spat into the street. “Could have been better. Could have been a lot worse.”

“Do any of the soldiers come here … next door, I mean?”

“Nope. Governor said that Shariela’s place is off-limits. ’Sides, they got their own place out by the palace. Some of the girls went there. Said they made more.” The ostler looked directly at Quaeryt again. “You sure you’re not with those scholars at the Ecoliae?”

“I’m not. I did deliver a letter to a student there, as a favor to his father.”

“What do you think of the place?”

“It seemed to me that it had seen better days.”

“Did once. My cousin worked there. They let him go after the war. Said that they couldn’t pay him no more. The Khanar used to give the scholars golds. The governor doesn’t.”

“Do you think he should?”

Thayl spat again. “Nope. Hard on Taxyr, but why should folks who spend all their time in books, begging your pardon, sir, get golds when the rest of us don’t?”

“That’s true. The Scholars’ Houses in other cities don’t.”

“They don’t?”

“No. Scholars who stay more than a night or two have to pay for their food and lodging. Why did the Khanar pay them? Do you know?”

“Always did, from way back in the time of Nidar. Couldn’t say why.”

“That’s the way things are, sometimes.” Quaeryt nodded.

“That they are. Don’t you be worrying about your mare. She’ll be fine.”

“I’m sure she’s in good hands.”

Quaeryt walked from the stable and turned toward the harbor, walking past the unnamed brothel, not gawking at the women who stood just inside the windows, adorning them, after a fashion.

“Do scholars really know how to do it better?” whispered a throaty voice from one of the upper windows.

Quaeryt couldn’t help grinning slightly, and he replied, “Knowledge isn’t the same as skill or practice, and I defer to you ladies in both.”

An amused, if husky, laugh followed.

When he reached the corner, he turned left and crossed the street. The shop on the corner was an apothecary’s, and he entered.

The man behind the low counter, with the rows of shelves behind him, looked up. “I’d not be selling to you.”

“I’m not looking to buy. I’ve been sent-”

“You’re not from the Ecoliae.”

“No. I came from Solis. I’m trying to get information for a history.”

The apothecary nodded. “I don’t know history.”

Quaeryt smiled. “Recent history. What you’ve lived through since the time of Eleonyd. That’s all history is, except after we’re dead, if it’s written down, it becomes history. If it isn’t, more of the truth is lost.”

“Not much to say. Eleonyd was a good Khanar until he got sick. His daughter would have been a good ruler, too. Rhecyrd and the northers and the timber holders didn’t like her. The Guard sat on its honor and lost it, and Chayar came in and defeated Rhecyrd and his clan militia. That’s what happened. Nothing will change it.”

“Why didn’t the southers stand up for her?”

“We couldn’t. All the men in arms from the south were in the Guard.”

“But-”

“I’d rather not talk about it. You’re probably not like the others, but let’s leave it at that.” He turned his back and begin to grind something in a pestle.

Quaeryt eased out of the apothecary’s. He could have pressed some, but his reception hadn’t been that good to begin with.

When he stepped back outside, the door to the adjoining shop was shuttered and closed. So was the adjoining shop. He didn’t think either had been when he entered the apothecary’s.

He shook his head and went back across the street. The silversmith’s door was shuttered. The next shop was tiny, with but a single narrow window beside the door. While the door was unshuttered, the window was not, but the door opened, and he stepped inside.

“You must have the wrong shop,” came a voice from his left.

He turned to see a thin woman adjusting the fabric on a frame shaped like a woman’s figure. The woman didn’t look to be much older than Quaeryt, although there were streaks of gray in her short-cut hair and lines from the corners of her eyes. “Why? Because you’re a dressmaker?”

“I don’t see you wearing a dress, and few scholars have either wives or mistresses. Even if you did, you’d not likely have the coins for what I sew.” She paused and studied him again. “You are a scholar … but you’re not from the Ecoliae, are you?”

“Actually, I’m from the Scholarium in Solis. I’m here to study the history of Tilbor.”

“You do have the wrong shop.”

“I think not. You probably know more of what happened here since just before the war than most.”

“The Khanar wasn’t strong enough. His daughter was. The north didn’t want a Khanara, and neither did the hill people. Those in Tilbora did; the others in the south didn’t want a civil war. We all lost. Things turned out better under the governor than they would have under the Pretender. What else is there to say?”

“Well…” said Quaeryt with a smile. “… there is the question of why it all came to that. What would have been so bad about a Khanara?”

“It wasn’t that she was a woman. It was that she was smart, and she saw that Rhecyrd would lead Tilbor into war with Telaryn. She also saw how the timber holders and the northers were evading tariffs. She was keeping her father alive, and she was really the Khanar. But things worked, and no one said anything. Then Rhecyrd brought all his clan militia-and his imager-south, and Eleonyd got sicker and died, and then the imager imaged Antiagon Fire over the envoy from Telaryn. That was because she would have wed Lord Bhayar to save Tilbor, and Rhecyrd knew it.”

“And Rhecyrd knew she wouldn’t marry him?”

“No woman with any sense would. His wife got sick and died when he needed her out of the way.”

“Did you ever meet her?”

“Lady Tyrena? She had me sew several riding outfits for her … she was young then.” The seamstress laughed so softly that there was almost no sound. “Weren’t we all?”

“What can you tell me about her?”

“What is there to say? She was young, a bit too strong-featured to be beautiful, but attractive in a handsome way. She was very intelligent, more so than her father, I’d say, and Tilbor might not be a part of Telaryn had he listened to her.”

“Why do you say that?”

“She was the one who truly commanded the Guard. The old commander-Gustraak-knew she understood battles better, and she rode beside him and advised him. Then he died-I still say that he and Eleonyd were both poisoned by Rhecyrd’s imager. Commander Traesk refused to listen to her, and she had the imager killed and forced a Bovarian merchanter to take her away with her personal armsmen. Before she left someone put a knife in Traesk’s ribs, and he died, and the Guard retreated to the palace and closed it off. If she’d been in command … who knows?”

“Strategy isn’t everything,” Quaeryt pointed out.

“No. It’s not. Soldiers are important, too, and the men of Tilbor make the best soldiers. Why do you think the governor recruits so many of them.”

At that moment, a muscular man burst through the rear door and moved quickly toward Quaeryt, a stout club in hand. The scholar barely got up a forearm to deflect the arm with the club.