David Drake - The Gods Return

Lires had been part of Sharina's guard in several hard places, and they'd saved one another's life on occasion. That familiarity made him even less concerned about formal courtesy than most Blood Eagles, and propriety was well down Lord Attaper's list when he was choosing men to replace those who'd fallen. "Of course they could, Lires," Sharina said, jumping in quickly so that nobody'd try to discipline an uppity guard. "Even in Pandah, not one in a hundred people have seen me closer than on the dais at an assembly. How difficult wouldyou find it to believe a noble you didn't know would torture prisoners?" "Well, even those I do know, Princess," Lires said in embarrassment. "But notyou." Sharina quirked a smile at him. To Tadai she said, "Milord, what do you want of me?" Tadai shrugged. "The trouble's widespread, but I don't think it's very deep," he said. "With the help of the garrison, we should have it under control shortly. By dawn, at any rate. I suggest that you get some rest, if you can." "Thank you, milord," Sharina said, "but I tried that and wound up here. I think I'll take a look from the roof." "I'll accompany you if I may, your highness," said Master Dysart. He must've entered behind her. She nodded, already moving. Tadai needed his office. The guards swept them through the crowd the way the hull cuts the water around a ship's passengers. Captain Ascor allowed Dysart to walk beside Sharina, though she wasn't certain that Lord Attaper would've approved had he known. "The riots must've been planned at the same time as the murder of the captured priest, your highness," Dysart murmured as they mounted the stairs. "They broke out in all parts of the city simultaneously." "Yes," said Sharina. She considered options silently.

There were really only two choices: to quit or to go on. She would go on, no matter how tired and frustrated she was. They all would. Aloud she said, "The next time we capture a priest of the Scorpion, we'll know we have to guard against his former master murdering him."

Howcould they protect the prisoner? If they even managed to get another one. Their enemy and its minions were sophisticated and learned quickly. Sharina looked out over the city. The moon had set, but several plumes of smoke rose into the starlit sky. Lanterns winked in the streets, but at least the fires weren't burning out of control.

"Ah…," Dysart said. "I've directed my agents to look for the headquarters of the cult, rather than to spend their efforts in capturing another functionary." "There may not be a headquarters!"

Sharina said, more sharply than she'd intended. "All the Scorpion's worshippers may get their instructions in dreams and never see one another." "Yes, your highness," Dysart said quietly. "In that case, nothing we do here will be of any real value. I prefer to assume that my actions have meaning." We're all trying, Sharina thought. We're all doing the best we can. She noticed something. "Master Dysart?" she said. "Ascor, any of you? Have you seen Burne? He's not with me."

"Your rat, princess?" said Trooper Lires. "He went out through the window down in the prefect's office." "Oh," said Sharina. "Well, I suppose he knows what he's doing." Silently she added, I only wish that the rest of us did. *** Brincisa took a deep breath as she finished her second set of chants, then moved to the final side of the triangle in which Ilna and Ingens stood. Space was tight, so Usun sat on Ilna's left arm. The secretary was restive. Wizardry made most people uncomfortable, but the fact that they'd been standing in the symbol for long minutes without anything happening might bother him as well. It certainly bothered Ilna. "Erek rechthi-" Brincisa said, gesturing with the athame she'd chosen for this work. It had been carved from jade with a faint greenish cast. The words of power broke off in mid syllable. The world outside Ilna's eyes went black-shapeless and opaque. Her grip on the coil of fine blond hair tightened. If it was as strong as she suspected, a hard tug would slice the loop on the other end through the wizard's neck. There was light. They stood in a grove of mature hardwoods: a pair of shagbark hickories, a white oak, and directly before them a huge red oak. Dogwoods and white birches grew outside the large trees, but the area within the stand was covered by knee-high fern. The red oak stretched out a limb thicker than most tree boles. It grew from a point on the trunk that was a little higher than Ilna could reach by stretching to her full height. From it hung a stone gong supported by two bronze chains. Usun hopped from the crook of Ilna's arm but climbed onto a fallen limb to see over the fern. He sniffed deeply. "Rabbits, squirrels, and a fox," he said. He giggled and added, "Mistress Brincisa hasn't put us in a tiger's den, at least. Or found another ghoul for us to dispose of." "This is the grove where Princess Perrine came to us," Ingens said in a dull voice.

He walked away, keeping his back to Ilna. The ferns he brushed through gave off a faint odor of fresh hay. "The gong there…" He gestured. "Master Hervir tapped the center of it with his knuckles, and she came through the woods with four servants. The servants were apes but they wore clothes." "Apes, now?" said Usun. He tested the air again. "Well, they haven't been here recently." Ilna looked about.

There was no sign of the way Brincisa had sent them to this place. The hair stretching from the coil in her hand vanished somewhere in the air behind her, but she couldn't be sure exactly what that point was.

"Do we agree that Brincisa has taken us where we asked her to?" she said to her companions. "And that there's no immediate danger?" Ingens nodded, his back still turned. "Yes," he mumbled. "No danger, certainly," Usun agreed. "But if you want to pull on the hair and take Brincisa's head off, then there won't be many mourners. Not even those servants of hers, I'll wager." "What I want to do," said Ilna, "is to keep my word. Of course." She gave the coil an underhanded toss in the direction the strand tended. It vanished in mid air, a golden flash in the leaf-filtered grove. "All right," Ilna said. "I'll ring the gong, then. You said that I can ring it with a finger?" "Before you do that, mistress," Usun said, "There's one thing we might check. There, midway between the two hickory trees. The ground's been disturbed." "Has it?"

Ilna said. She'd been walking toward the gong, but out of politeness she glanced where the little man pointed. So far as she could tell, the ferns grew in a feathery, unbroken surface across the floor of the glade. Cashel might've been able to tell more, but neither them had been a forester. Oh. Ilna stopped. "Master Ingens," she said. "Face me." The secretary buried his face in his hands. He didn't speak or look at her. Ilna had taken yarn from her sleeve and was knotting it.

That was more reflex than a conscious act, the way she'd have grabbed her weaver's sword if it slipped from her hand. "Master Ingens," she repeated, "faceme!" The secretary turned slowly and lowered his hands.

Tears streaked his cheeks, but his expression now was defiant. "Hervir was completely healthy when I last saw him," he said. "I didn't kill him!" Usun cackled. He stood arms akimbo on his low perch. "Very well," said Ilna. She was coldly furious. She'd regarded Ingens as… not a friend, of course, but an ally who'd help to the limited degree he was able. It now appeared that- Well, better to ask than to speculate. "Tell us what really happened to Hervir," she said.

Her voice was calm. "Tell us everything. Or I will not only tear the information out of you, I will tear your eyes from their sockets."

"Yes, mistress," said Ingens. He sounded like a dead man. "I buried the money there." He gestured. "I was going to bury it beside a tree, but I couldn't because of the roots. I had only my stylus to break the ground and a wax tablet to scoop it away. I didn't plan to do this! It just happened." "What happened to Hervir?" Ilna repeated, though this time without her previous anger. Ingens was weak, but almost everyone was weak. Ilna os-Kenset was weak at times, which she hated as she hated few other things. "It was just as I told you," said Ingens, getting control of himself better. "Hervir met the princess and her apes. They talked. He told me he was going with her but that he'd be back in the evening. I was holding the money he'd brought to buy the saffron." He took a deep, shuddering breath. He was looking at Ilna's feet, not her eyes, but he didn't try to turn away. "The guards didn't know that," he explained. "Hervir always had me carry the money in a belt between my tunics. He didn't like the weight, and it chafed his hipbones." "He trusted you?" said Usun, laughter not far beneath the surface of the words. "He was right to trust me!" Ingens said. "I'd no more steal than I would have killed and eaten him!" He licked his lips and grimaced, trying to wet them. "He went with Perrine, just walked out of the grove-" He pointed with his full arm, toward the gong.