Eric Flint - Much Fall Of Blood

"Oh, is that what the shackles are for?" he asked, pleased to have had the mystery clarified.

She looked at him enquiringly with just an element of calculation in her gaze. "Shackles?"

"Yes. There are four set into the wood of the bed. I barked my shin on one, so I noticed."

"Goodness. I wonder what those are for. Perhaps for chaining a dog or something. I was merely joking, Vlad. I did not want to trouble you with that sad business last night. The poor girl was possessed of an evil spirit. We had to scourge her and pray with her to exorcise it."

"Oh. I will include her in my prayers, then," said Vlad. "Is she free of it now? Will she be all right?"

"She will recover. Pain is a necessary part of the process," said the countess. "Do you really have to have the curtains open, Prince? Of course I am a weak woman and not as robust as you. The breeze is so injurious to a lady's complexion. It's almost as bad as the sun."

"Once they cross they Danube we must strike," said Angelo. "If we let her get him to her fortress we will never get him away from her. Even another night could be too late."

"They will take a ferry. We could sink it, and snatch him from the flotsam." Grigori grinned, showing very white teeth.

Angelo shook his head. "She has a bargain with the Vila."

"Then we need to plan to get across by boat," said Radu. "Besides, Grigori, you get tired after swimming half a league."

The crowd of voivodes and hetmen in his throne room were doing their best to look brave and great. To the iron eyes that looked out at them from Jagiellon's mask, they were neither. They were, however, the right sort of tools for his tasks. Greed and fear made great levers to drive them about his purposes. He kept them in balance between fear of their fellows and fear of him. And when he called, they came, like the cowed dogs they were.

Of course, there were a few who had attempted to avoid the summons with various excuses, and had sent representatives. They would be punished appropriately. They entertained something Chernobog disapproved of, and did his best to eradicate: the folly of hope.

Still, there was one emissary whose master could not be punished. Or, at least, could not be punished… yet. The fact that the emissary was here, and being seen in public, was an endorsement of sorts, as the remains of the Golden Horde were not yet vassals. But soon they, and the Bulgar Slavs, would fall in line. Constantinople and Alexius posed no challenge. Chernobog's geo-political machinations followed a very different logic from that of his merely mortal foes.

There was power in the geography, both on a physical and a spiritual plane. Other powers and their minions, such as that accursed Elizabeth Bartholdy, did not fully grasp that. They would. But by then it would be too late.

"Nogay Tarkhan." Jagiellon greeted the emissary with what for him was considerable affability. The man still stood too straight. He bowed. He had not abased himself. "And what news from Gatu Khan?"

"He still remains Gatu Orkhan. The kurultai broke apart before his election could be finalized."

Jagiellon stood up slowly. He was a huge man and he towered over the tarkhan. He turned to the assembled lords of all of the vassal tribes and states to the east and south. "You are all dismissed," he said. "The tarkhan and I have things to discuss privately."

Nogay stood stock still, perhaps alarmed by the hasty departure of the others. Some of them were known to him. Many of the southern clans which owed fealty to Jagiellon were blood relations of the clans within the remnant of the Golden Horde that lived on the western shore of the Black Sea. The Crimean Tatar were close kin. They were intermarried too with Bessarabians under Jagiellon's sway.

When they were alone, Jagiellon resumed his seat. He had stood solely for the purpose of intimidating the tarkhan with his immense size. That done-satisfactorily, he gauged-he had no desire to remain on his feet. The Black Brain found the grand duke useful, and the man had become so heavy in middle age that standing for any length of time risked damaging his lower limbs.

As he lowered himself into the throne, a slight scuttling noise drew his attention to the side. A rat had emerged from a hole in a corner of the throne room and was staring at him, its whiskers twitching with caution.

Caution only, not fear. Rats had little to fear in the grand duke of Lithuania's palace. As a matter of policy, Jagiellon made only minimal attempts to suppress the rodents. He kept just enough feral felines to prevent the rats from overrunning the palace altogether. He-or rather, the demon who controlled him-found that a multitude of rats had the effect of frightening his subjects, in a subtle kind of way. Perhaps they feared their overlord might feed them to the rats in the cellars.

As, indeed, he had done on a number of occasions.

Once the grand duke's eyes moved away, Mindaug sent the rat scurrying along the wall. As soon as Jagiellon began to speak, he would have the rat move close enough to overhear the conversation.

Mindaug leaned back in his chair, his eyes closed, visualizing the scene in far-off Vilna through the rat's eyes. There was some peril here, of course. Mindaug would be subjected to considerable pain in the event Jagiellon took notice of the rat again and decided to kill it.

That was a minor danger, however. First, because it was unlikely that the grand duke would succeed in such a project. As a young man, Jagiellon had been a truly formidable physical specimen. His reflexes had been astonishing for someone his size. But age and sedentary habits-not to mention his gross culinary indulgences-had added so much fat to his frame that, though still immensely strong, he was no longer as quick as he'd been years earlier.

The grand duke was still surprisingly quick, for such a huge man. But not likely to be quick enough to catch a rodent. Even if he did, the pain inflicted upon Mindaug would be intense but brief. And there would be no lasting damage. The method Mindaug was using to control the rat had some problems. The effort of controlling the noxious little creature was considerable; the effort of trying to filter meaningful words through its tiny brain harder still. After two hours, Mindaug would be mentally exhausted. But the great advantage was that Mindaug could sever his connection with the rat-or have it severed by another-without suffering any permanent injury.

No, the real danger lay with the Black Brain, not the monster's human shell. There was always the possibility that Chernobog's suspicion would be aroused, should he notice that a rat in his palace was behaving oddly. The demon himself was not given to using small animals as spies. Those methods were too humble and subtle to appeal to his basic nature. However, he would know that such was possible, for someone with sufficient knowledge and skill.

There weren't many in the world who had that knowledge and skill. But Chernobog was likely to know that his former servant Count Mindaug was one of them-and he had a grudge against Mindaug. Which was reasonable enough, of course, given that Mindaug had betrayed him.

Should the Black Brain come alert, there was the real possibility that his demonic powers-which, unlike his human sheath's body, was not subject to fat and unexercised muscles-could move fast enough to catch Mindaug before he could extricate himself from the rodent. Should that happen…

Well. The result would be most unfortunate. The best Mindaug could hope for was that Chernobog would be satisfied with locking the count into his rodent form with no hope of escape. In which case, Mindaug's lifespan would become that of a rat-two years; three, at best-and, still worse, it would be a life emptied of all interest. Even if Mindaug could maintain his intelligence in those circumstances, which he thought dubious beyond a few weeks, what good would it do him?