K Parker - Devices and Desires

When she'd gone, he took a fresh sheet of paper (she'd brought a ream with her up from the house, since he was running low) and wrote his usual letters: to Orsea, conversational and slightly desperate; to Jarnac, asking him if he'd mind taking the riding horses to his stables for the time being, since he was concerned that they weren't getting enough exercise; to Veatriz, six pages, which he read over slowly before tearing them into small pieces and feeding them methodically into the fire. Not long after he'd finished that task, a guard told him he had another visitor: Vaatzes, the Mezentine, if he could spare a moment to see him.

'I think I might be able to fit him in,' Miel replied gravely. The guard went away, and Miel got up to pour some wine from the jug into a decanter. There was a bowl of fresh apples, a new loaf and some seed-cakes, which the housekeeper had brought. The Ducas recipe for seed-cake was as old as the city itself and even more closely guarded; Miel had never liked it much.

Vaatzes looked tired, which was hardly surprising; he was thinner, and he grunted softly when he sat down. Then he yawned, and apologised.

'That's all right,' Miel said. 'I imagine they're keeping you busy right now.'

Vaatzes nodded. 'It sounds bad saying it,' he replied, 'but I'll almost be glad when the attack comes, and there's nothing else I can do. At the moment I keep thinking of slight modifications and improvements, which means breaking down four hundred sets of mountings just to put on an extra washer or slip in another shim. I know for a fact that all the artillery crews hate me. Don't blame them, either.'

Miel shook his head. 'You just wait,' he said. 'Once they attack, you'll have your work cut out.'

'Not really,' Vaatzes said. 'I'm not a soldier, I'm just a mechanic. As soon as the bolts start flying I intend, to find a deep, dark cellar and barricade myself in.'

'Very wise,' Miel said. 'And you've done your bit already, God knows. But I suppose it's your war as much as ours, given the way they treated you. You want to get back at them, naturally.'

Vaatzes frowned. 'Not at all,' he said. 'I've got one hell of a grudge against a small number of officials in the Foundrymen's Guild and Compliance, but I love my city. What I want most in the whole world is to go home and carry on with my old life. That's not going to be possible, but it still doesn't mean I suddenly hate everybody I used to love, and that I've stopped believing in everything that I used to live by. No, I'm helping you because it's my duty, because you people rescued me when I was dying and gave me a home and a job to do; and because nobody else has a use for me. I'd have thought you of all people would've understood about duty'

'That old thing.' Miel laughed. 'It's actually one of our family's titles: the Ducas, Lord of the Mesogaea, Baron Hereditary of the Swan River, Master of the East Marches, Slave of Duty. Always made me laugh, that, but in fact it's true; the Ducas is the second most powerful man in this country, but everything he does every day, from getting up in the morning to going to bed at night, is pretty well dictated to him by duty. It's not something I ever think about, the way fish don't think about water.'

Vaatzes studied him for a moment, as though making an assessment. 'Duke Orsea's taken over running the war himself,' he said. 'Someone called the lesser Phocas is in charge of supplies and administration, and your cousin Jarnac's in command of the defence of the walls. There's a man called something Amyntas supposedly commanding the artillery, but I haven't met him yet. I think he's quite happy for me to get on with it; which is stupid, since I don't know the first thing about military science.'

Miel grinned. 'Neither does Tarsa Amyntas,' he said. 'He was famous for a week or so about fifteen years ago, when he killed a lot of Vadani in the war; hand-to-hand fighting in a forest, if I'm thinking about the right man. Since then, he's mostly spent his time composing flute-music and trying to grow strawberries in winter. Military command in this country goes according to birth, rank and position. It's a miracle we're still here.'

'It seems to have worked,' Vaatzes said mildly. 'Take you, for instance. You won a battle.'

'That seems to be a matter of opinion,' Miel said.

'No, it's a fact. You were outnumbered-what, ten to one? It was something ridiculous like that. You outplanned and outfought the best professional commander money can buy. And I don't suppose it was just natural talent or beginner's luck,' he added, with a small grin. 'It's because you were born and brought up to do a particular job, just like sons follow their fathers in the Guilds. I'll bet you were learning about logistics and reading up old battles at an age when most kids are learning their times tables.'

'Sort of,' Miel said. 'But I'm nothing special, believe me. It was just luck; and besides, I threw it all away by pulling back too early. At any rate, that seems to be what Orsea thinks, and the opinion of the Duke is the only thing that matters to the Ducas. Says so somewhere in the book of rules.'

Vaatzes frowned at him. 'Your family has a rule-book?' he said.

Miel laughed. 'No, it's a figure of speech. Though, since you mention it, there is a Ducas code of honour, all properly written down and everything. The Five Transcendent Precepts, it's called. My great-great-'-he paused and counted on his fingers-'great-great-grandfather made it up and had it carved on a wall, on the left by the main hall door as you go in. I had to learn it by heart when I was eight.'

'Really? What does it say?'

'Can't remember, to be honest with you. Not all of it, anyhow. Let's see: do your duty to your Duke, your family, your tenants and servants, your people and your country. That's one. Never question an order or give an order that deserves to be questioned, that's two. Three…' He closed his eyes, trying to visualise the chisel-cuts in the yellow stone. 'Three is something like true courtesy dignifies the receiver and the giver. Four is, remember always that the acts of the Ducas live for ever. Five-well, you get the general idea. Pretty intimidating stuff to force on an eight-year-old.' He frowned slightly. 'You're laughing,' he said. 'Which is fair enough, it's all pretty ridiculous stuff, but-'

'Actually,' Vaatzes said, 'I was thinking, that's something you and me have in common. Except when I was eight years old, I was learning the specifications of the Foundrymen and Machinists' Guild. At least all your rules of conduct make some sort of sense. The specifications are just a whole list of measurements and dimensions. But really they amount to the same thing; stuff you've got to live by, like it or not, because that's what we stand for. I can still remember them all, believe it or not. On my ninth birthday I had to go to the Guildhall along with all the other kids in my class and stand on a platform in the Long Gallery, and three scary old men tested us; it felt like hours, and we'd been told beforehand that if we got anything even slightly wrong, that'd be it-out of the Guild for ever, which would've been the next best thing to a death sentence. Were we nervous? I can feel the sweat now, running down inside my shirt. And I was desperate for a pee-I'd gone about a dozen times while we were waiting in the lodge-but of course there was nothing I could do except stand with my legs crossed hoping nobody'd notice.'

Miel laughed. 'When I was that age I had to go up in front of everybody when we had company for dinner and recite poetry-Mannerist stuff, mostly, which I never could be doing with. If I did all right and remembered it all and didn't gabble, Father'd give me a present, like a new hood for my sparrowhawk or a new pair of riding gloves; but if I got it wrong and showed him up he'd be absolutely livid for days; wouldn't speak to me, just looked past me as though I didn't exist. I never could see the point of it, because the guests must've been bored stiff-who wants to hear a snot-nosed kid reciting sonnets about dew-spattered ferns?-and he'd be mortified if I wasn't absolutely perfect, and I hated it, of course. But apparently it was one of those things you had to do, so we all did it. Like you and your measurements, I suppose.'