Katharine Kerr - Sword of Fire

‘Now there’s a thought! It would get him safely out of town as well, and the Bears aren’t going to growl at a silver dagger running an errand. But I doubt me if the healers on the island would hand the book over to a silver dagger, even with a letter from me. It’s a very rare book.’

‘Well, I don’t suppose giving it to the Advocates would mean much, anyway. It would be a splendid gesture, but just a gesture. Though, curse it all! I want to honor Cradoc’s memory with more than a speech! A gesture would have been better than naught.’

‘Wait!’ Dovina paused to think something through. ‘Would it really be just a gesture? The Advocates could cite it as yet another legal precedent, and this one has teeth. But if we can’t fetch the book, truly, it matters very little. You heard Father. It’s too easy to claim the new copies as forgeries.’

‘Would the Lady of Haen Marn refuse to give it up, do you think?’

‘We have the loan note.’ Dovina held up the piece of pabrus. ‘They have to give it over to someone from the collegium who brings this to them. It’s too bad that we don’t know someone who’s been there, someone they know and would trust.’

Alyssa’s idea struck her as immensely dangerous, immensely foolish. Had it not been for Cradoc’s death, and her desire to do some grand thing to make that death worthwhile, she would never have spoken it aloud.

‘What’s so wrong?’ Dovina said.

‘I’ve been there.’ Alyssa breathed deeply and forced her voice under control. ‘They know me, my lady.’

‘Ye gods! Were you desperately ill, then?’

‘I wasn’t. Before I came to the collegium, my father fell ill. My mother had to stay and run the bakery, and so I travelled with him when he went to consult the healers.’ Alyssa paused, remembering. ‘It’s such an amazing place! And the healers! You really start to believe they can work dwimmer.’

‘Well, if such a thing truly exists. Though you do hear strange stories that make me wonder.’

‘Indeed. I was sitting with my father when one of the healers came in. Perra of Cannobaen’s her name. When she was done helping him, she took a moment to chat with me. Da was sleeping thanks to the anodyne she’d given him. She asked me what I liked to do when I had time to myself. I like to read, I told her.’ Alyssa smiled, remembering the shock on the healer’s face. ‘I asked her if they had books, and she said yes, but they were all about healing and medicinals. I told her about the guildhall’s little bookhoard and how I’d put it all in order and made a list of them and such. Very well, she said, you should be a scholar. She got me my place here at the collegium.’

‘Ai!’ Dovina’s eyes widened. ‘I’ve heard much about her.’

‘She’s in charge of all the healers there, now, from what I’ve heard.’

‘She’s a grand patroness to have, truly! This could work out splendidly if we could get you to Haen Marn. We could hire the silver dagger to accompany – er, wait, not such a good idea. Everyone would think you were eloping with him, and you’d be dishonored.’

‘Better than seeing my family driven into poverty. Or watching him hang.’

‘Well, I shall do my best to keep that from happening.’ Yet Dovina sounded doubtful, a rare thing for her.

‘You’ve already got one huge concession out of your father. You shan’t be able to get another.’

‘Most likely that’s true, alas. He’ll bend a bit when I force things, but he doesn’t give in twice over the same matter. Having you go to Haen Marn on your own would be far too dangerous, a woman alone on the roads. And we’ve got to get the silver dagger out of town – what is his name?’

‘Cavan of Lughcarn, my lady.’

‘Ah, my thanks.’ Dovina considered this for a few moments. ‘Hmm. That’s oddly familiar. It makes me wonder, but anyway, we’ve got to get Cavan away quickly. And I certainly don’t want my wretched father’s wrath descending upon your family, either. Would you be safe on the road with your silver dagger, do you think?’

‘I do, especially if we told him he’d not get paid for the job if he gave me any trouble.’

‘Good thought! What I can do is give you a note, a draft, they call them, to my father’s banker up in Haen Marn. Father’s got a fair bit of coin in the treasury there. A lot of lords keep treasure there for safety’s sake. Only you can draw out the money, not Cavan, not anyone else. So if you don’t want him to have one copper penny of it, he’ll not get it.’

‘But what will your father say when he finds out the coin’s been taken?’

‘I shall tell him I need new dresses to impress this wretched suitor he’s dug up.’ Dovina shrugged the problem away. ‘My name wouldn’t be on the draft if he didn’t expect me to draw coin out now and then.’

‘Very well, if you think taking the money’s safe.’

‘If I didn’t, I wouldn’t suggest it. That should work splendidly. No matter what they were before, silver daggers always think of the coin.’

‘I suppose they have to, out on the long road like that.’

‘Oh, no doubt. Where is he now, in some tavern in town?’

‘He’s not, but in Wmm’s Scribal. Rhys is hiding him there.’

‘Good for Rhys!’ Dovina rubbed her hands together. ‘Let’s go downstairs and find Mavva. You’d best stay inside out of sight, but no doubt she’ll not mind taking a message to her betrothed.’

‘One thing I don’t understand,’ Cavan said. ‘Why would the noble-born men in King’s join your cause?’

‘They’re all younger sons,’ Rhys said. ‘They’ve got good reason to want to stick it to their first-born brothers.’

‘Makes sense.’ Cavan could understand that motive all too well.

‘Besides, they’re at the collegium because they’re going to end up as councillors or even running the law courts in their fathers’ rhannau, and very few of them want to. What complaints come before most small lords out here in the west, anyway? Some farmer claiming a witch cursed his cow or stole his chickens, or neighbors hauling in a townsman who won’t clean up his dungheap in the summer. The truly big cases, a guild bringing action against a lord to make him pay his debts, for instance, always go before the gwerbret himself. And you can guess, I’m sure, how such a case is settled.’

‘Always in the lord’s favor.’ Cavan paused for a sip of ale. ‘The same thing happens to silver daggers, if some miser refuses to pay your hire.’

Rhys nodded in sympathy. They were sitting at one of the polished oak tables in Wmm’s Scribal’s great hall. These priests-to-be did themselves well, Cavan thought. Bardekian carpets in bright patterns covered the floor, and silver sconces hung between the glazed windows. The long tables and benches shone from polishing. He and Rhys had just shared a trencher of roast meats and fresh bread, washed down with a decent dark ale.

‘Not a bad life you lead,’ Cavan said. ‘Good ale, anyway.’

‘We might as well drink now. Once we take the vows of Wmm’s priesthood, it’s no more ale for us.’

‘What? Bardek wine, then?’

‘None of that, either. Boiled water. On special feast days, spiced milk.’

Cavan made a sour face, and Rhys laughed at him. ‘At least we can marry,’ Rhys said. ‘I’d hate to be part of Bel’s priesthood.’

‘So would I.’ A pleasantly dark voice spoke behind them.

Cavan turned on the bench and saw a tall, slender young man, smiling at them. He wore his moonbeam-pale hair long to cover his ears, but his eyes gave him away: purple, and slit vertically like a cat’s. One of the fabled Westfolk, then, even though he wore a shirt and breeches like an ordinary man and the orange surcoat of the collegium.