“Speak to me,” Else said. He pushed the long dagger’s razor-sharp tip a quarter inch deeper into the space beneath the man’s right kneecap. Nothing. “There’ll be no help. Your longhaired friend left.” Still nothing. “If you have the brains God gave a toad...” The Sha-lug had a saying, You can’t fix stupid, said of crusader captains who fell for a trick more than once. This looked like it might be a major case of stupid. “You’re bothering me for a reason. I want to know what it is.” He probed a little deeper with the dagger.
Else saw the moment when the shock cleared enough for realization to strike home. The moment when understanding arrived.
The big man ground his teeth. “There is nothing I can tell you.” He spoke mechanically. “I was told to find Carpio. He would point you out. I would kill you in a brawl that Carpio would swear you started.”
“But Carpio took off right after he talked to you. Where do
you suppose he went? Who told you to kill the man he marked?”
“Starkden. The order came from Starkden.”
“Is that a man’s name?”
“Starkden is a woman. They say.”
Volunteered information. A good sign. A watershed in this relationship. “Be that as it may, Starkden sent you. Why?”
“Because she wanted you dead, I guess.”
“Why?” Shrug.
“Tell me about this woman. Including where I can find her.”
The big man knew nothing. He’d never met Starkden. He’d heard that she was an older woman, in her forties or even her fifties. If you did what she said she paid well. She supposedly had no political or religious axes to grind. Not that he cared about that stuff himself.
Else questioned the man for another ten minutes and learned nothing more. “All right, Ben.” The big fellow’s name was Be-natar Piola. “I want you to sit right there till your knee stops hurting. If you put any strain on it right away it’ll fold up, you’ll wreck the joint, and they’ll probably have to cut off your leg.” You could not fix stupid but you could use it.
Else called for wine for Ben, paid and left.
Once back at the factor house he told his story to anyone who would listen. He thought a legitimate traveler would do that. And he hoped somebody would have an idea about what really had happened. He got nothing for his trouble but insincere sympathy. He should have had sense enough not to frequent waterfront dives. Nobody seemed willing to guess who Starkden might be.
The morning he was supposed to board Vivia Infanti for Sonsa he received a summons through a house messenger. He followed nervously. Something must have gone wrong. Then he was sure it had when he found himself in a room with four older members of the Brotherhood of War.
“You’re Sir Aelford daSkees, homeward bound after service in the Holy Lands?” one asked. “I am.”
“I’m Parthen Lorica. From the Special Office. We’re interested in your encounter in the sailors’ tavern.”
“Why?”
“Excuse me?”
“I complained myself gray around here and the only thing anybody cared about was whether I owed anybody any money. Somebody’s out to kill daSkees? Better not let him have anything on credit.”
“Sound business practice.”
Else grimaced but kept his mouth shut.
“Someone passed the story on to us. And here we are. Interested.” Else responded with a grudging, “All right.”
“Tell us what happened. Try not to leave anything out. Any little detail might help. This might give us a chance to do something we’ve wanted for a long time.”
“Which would be?”
“To get a line on a witch and spy who calls herself Starkden.”
Else was tempted by the notion that any enemy of the Brotherhood of War was a friend of Else Tage. Only this particular enemy of the Brotherhood had paid to have Else Tage murdered.
Else told his story almost exactly as it had happened — discounting some creative editing on behalf of Nahlik and Mallin. “Those sailors you were sitting with. You didn’t know them?”
“No. The soberest two knew each other but not the unconscious drunk, I’m pretty sure, even though they carried him away. He was there when I sat down. Those two didn’t show up until a few minutes later.”
“And their names were Ren and Doy?”
“That’s what they said. I didn’t really care about diem. I was in there because the Lantern has Peqaad coffee and I developed a taste for that... I was trying to relax some before I travel again. I hate sea voyages. I get seasick. Bad.”
“Carpio and Benatar Piola were the other men?”
“Yes.”
“We know Carpio,” the oldest Brother said, speaking for the first time.
Lorica said, “Only a moron would trust Carpio with any secret. But someone must have hired him. So he’s a thread we can tug at. Piola shouldn’t be that hard to find, either.”
“Can you tell me anything about this woman who wanted me killed?”
“No. But only because we know so little ourselves. We’re hoping to change that. Why would she want to kill you?”
“Please don’t start that. I’ve already got my brain twisted into knots trying to figure that out. The only thing that makes any sense to me is, somebody picked the wrong target That Carpio. If he was following me around, maybe he followed me from here. Maybe he was supposed to follow somebody else who was staying here.”
“Possible, I suppose. Or Starkden might think you’re someone else in disguise. Who could she mistake you for?” Else shrugged. “I’ve spent my whole adult life fighting for Triamolin. I don’t own anything worth stealing, in the Holy Lands or back home in Tramaine. I’m carrying my whole fortune with me. Who would this woman be spying for?”
“Rumors have linked her to the Patriarch, to the Eastern Emperor, and to Hansel Blackboots. Do any of them have any treason to kill you?”
“Hardly.”
Lorica added, “Starkden has been associated with the Unbeliever, too. With Lucidia in particular.”
“I never had much to do with them. We mostly dealt with tribal raiders that Dreanger bribed to harass us. Except for the battle at the Well of Days. Which I missed because I was laid up with a wound from a poisoned arrow.”
Parthen Lorica told him, “We’ve been forthcoming with you. We hope you have with us. You’re leaving aboard Infanti. If anything turns up before she sails we’ll send a message.”
“I appreciate that.” It was a generous gesture. These men respected what they believed him to be. But he hoped they would have no success. Success could mean them finding out that Starkden really was after a Sha-lug chieftain pretending to be Aelford daSkees.
He devoted himself to mental exercises meant to conquer stress. Success eluded him. He envisioned a pretty little blonde girl, a toddler grinning wildly as she tried to walk toward him.
He puzzled that until he realized that she must be his sister. And that left him with the icy chills.
Normally, he failed miserably when he tried to remember his family. Which was surprising. The boys of the Vibrant Spring, while they were still little, remembered their families. Their mothers, especially. And spent a lot of silent tears in the darkness, when their instructors could not see.
***
ELSE BOARDED VIVIA INFANTI SHORTLY AFTER NOON, HAVING eaten nothing all morning. The ship was still taking on cargo when he arrived. He spied both Mallin and Nahlik on the quay.
A Sonsan seaman checked his name off a list. Another man, wearing a pipe on a chain around his neck, drew him aside. “Sir Aelford, the stuff you sent ahead is in your personal locker, up forward. I’ll show you.”
Vivia Infanti did not resemble the long, lean sharks of war that Else had seen while approaching Staklirhod. She was a huge wooden bathtub with exaggerated castles on either end, a hundred and thirty feet from stem to stern and fifty-five wide at the beam. A monster of a merchant ship, probably originally meant to transport soldiers eastward on the crusader routes.
>
There were stowage lockers below the rails up forward, obviously installed as an afterthought. The seaman opened a hatch on what proved to be a cubicle slightly more than two feet in each dimension.
“This will keep your stuff from sliding around. Or washing overboard in bad weather. It won’t keep anything from getting stolen. It won’t keep anything dry if we do run into any weather. Use it accordingly.”
“Thank you.” Else considered the small oilskin bundle lying inside. The bundle contained written instructions from Gordimer. He was not allowed to open them until he was on his way to Sonsa.
Else stowed his gear, shut the locker, and joined Enio Scolora at the landward rail. Scolora said, “I heard the Witchfinders had you in.”
“Who? The Brothers I talked to this morning? They wanted to know what happened at the Rusted Lantern. What nobody else cared about.”
“I heard it was Parthen Lonca and Bugo Armiena. “One said his name was Lorica.”
“That’s them. They’re from the Special Office. They hunt down ghosts and demons and sorcerers and whatnot. You don’t want to get noticed by them.”
“What? Tell me about this Special Office.”
“You didn’t have the Brotherhood underfoot in Triamolin, I take it.”
“Triamolin is the back end of beyond. We’re still there only because it isn’t worth the trouble of kicking us out.”
Scolora related a long tale about fanatics hidden inside the already fanatic Brotherhood. Men with strong sorcerous talents who wanted nothing less than the extinction of the tyranny of the night.
Else did not understand. The things of the night were no more evil than lions or hyenas. They did what God made them do, like dogs and flies and rainbows. They might be dangerous and deadly but so might any other part of the natural order. The tyranny of the night was part of the world and life.
Scolora shrugged. “They got it made. They can afford to be fanatic. They live out here where the night ain’t part of their life every minute of every single day.” Which it was amongst the Wells of Ihrian, more so than anywhere else in the world.
“How do they manage when they visit the Holy Lands?”
“They grumble a lot. And take it out on the Pramans. Word is, though, something happened over there mat’s got them all stirred up.”
“Uhm?”
“I think somebody skragged some kind of big deal spook thing. Just a regular guy, not a wizard. They want to know how he did it.” Sailors asked Else and Scolora to move away from the rail. They began singling up the mooring lines. Boats gathered to nudge the vessel away from the quay and toward the channel. Vivia Infanti depended entirely on sail power. Eliminating oarsmen offered huge labor savings.
There was a ghost of a breeze directly on the ship’s beam, pushing her toward the quay. The oarsmen in the boats earned their pay. The deck force did not take in the fenders until Infanti was thirty feet out from the quay and her bow was swinging toward the channel.
The first small sails broke. Infanti soon held her heading on her own, and crept forward, though without adequate steerage way. More sails spread.
Else said, “The master of this tub is good.”
“He wasn’t, he wouldn’t be her master. Sonsans are practical and pragmatic in the extreme. You all right?”
“I’m never all right when there’s water under me instead of dirt. Big things with lots of teeth live down there. And they all want to eat me.”
Scolora chuckled. “You get seasick, eh?”
The merchantman put more way on. She eased into the channel and ranged the lighthouse that marked the mouth of the harbor. Once Vivia Infanti passed that two-hundred-foot-tall brick structure she would be on open seas and Else would feel more and more like he had fallen off the edge of the world. “Yes.”
Infanti’s master lined her on the range markers. Signalmen exchanged messages with the harbormaster ashore and the traffic watchers in the lighthouse. There was a lot of traffic at Runch.
Excitement broke out on the stern castle. One of the signalmen called for the ship’s master. Else said, “Something’s up.”
“They can’t get anything past you, can they?” The ship’s master, first officer, and several others closed in on the signalmen. After two minutes of wigwags the chief boatswain shouted orders to the deck crew to get the sails taken in. The helmsman took the ship to starboard, out of the channel. She lost way. Shortly, the anchor chain squealed and rattled.
“Bet that there is the reason why,” Scolora said, indicating a longboat putting out from the small quay at the foot of Mount Calen, which was crowned by the Castella Anjela dolla Kcolina, headquarters of the Brotherhood of War. “Somebody wants a ride.”
Else hoped that was all.
The ship’s master barked. The deck hands began herding passengers belowdecks. Demands to know what was going on received no answer.
The working crew followed the passengers, no more pleased about their situation. The ratings and officers followed diem, until no one remained above decks but the ship’s master himself.
Else heard a boat come alongside and scrape against the hull. People clambered aboard. There was a muffled, heated exchange on deck. That faded away.
Crew and passengers alike virtually exploded onto the open deck when permission came down.
There was nothing to be seen now but a longboat headed toward the quay below Castella Anjela dolla Picolina. The ship’s master resumed issuing orders. The crew prepared to get under way again.
An hour later no one knew more than what was obvious immediately. Scolora was of the opinion that, “It’s somebody from the Special Office. A big-time sorcerer. Something’s going on, Alf. This is history in the making. And we’re right here in the middle of it.” That excited him.
Else was not excited. He feared that he was why Vivia Infanti had stopped.
No sign was seen of any Brotherhood passenger. If such a creature existed he did his own cooking. The ship’s cook was not fixing anything for any secret traveler. No one had been evicted from his quarters.
***
THE WEST COAST OF FIRALDIA, APPROACHING SONSA FROM THE south, was the most heavily settled rural land Else had ever seen. Every headland boasted some kind of fortress or watch-tower. The land sloped down steeply to the Mother Sea.
Sea traffic was heavy. Any boat that came within hailing distance tried to sell something.
“They’re all out because the weather is so nice,” Scolora said. “You have to take advantage of the good days.”
“Sounds like words to live by.” Else had grown comfortable with Scolora. Enio talked constantly but asked few questions. Enio did not mind the silent veteran type. A lot of old soldiers were that way.
Several other passengers were headed home from the Holy Lands. The lot formed a clique. The remaining passengers were pilgrims who had gone to visit the Wells of Ihrian. Else, Scolora, and two others from farther west had agreed to continue on from Sonsa together. Else wondered how he could get shut of Scolora long enough to disappear.
He had not managed enough privacy to look at his sealed orders. Gordimer’s packet contained a dozen letters, each to be opened only after he reached a prescribed point in his mission. There were three letters he was supposed to read before he reached Sonsa. They remained unopened. He worried. There might be some critical detail that needed handling... though he doubted that Gordimer fussed worse than a clutch of old women.
“Looking forward to getting home?” Scolora asked.
“Not really. It won’t be anything like what I remember. Everybody I knew will be old or dead.”
Scolora made a sour face. “You sure as fuck take the fun out, Alf. Now you got me thinking I’m heading for a foreign country.”
“There was an old Deve in Triamolin who used to say that.”
“Huh? What?”
“That the past is a foreign country. I keep thinking I’m dreaming and pretty soon I’ll wake up on my own cot back in Triamolin.”
“Yeah? Dream about that. That’s the outer lightship.” Enio had visited Sonsa before. Sonsa proper was a riverine city eight miles inland. Vivia Infanti would travel from lightship to lightship until regular river buoys became visible. A pilot waiting on this first lightship would take control for the rest of the journey.
That pilot came aboard. Hours passed. The ship proceeded slowly. Else grumbled, “We’re going to spend a whole day just covering the last few miles.”
“Bet you they’ll let you get out and walk.”
“Probably would,” he admitted. “I’ll be a new man once I get some dirt under my feet.” He knew his companions were tired of his complaints.
“We’re looking forward to it, pal.” It did take almost all day to climb the Sawn River to Sonsa’s great waterfront. Else marveled at the strange, busy buildings, all so tall, so ornate, so gaily painted Al-Qarn was a dun city of mud brick, low, square buildings, the only color the awnings merchants used to identify their trade. The Kaif did not like color.
Vivia Infanti passed berth after open berth. Else asked one of the sailors why.
“Those don’t belong to us. They’re Red or Blue. Infanti is a Durandanti ship. The Durandanti are Greens.”
Color was a facet of Chaldarean culture that baffled Else. In the Eastern Empire, in the Firaldian kingdoms and republics, in the principalities along the Promptean coast, anywhere that the Old Brothen Empire had had an enduring impact, the populace divided into two or more Colors. These days those usually identified political factions. Colors had begun, in antiquity, as wagering societies and fan groups of team events at the circus and hippodrome.
Sonsa claimed it was the most important mercantile force on the Mother Sea. Aparion and Dateon disagreed. Platadura, over in Praman Direcia, offered a nay-say of its own. Sonsa showed a unified, determined face to the world but the squabbles of the factions at home were worse than those of spoiled children. Without rational basis in the eyes of outsiders.
There were no doctrinal or ideological conflicts. Just a perpetual, intractable contest for control of the state. As in local politics everywhere in Firaldia, it all came down to families.