Lord of the Silent Kingdom

  Not good, Hecht thought. Sublime could start lining up a whole new clutch of creditors. Getting ready to make more people die.

  “Sergeant, I fear we’ll be visiting the Connec again, before long.”

  “Sir, I wish I could say you’re wrong. And I’m not looking forward to it. Our next visit isn’t going to be nearly as sweet as the last one.”

  “It was sweet last time?”

  “It should’ve been. And would’ve been. If the black side of the Night hadn’t taken hold of Bishop Serifs.”

  “The man did do everything he could to make people hate him.”

  “The guys in there now are probably even worse.”

  “No doubt. Where’s Sedlakova? I haven’t seen him all morning. I need to know if we can make those hounds bark.” He meant the cannons. Devedian artisans had cast and crafted them, based on a design he recalled from the east. The Sha-lug falcon was supposed to be a secret weapon. The Deves of Firaldia, though, had turned out to know more about firepowder weapons than ever he had, and understood them better.

  Bechter said, “He’s having trouble keeping his firepowder dry enough to go bang.”

  True. Sedlakova would handle that by baking the powder at a low heat, carefully keeping it away from any flame.

  Hecht opened the courier packet. “Messenger. You see any of the rioting yourself?”

  “No, sir. The Castella did go on alert. So did the Patriarchal Guard. But the City Regiment handled it.”

  “And they still won’t keep Pinkus on,” Hecht muttered. The Five Families wanted to shed the costs of the City Regiment, finding it not worth the price if they could not use it against one another. “Go ahead,” he told the courier. “I’m listening.” He read while the man talked.

  Titus Consent was right about his former co-religionists. They remained cooperative.

  Consent had joined the expedition. He was inside Clearenza now. No siege had been set. Hecht was mounting a demonstration meant to intimidate Duke Germa. If fon Dreasser remained stubborn, and his Imperial friends lent no more support than they had to this point, he would summon additional troops and lay a real siege.

  The other side knew the plan as well as he did.

  Word of Sublime’s financial windfall would be spreading. The troops would be more cooperative.

  Hecht’s natural cynicism made him wonder if Sublime hadn’t planted the story.

  How could Sublime be thwarted if the Anne of Menand story was true?

  How would that much specie be moved from Salpeno to Brothe? Any number of people might be tempted to interfere. Grolsach, in particular, would be dangerous. Those people were hungry enough to dare holding up the Church itself.

  A roll of thunder off toward Clearenza got his attention. Sergeant Bechter, Drago Prosek, and the courier started, suddenly frightened.

  They had not heard the hounds bark before.

  Hecht said, “I hope that stone comes down somewhere that will impress the Duke.” He had no real hope, though. The hounds threw a stone that weighed about ten pounds. That would not do the damage caused by traditional stone-casters. But the hounds were impressively loud and smoky and could hurl their missiles a lot farther.

  “Unless we have a spot of luck they’ll put holes in a few roofs and let in the drizzle,” Bechter said.

  “Tell you the truth, I’d as soon go home and get out of the weather.”

  “Sir, if I had a woman like yours I wouldn’t ever have left.”

  “I’ll mention your appreciation, Sergeant. I’m sure she’ll agree.”

  Bechter reddened.

  “And here’s a note from the boss himself. Wants us to be quick and wrap this up on account of he’s got other work for us. Are you sneering at our master, Sergeant?”

  “Not me, sir. He’s the Infallible Voice of God.”

  Drago Prosek was appalled. Hecht said, “Prosek, go check out the houses south of the city. Find us a place. Duke Germa’s would be good, if we fit. You. Courier. There’s a mess tent about thirty yards back there. Go get warmed up. Get some sleep. I won’t have anything for you to take back till tomorrow.”

  After a moment, Bechter asked, “Why did you get rid of them?”

  “You were giving them apoplexy. They both really believe the Patriarch is the Living Voice of God.”

  “They’ll get older. What else?”

  Bechter was getting to know him. “Titus Consent is headed this way. He shouldn’t be back this soon.”

  There was another boom. Different. Louder. Less directed. Hecht sighed. “I hope they were behind something before they matched that fuse. Because that sounded like it blew up.” Which had been a big problem during the development of the weapons in Dreanger.

  Titus Consent slipped in through the closed back of the tent, looking for eavesdroppers hiding in corners that were not there.

  “You found out something special?” Hecht asked. “I didn’t expect you for a few more days.”

  “Plans have to adapt to circumstance.”

  “Good news? Or bad?”

  “Depends on what you want to do and who you are.”

  “You going to play games with me?”

  “No. I came back because I thought we could … Shit!”

  “Language, young man. Language.”

  Consent grinned, showing bright, perfect teeth. “What was that?”

  “One of the hounds barking. I didn’t think you’d be surprised.” A second boom followed a moment later. Which meant that there had not been a blowup, after all. Hecht told Bechter, “Go check that out.

  Find out what that odd bang was before.”

  Sergeant Bechter nodded. “Of course, sir. Of course.”

  A moment later, Consent said, “You didn’t need to send him away.”

  “That wasn’t the point. I do want to know what happened. There was an explosion. It sounded like one of the hounds blew up. Those things are expensive. And almost as dangerous to their crews as to their targets. So. Why are you back already?”

  “They aren’t taking us serious. It’s business as usual over there. The Duke’s men and some advisers from the Grail Empire have been looking at the defenses and talking about reinforcing the gates, but they aren’t in any hurry. Two hundred men don’t scare them. They don’t expect us to get help from our garrisons. And they expect reinforcements of their own.”

  “How soon?”

  “I don’t know. Because they didn’t. But Lothar promised to send a company of Braunsknechts.”

  “Not good, that. But the first shipment of money from Anne of Menand has arrived. That should alter the balance of power.”

  Consent looked skeptical. “In that case, I recommend we move right now.”

  “Tell me what you’re thinking.”

  Titus Consent had in mind jumping on Clearenza with both feet before anybody thought there was the least chance that the Captain-General would do anything but show the flag.

  The night sky began to clear as the Patriarchals stole toward the city. They made very little noise, except by snarling at one another to keep quiet. A fragment of moon kept trying to peek through cold clouds that promised snow.

  Clearenza’s north gate was a minor one. It served agricultural traffic. The gate was shut, but not so the sally port built into it. That was not secured because illicit traffic, avoiding tariffs and customs duties, moved in and out by night. Titus Consent and several obvious Devedians took point. Those who were not Episcopal Chaldareans were subject to a weighty head tax by day.

  The guards were not alert. So much not so that all the sneaking went to waste. The only guard awake enough to demand bribes was so focused on a jug of wine that he found himself tied up before he understood what was happening. His only comment was, “Oh, shit!”

  Piper Hecht muttered, “Is this a trap? Can they possibly be this lax with an enemy outside?” Though he saw the same loose attitude every day, everywhere. There was no professional tradition amongst Firaldian soldiers. Maybe because they
did not get into many real fights. “Please tell me this isn’t a trap.”

  “They’ve been setting it up for ten years if it is.”

  “Really?” Did Pinkus Ghort’s adventure here predate that time? Or was his story about service here another tall tale?

  “This was the easy part,” Consent said. “Now we have to reach the citadel without raising an alarm. If they lock us out …”

  “Thought the Duke goes whoring every night.”

  “Not every night. He’s not as young as he used to be. But a lot.”

  “None of us are as young as we used to be. Send your lead teams.”

  Three teams of three men each headed for sporting houses Duke Germa was known to frequent. They would do nothing but find out if the man was there. That would be obvious. He dragged a retinue everywhere he went. A runner would carry word from each location to Consent. He would be waiting outside the citadel. If fon Dreasser was out, they would try to capture the citadel gate. The Duke always left it open when he went out on the prowl. Or such had been his custom since the advent of the Patriarchals had forced him to abandon his manor outside the wall.

  Hecht told Bechter, “If we don’t bring this off, I’ll make him hurt by using his manor for our headquarters.”

  “Aren’t we supposed to respect his properties? Sublime wants him back in the fold.”

  “I must’ve misunderstood my instructions.”

  Bechter grunted. He was recovering from the hike from camp. He was in shape for his age, but he was his age, trying to keep up with men mostly younger than the Captain-General.

  Hecht said, “That’s enough head start.” Consent’s band was five minutes gone. “Move out by squads.

  Quietly.” The group leaders had been briefed by Titus Consent but Hecht was sure somebody would get lost. Clearenza was not vast but it was old and had grown organically. Streets meandered and were not marked.

  Confusion was the natural state of combat. Hecht hoped to cause more of that on the other side than plagued his own. His men supposedly knew what to do even if they got turned around.

  Hecht offered an encouraging word to each departing team leader. He did not want anyone getting killed.

  He shuddered suddenly, touched by an unexpected chill. It was not the weather. Maybe it was his imagination.

  Or maybe not. Sergeant Bechter murmured, “You felt that, sir?”

  “Sergeant?”

  “You shivered. It was a cold presence. I don’t know how else to put it. Like there’s something here.

  Right behind you. Looking over your shoulder.”

  “And there’s nothing there when you look.”

  “Yes, sir.” That almost defined the Instrumentalities of the Night. “I’ve been feeling that a lot, lately.”

  “As have I.” But that just puzzled him more. If there was something of the Night out there, close by, of the magnitude suggested by the creeps he and Bechter felt, his wrist ought to be hurting so bad that he would be thinking about cutting his amulet off.

  “Stay alert,” Hecht told the men who would stay at the gate. “Let those guys tied up in the guardroom be your inspiration. Sergeant, let’s go.”

  In the dark street, headed for the citadel, Hecht concluded that there was only one way his amulet would not function in the presence of the Instrumentalities of the Night. Because er-Rashal al-Dhulquarnen, the man who had created it, did not want it to work.

  Only Gordimer the Lion and the Rascal knew the amulet existed. Gordimer would not know how to get around it.

  But why would the sorcerer want to kill Else Tage?

  Hecht had not been able to work that out. He was sure er-Rashal had been trying from the moment he had left Dreanger. And possibly from even earlier.

  Someone had raised that bogon in Esther’s Wood, near the Well of Calamity, beside the Plain of Judgment. He had slain it. And by doing so had demonstrated a hitherto unsuspected vulnerability of the Instrumentalities of the Night.

  Death had stalked him ever since.

  There was fighting at the citadel entrance. There were occasional pops inside, suggesting that the men were discharging their handheld firearms in spite of orders to save them for something supernatural.

  Hecht understood why. Those weapons could bring an enemy down while he was still too far away to hurt you back.

  One of his subalterns reported, “We surprised them, sir. But we had some bad luck. They surprised us back.”

  “How?”

  “There are Braunsknecht guards in there. We don’t know how many, but they aren’t staying neutral.”

  “What about that, Titus? You didn’t know they were here?”

  “I knew there were advisers. I told you. I thought there were only a few. That’s what people outside thought. We don’t have to take the citadel, though. The Duke is holed up in a sporting house. I’ve sent men to dig him out.”

  Rapid popping inside signaled a counterattack by the defenders.

  “Good.” Hecht gathered his officers. “We don’t push back unless Lieutenant Consent has his signals crossed. But we’ll hang on here till we have the Duke. Titus. Don’t wander off. Bechter. I need stuff to start a fire.” That ought to win Sublime a new crop of hatred.

  A fresh chill made him shudder. He looked around. Spectators had begun to gather in the moonlight, at a distance. They twitched every time there was a pop inside the fortress. “Bechter. Break that crowd up before it gets tempted to turn into a mob.”

  “Yes, sir.” Bechter grabbed several men who had nothing else to do.

  Consent reported, “There’s word, sir. They’ve got him. They’re headed for the gate. We should think about going.”

  “Excellent. You men. Get that fire started.” That would make it hard for the Duke’s men to come to his rescue.

  Bechter fell in beside Hecht as they left the city. “Sir, there was a man in that crowd back there that we’ve seen before.”

  “Uhm?”

  “In Brothe. He’s a little under average height, average frame, hair well trimmed. Beard likewise. No hair on the cheeks. Head and chin both brown, so he’s probably not a native. Salted with gray. Gray eyes.

  Forty to fifty years old. He looks pretty much like Grade Drocker did at the same age. Make that like Drocker would’ve looked if he didn’t get mutilated.”

  “Really?” He would have to consult Principatè Delari about that.

  He thought he had seen the man Bechter meant. Without noting any resemblance to Drocker. Whom he had not known unmutilated. He had had only a few glimpses of the sorcerer earlier. “Was he wearing brown?”

  “Yes, sir. And every time I’ve noticed him it’s been right after that creepy feeling came on.”

  “Worth remembering. Keep an eye out once we’re back in Brothe. I’ll see if I can’t get the Collegium after him.”

  The Patriarch himself came out for Piper Hecht’s report on the Clearenza operation, though the Captain-General never spoke to him directly. By the time the Collegium assembled Sublime had accepted Germa fon Dreasser’s ransom and the Duke was headed home. The soldiers were not pleased. They had received no share of the ransom. There had been casualties, though just a few and only two of those fatalities.

  Hecht told Anna, “I can’t fathom this man’s mind. He doesn’t understand people at all. Next week he’ll tell my men to go break up one of those riots. And he won’t be able to figure out why they just stand around watching.”

  “It’s getting scary here, Piper.”

  Her tone got his attention. “Yes?”

  “It isn’t just the riots. I don’t feel safe outside anymore. I don’t like the kids going out. Not since that man was killed. I always feel like somebody is watching me. Even stalking me. The kids feel it, too.”

  “I’ll talk to Pella. He understands the streets better than you or I do.”

  Anna was not impressed. He needed to make a better showing. “There’s an advantage to being the Captain-General of the Armies of the Faith
.”

  “Other than being able to fling around an overweight title?”

  “Yes. I can tell people to do things. And they do them. Even if they think it’s crazy to hold exercises in a neighborhood like this. They’ll do what I say because they’re afraid they won’t get paid.”

  “And what does all that mean?”

  “That I can come around here and turn the whole neighborhood over. And claim it’s business. I’d be hunting heretics.”

  Heretics were about to become big business. There was a lot of talk about heresy in the Collegium, mostly among Sublime’s cronies. Preparing minds for what they hoped would come.

  “Bring that idiot Morcant Farfog. Maybe the boogeyman will get him.”

  Hecht had not met Bishop Farfog. He knew little about the man other than that he headed the Patriarchal Office for the Suppression of Sacrilege and Heresy, with the title of Chief Inquestor. Rumor had the monasteries emptying out as monks signed up to help.

  What little Hecht knew about Farfog suggested that he was more foul than Bishop Serifs of Antieux had been.

  Why did Sublime favor such men?

  “Clever work in Clearenza,” Principatè Delari told Hecht, joining him in the baths. Osa Stile smirked from behind the Principatè.

  “Thank you, sir. Lieutenant Consent deserves most of the credit.”

  “And you used his information to sculpt a plan. You made the decision to go.”

  “Uh …”

  “You took a chance. It paid off. Most men would have dithered like Tormond IV, never confident enough to jump. We suffer from an absence of decisiveness. Everyone wants a sure thing.”

  “We sure got a surprise when we discovered those Braunsknechts.” Though the Imperials had gotten a big surprise themselves.

  Delari chuckled.

  Herren and Vernal seemed a little starstruck this morning. And unusually friendly. “Stop that!” Hecht told Vernal.

  Delari chuckled again. “Everybody loves a winner.”

  “There’s a problem, sir.”

  “I don’t like the sound of that. What?”

  “I thought it was my imagination till Sergeant Bechter mentioned having the same problem.”