He asked, “Is there some military cause for alarm? Or am I just here because His Holiness is in a snit?”
He needed to show a little respect here. These men had known Honario Benedocto since childhood.
Doneto nodded. “There is. The Grail Emperor is probably behind fon Dreasser’s defection. With an eye to extending his influence into the Aco floodplain.”
“Is that more of a problem now than the last time fon Dreasser switched allegiances?”
For a moment the Patriarch’s cousin seemed unwilling to share secrets. Then he shrugged. ‘This puts another Imperial stronghold at our backs.”
“So. His Holiness still wants to plunder the Connec.”
The Empire had neutralized a parade of Patriarchs by forcing them to concentrate on protecting the Patriarchal States. The spate of cooperation during the Calziran Crusade was an anomaly. That truce lasted only till the last Praman kingdom on the Firaldian peninsula fell.
“I’m afraid so.”
“Not good, Principatè.” Clearenza was ideally sited for interdicting traffic on both the central north-south military road and the east-west highway skirting the foothills of the Jago Mountains and the Ownvidian Knot. Nor would it be a long ride to interfere with barge traffic on the Aco River, or traffic on the eastern military road, which swung inland to cross the most downriver bridge spanning the Aco. “Especially if Clearenza’s neighbors harbor grievances of their own.”
Principatè Doneto appeared slightly embarrassed. Principatè Madisetti sneered.
Hecht asked, “His Holiness owes them money, too?”
“All of them,” Madisetti growled.
“I don’t want to seem defeatist. But if His Holiness won’t pay his debts, yet keeps on spending, how can he not expect difficulties? Won’t he listen to Your Graces?”
“No,” Donel Madisetti admitted. “Voting for that man may have been the biggest mistake I ever made.”
Interesting. This was the sort of news Gordimer the Lion hoped to glean when he sent his best captain over here. Though he meant to distance a potential threat as well.
Captain Else Tage had been too popular with the Sha-lug.
Principatè Doneto grumbled, “Sometimes I wish Honario wasn’t family. But he does have a flair for intrigue. He has something going in the Connec. He says it will take care of his debts.” Doneto did not sound convinced. “And Lothar Ege’s obstruction …” He stopped. Secrets escaped even the deepest heart of the Chiaro Palace.
Hecht wished Principatè Delari had not gone down to question the prisoners.
Principatè Delari had a taste for boys. His current favorite was Armand. Armand was an agent of Ferris Renfrow. And of Dreanger. Gordimer had presented the boy to Renfrow during one of the Imperial spymaster’s visits to al-Qarn. Armand’s real name was Osa Stile. He had been trained and rendered permanently youthful by er-Rashal al-Dhulquarnen.
The old man shared everything with his lover. Who, most observers assumed, was too self-absorbed and scatter-brained to care the slightest about things political, religious, or military. Armand just wanted to be spoiled with sweet scents, rich foods, and pretty clothes.
Piper Hecht saw the boy seldom and was glad of it. What had been done to Osa Stile was too terrible.
The slavery of the Sha-lug should not be that cruel.
Osa gave every indication of enjoying his life.
Er-Rashal had known what he was doing when he chose the boy.
Principatè Delari returned, still angry. “They knew nothing. Of course. They were hirelings. Two belonged to the City Regiment, Colonel Ghort. The deathmage and his brother were outsiders.”
Pinkus Ghort showed color in throat and cheeks, anger and embarrassment alike. “Who paid them? Who recruited them? Would the two who got away know anything more?”
“Unlikely,” Delari said. “But we do know where they’re headed, now. The Knight of Wands. An inn in a town named Alicea. The entire team was supposed to reassemble there.”
Hecht and Ghort produced skeptical scowls. Both knew Alicea. They had first met not far from Alicea.
Hecht said, “The West Way runs through the town. Crossing the trace running east from Sonsa. Pinkus, if you sent Bo by sea he could be there waiting for them.”
“I changed my mind. They know Bo. They’d recognize anybody I trust.”
“You have to send somebody who’ll recognize them.”
“I don’t know. I’m thinking some of your Deve pals might be the answer.”
Grumbling from Donel Madisetti reminded them that I hey were not brainstorming in their quarters.
Hecht’s too-friendly association with the Devedian community did cause stress with some Collegium members. “Won’t work. They’re only trying to stay out of the way of a crusade themselves.” Which was true, well known, and no doubt would, someday, constitute sufficient excuse itself for a Patriarch with Sublime’s twist of mind to go after them.
Devedians, and their less numerous and far stranger religious ancestors the Dainshaukin, were loathed by Episcopal Chaldareans. The more because western society could not function without them. Deves provided an inordinate proportion of the lettered and artisan classes. They kept the records and wrote the letters, made the paper those were written on, and manufactured the pens that did the writing. Not all, of course, but better than anyone else. And so they were hated.
Hecht mused, “Then again, I know one who might. But we’re here because of Clearenza. Where do we stand?”
He hoped there would be no punitive expedition. The Patriarchal army was not up to it. As always, it was tied up in garrison wherever Sublime feared rebellion or some encroachment by the Grail Emperor.
It was a purely defensive force and the Captain-General was not being given the resources to change that. Not fast.
Principatè Doneto broke Hecht’s heart. “I’m sure my cousin will insist on something. As a demonstration.”
“It can’t happen. Not now. He’s too far in arrears to the troops.”
“He’ll send the City Regiment, then.”
Ghort snorted.
Hecht said, “The City Regiment isn’t his to send. It was raised for the Calziran Crusade. That’s over. The men who financed it didn’t get any loot out of that. They won’t take the same hook twice.”
Doneto replied, “I know. But I have to read my lines.”
Interesting. The Patriarch’s number one supporter was not inspired by his cousin’s behavior.
“Would it help if someone he trusted drove each point home?”
“He pays no attention to what I say if it’s something he doesn’t want to hear.”
“I was thinking more like his father or mother. Or somebody he especially respected when he was a kid.”
“That hadn’t occurred to me. I’ll do what I can. But don’t expect much.”
Hecht nodded, disgruntled. This gathering, slapped together with such suggested high drama, was typical. Every day he had to deal with crises that existed only in the minds of the Patriarch and his henchmen. And with their implacable blindness to the needs of the men they expected to work their wills.
One irony of the world round the Mother Sea was that only during periods of peace and security was there economic activity sufficient to generate the revenues princes needed to finance their wars. The Church, in particular, needed money because the Patriarchy did not have enough fiefdoms whose feudal obligations could be exploited. The Church used mostly hired soldiers. But those mercenaries were seldom dedicated or reliable. Or even very effective. As all the defeats suffered by Grolsachers so frequently demonstrated.
Principatè Doneto suggested, “Let’s break this up. We’ve done His Holiness’s bidding. We agree that punishing Clearenza may be more painful for us than them. Hecht, put together the best show you can.
Ghort, catch your traitors. Donel. Wake Mongoz so he can close this officially.”
Several Principatès wanted to protest but were not inclined to argue with the
Patriarch’s cousin.
***
PRINCIPATÈ DELARI TOLD HECHT, “COME WITH ME, please.”
Hecht did so, though he wanted to stay with Ghort, to manufacture a scheme for catching the fugitives.
He was uncomfortable being alone with Muniero Delari. Despite his intellectual confidence that the man was not interested in him. He was far too elderly. He was thirty-five.
Principatè Delari sensed his discomfort. And did nothing to allay it. “It’s time to bring you into the inner circle.”
“Your Grace?”
“The Collegium is more than a clatch of doddering old farts squabbling over bribes.” A popular notion underlying an entire cycle of contemptuous jokes.
“Well, of course.”
“We occasionally do things we hope will do some good for humanity. Some of us. Sometimes. Even people here in the Palace don’t realize.”
“All right.”
“You sound skeptical.”
“Your Grace, I judge only by what I’ve seen.”
“And that is?”
“What the man in the street thinks. Only more so. Because I’ve met the beast face-to-face.”
Delari chuckled. “And that isn’t far off the mark. Particularly my brethren from the Patriarchal States.
They exist to indulge their own pleasures. They have their capes and miters because they bought them.
Or because they’re Brothens whose families always have members in the Collegium. If for no better reason than to make sure the Patriarch is always Brothen.”
“Yes. I’ve never understood how Ornis of Cedelete got elected.” Hecht meant Worthy VI, the first Anti-Patriarch. Worthy VI was elected legitimately — then run out of town by the Brothen mob. The people of the Mother City believed the Patriarchal seat was Brothen by right and preeminent over the Chaldarean world. In fact, however, the earlier Brothen Patriarchs had been but one of nine equal Fathers of the Church. The Praman Conquest overwhelmed five. Three others went with the Eastern Rite in the schism after the Second Synod of Hypraxium.
“He was elected because an angry Collegium, including Principatès from the Five Families, were fed up with a string of arrogant Bruglioni Patriarchs.”
Hecht did not comment.
“The lesson seems to have gone to waste.”
Hecht held his tongue. Delari held Honario Benedocto in high disdain.
The Principatè led him to the baths for which the Chiaro Palace was infamous. In Hecht’s eye. He used them himself only to avert suspicion. The way he ate pork and broke countless other religious laws. So he told himself.
Never again would he be the hard, razor-edged warrior who had captained the best company of special fighters ever fielded by the Sha-lug. Brothe had ruined him.
Delari’s boy Armand awaited his master. He smirked as he helped Delari disrobe. “Would you like someone to assist you, Captain-General?” The boy’s voice had yet to break. He was an excellent singer.
“Herrin and Vernal will be along.” Those being the youngsters who bathed him regularly. He made no personal demands on them — though the rules did not permit a bather to force himself on the orphans who served there.
The baths were a sort of charity, providing employment for Brothe’s more comely orphans.
The rules were tested occasionally. Principatè Delari was in mild violation by bringing his own catamite in.
There would be no complaints. The whole Chiaro Palace feared Muniero Delari. He was reputed to be a powerful sorcerer.
Principatè Muniero Delari was famous for, and sometimes hated for, his determination to do what best served the Church as a whole.
Hecht was repelled by Delari unclad. The man was a pallid old stick figure veined with ugly blue, like an Arnhander cheese. He resembled an artist’s caricature of death, as in some paintings hanging in the Palace’s miles of hallways. He smelled old, even after his baths.
Hecht could not imagine how Osa Stile had congress with that.
Delari said, “If you’re as unlucky as I am and survive as long as I have, you’ll be a repulsive old man yourself.”
Hecht started. Delari had a disconcerting knack for knowing what he was thinking.
Osa sneered.
Herrin and Vernal arrived. Both were tall and thin. Both were of an age where they would be expected to find other employment soon. Herrin had blossomed dramatically of late. She was an attractive blonde burdened by a dour personality. An eventuation Hecht thought ought to mar all children compelled to serve in order to survive. Then reflected that he had not turned out badly despite having been kidnapped and sold into slavery as a toddler.
Vernal lived up to her name. She was bright and cheerful. Evil fortune could not crush her natural optimism. Hecht had, occasionally, considered sending Vernal to serve Anna Mozilla. Anna could use the help. Being what she was, and having who she had for a lover, though, left her unwilling to have anyone stay in full time.
Vernal shared a birthday with Herrin and was as tall but had not yet bloomed. Hecht suspected that she would not change much once she did.
Osa and the girls led Delari and Hecht to an unoccupied hot pool. Once he settled, Hecht asked, “How do you think Sublime will respond to Clearenza’s defection?”
Armand’s ears pricked up. Delari seemed puzzled by the question.
Hecht said, “The others think he’ll do something stupid. You’ve known him since he was a pup. Will he?”
“Probably. Thinking he’s being clever.”
“But he will insist on doing something? Even if Lothar is serious about protecting fon Dreasser?”
Armand paid close attention.
“Even more certainly if the Grail Empire gets involved. He’s sure Lothar is a weakling. Despite the evidence so far. He’s also sure the boy won’t live much longer. Despite the contrary evidence there. If he could hasten Lothar’s passage into the hereafter, he’d probably do it. Thinking the sisters will be weaker than the boy.”
“I don’t know about Katrin. I saw Helspeth on the battlefield. She’s young and female but that apple didn’t fall far from the tree.”
“As may be. Right now I want you to see what we do that could be of more enduring consequence.”
“Since it’s so secret that I don’t know about it already, should we talk about it here?”
Armand donned a sour look.
Delari said, “The Empire couldn’t put a spy in here. Children aren’t that motivated. But what a coup if they could. Everything gets discussed here.”
“Uhm.”
“Later, then. If that makes you more comfortable.”
“I have the evening free.”
“Take supper with me, then.”
Hecht accepted. Anna and Redfearn Bechter alike would pout.
Bechter wanted him to spend more time with the staff in the Castella dollas Pontellas. Hoping to seduce him into the warrior Brotherhood.
The Brothers there were preparing to welcome a new castellan. He would replace Grade Drocker.
Though Drocker had been but acting head of the local chapter. The true castellan, Hawley Quirke, had been summoned to the Brotherhood’s home base, the Castella Anjela dolla Picolena on the island of Staklirhod, in the eastern reaches of the Mother Sea. Quirke had been lost in a sea battle with a Praman fleet. The position of castellan had gone unfilled since.
“Send word to Bechter about when and where.”
“You’re in a hurry to go?”
No. I want to see how Polo is. And I want to talk to Colonel Ghort.”
***
HECHT ASKED, “YOU EVER HAVE TROUBLE WITH THOSE two before?”
“Not really. They belonged to the Cologni company.” The City Regiment was a conglomerate of forces subsidized by wealthy benefactors. “And, no, I don’t think the Cologni put them up to it. They don’t have the imagination.”
Having worked with senior members of all the Five Families, Hecht agreed. “They are a dim lot. They’re lucky there aren’t any bright
outsiders around to take advantage.”
“Those idiots just saw a chance to grab some extra money.”
That was not hard to understand. The poor generally were very poor and desperate indeed. Thinking past tomorrow was a waste of time.
Hecht shrugged. “I’d like to go after those cousins of yours myself.”
“Not cousins.” Ghort meant to distance himself. “Just guys from back home. How would you get away? Especially with this Clearenza shit?”
“‘I can’t. I’d just like to. To talk to them before anyone else.”
“What do you want to find out before anybody else?”
“Who sent them.”
“You know they won’t know that.”
“Don’t underestimate the reservoirs of stupid in this world. The man who’s supposed to pay them will turn up there. Maybe to pay them, maybe to cut their throats.”
“It was me, I’d send some other guys to do that.”
“That’s possible, too.”
“So. I’d really better have somebody get there first. You gonna lend me your Deves?”
“They aren’t mine. They’re still part of the City Regiment.”
“All but the best ones. You took them with you.”
“Yes. I did. And I mean to keep them close.”
“But …”
“I’ll talk to Titus. If he sees any advantage for his people, he’ll help. Was I you, I wouldn’t count on it.”
“Well, shit. I didn’t want to use my own guys. The finance board will kick my ass for operating outside the city. ‘Course, they’ll kick it if I don’t do nothing, too.”
“I feel your pain, brother. I don’t have it any better. It’s a full-time job just getting my troops paid.” He had a sudden notion. He suggested it.
“I like it, Pipe. How long till you could find out if Consent would cover you?”
“Not long.”
“I know a ship. The Donetos own her. She’s waiting for a cargo. She’s supposed to be greased lightning.