Yet he also knew Maik was right. In fact, however accurate the auxiliary bishop’s analysis might be at this instance, he himself was almost certainly the only reason Thirsk hadn’t been summoned to Zion to face the Inquisition long since. A part of him almost wished he had been, since it would have taken the burden from him. Only they wouldn’t have summoned him alone; Zhaspahr Clyntahn’s Inquisition had made its theory of “collective responsibility” only too clear.
Strange, he thought, sipping whiskey as he gazed at those distant lights. The thick, liquid fire rolled over his tongue and down his throat, and he shook his head. Strange to think that somehow my people and I have become the one bright spot in the darkness. How did we ever come to this? And can God truly care about His plan if he lets this happen in His world? What have we done? How have we made Him so angry that He leaves us in this abyss? Lets someone like Zhaspahr Clyntahn rip away our honor, shred it like garbage? Trample on what the Writ itself tells me to do? And what am I to do about it? Tell me that, God! Surely You can tell me that much!
But God was silent, and Thirsk threw back another swallow of whiskey while he cursed the day of his own birth.
* * *
Dialydd Mab sat quietly on the rock outcrop near the crest of the hill.
That hill rose above the bridge on which the Selykr-Glydahr High Road crossed the North Daivyn River, seventy miles east of Selkyr, and he’d been waiting patiently there for almost six hours. He’d waited the better part of two days for the proper combination of weather and location, however; he didn’t begrudge a few more hours.
It was raining again, hard enough to cut visibility significantly, and thunder muttered as distant lightning illuminated the bellies of the clouds. It wouldn’t be long now, he thought, watching the take from the SNARCs. Another forty-five minutes—an hour, at the outside—before the encampment settled down enough for his purposes.
Nimue Chwaeriau had offered to join him, but he’d turned her down. He wasn’t sure why he’d done that, really. Officially, he’d argued there was no point having two of the known seijins mysteriously out of sight at the same time, especially when he already had all the help he was likely to need. But both of them had known how weak that argument was. More probably, he’d decided, it was because he still felt compelled to protect his “younger sister” from all the ugliness with which he’d had to deal.
And maybe you just didn’t want to share, either, he told himself bitingly. This is your private little crusade, isn’t it? And how much of it—how much of tonight, right here—is because you had to sit and watch without doing anything about it for so damned long?
He didn’t have a good answer for that question, but that didn’t bother him as much as perhaps it ought to have. Maybe he should discuss that with Archbishop Maikel. The Bédardist was actually a very good psychiatrist, after all.
He checked the imagery again. No one had bothered to provide anything remotely like adequate tentage for the inmates being marched from Camp Tairek in Westmarch to the new camp prepared for them at Glydahr in the Princedom of Sardahn. They’d managed to throw together crude, leaky lean-tos for the weakest—and sickest—of their number, but most of them were huddled together in the rain, crowded around the smoky, raindrop-sputtering fires. Many of them had taken off their ragged clothing and used it to throw at least a fragile roof over the fire pits, but keeping those fires alight was a bitter struggle on a night like this.
He was, frankly, surprised the guards had permitted even that, but it hadn’t really been left up to them. Major Lainyl Paxtyn, the commander of the guard detachment, was Zhaspahr Clyntahn’s kind of officer. He’d invested his own sadism in the jihad, and he’d volunteered to march these prisoners to their new home. He’d also gone out of his way to make the journey a misery for them, and no doubt he would have ordered those fires extinguished in a heartbeat, if it had been his decision. And it was likely Father Trynt Dezmynd, the Schuelerite upper-priest in charge of the prisoner transfer and a man cut from very much the same cloth, would cheerfully have agreed with him … normally. But Father Zhames Symmyns, Dezmynd’s assistant, had other ideas. A less brutal man by nature—and one who seemed to have taken Dialydd Mab’s promises to heart—Symmyns had managed to mitigate the worst of Dezmynd and Lohgyn’s natural inclinations, if only by convincing Father Trynt that their ecclesiastic superiors would frown on a march which killed two-thirds of the prisoners en route.
“Is this really going to be a good idea, Merlin?” a voice asked over the com.
“It can’t hurt anything,” he growled back.
“It may not help anything, either,” Cayleb Ahrmahk pointed out. “You’re seventy miles behind the Harchongians’ front. Whatever you do to the guards, these people aren’t going to be able to walk to safety. And not even you can guide nine thousand people, half of them sick and all of them malnourished, through the woods to our lines without being overhauled by someone.”
“That’s not my object,” Mab said bleakly. “I know we can’t get them out. That doesn’t mean I can’t give the guards a … pointed suggestion that they ought to at least treat them like human beings.”
There was an almost-sound over the com, as if Cayleb had begun a response and then stopped himself, and Mab smiled thinly. His mission tonight was probably as quixotic as Cayleb had suggested, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t worth doing. He would count it a bonus if the guards at the new camp were wise enough to learn from Major Paxtyn’s example, yet he wasn’t going to pretend he really expected that to happen. No, this had far more to do with Lainyl Paxtyn and the handful of particularly brutal noncoms and enlisted men he’d handpicked for this march.
It was a pity they wouldn’t live long enough to learn from their own object lesson, but he could live with that.
“Do you think Clyntahn’s likely to let Thirsk survive very much longer?” Cayleb asked in a rather different tone, and Mab’s lips twitched at the emperor’s obvious bid to change the subject.
“I think Bishop Staiphan’s theory about the only reason Thirsk hasn’t already been hauled to Zion was pretty close to spot on, actually,” he said. The SNARC permanently assigned to Lywys Gardynyr had caught the entire conversation. “And I very much doubt Zhaspahr Clyntahn’s the least bit happy that someone whose loyalty he distrusts so profoundly is currently the Temple Loyalists’ hero.” He shrugged. “If I were Thirsk, I’d be worrying about daggers in my back—especially if Clyntahn tries his favorite trick of blaming the assassination on us. And I’d for damned sure figure Clyntahn would be taking steps to get rid of me as soon as there’s been a little time for my Kaudzhu Narrows’ halo to wear off.”
“Do you think Thirsk’s thinking the same way you would in his shoes?”
“I’m not sure. I know he’s thinking something—Khapahr’s activities’ve made that pretty clear. Kartyr may be one of Thirsk’s spies, and Khapahr’s the logical person to get any reports from him or tell him about any little missions the Navy needs him to undertake, but that’s not what’s going on here.”
“I’d have to agree,” Cayleb said. “I suppose it could be some sort of genuine clandestine operation for the Navy, but it sure doesn’t sound like one.”
Mab nodded in the rainy darkness. Lazymyr Kartyr was a merchant captain, of sorts. The extraordinarily obese and self-indulgent sailor owned and commanded the twin-masted schooner Mairee Zhain, which had been caught running contraband—better than seventy thousand marks’ worth of Chisholmian whiskeys and Charisian luxury goods—into Gorath in defiance of Zhaspahr Clyntahn’s embargo and King Rhanyld’s own decrees. The punishment for that was death, but Khapahr had convinced Thirsk and Staiphan Maik he would be more valuable as a live spy than as a dead smuggler. And, to be fair, he’d provided quite a bit of useful intelligence to the Royal Dohlaran Navy, courtesy of his contacts with his Chisholmian suppliers. He’d even inserted half a dozen Dohlaran spies and two agents inquisitor into Chisholm by sending them back up his chain of contacts. Of course,
none of those spies or agents inquisitor had prospered after reaching Chisholm and the agents Sir Ahlber Zhustyn had had waiting for them, courtesy of warnings from the seijin network. In fact, four of them had been sending back information Zhustyn and First Councilor White Crag wanted Dohlar to have.
So, yes, there could be a legitimate reason for Khapahr to visit Kartyr and tell him to hold the Mairee Zhain in readiness for another, as yet undisclosed mission. Unfortunately, they had no idea what that mission might be. It was tempting to assume it must have something to do with getting Thirsk and/or his family out of Gorath, except that there was exactly zero evidence that Khapahr—or Thirsk—had ever said so much as a single word about any such possibility to any of the earl’s daughters or either of his sons-in-law.
“Damn it!” Cayleb growled after a moment. “We know he’s up to something, and we know it has to be for Thirsk! And we still don’t have a clue what the two of them are planning. I just wish we’d had a SNARC on them when they organized whatever the hell it is they’ve organized! For that matter, I’d like to know how the hell they did it without our having a SNARC on them, given how carefully we’ve been monitoring Thirsk!”
“I’ve been thinking about that,” Mab said. “And it’s occurred to me that we may have been coming at this the wrong way. I don’t think Thirsk’s organized anything with Khapahr; I think Khapahr’s been doing all the organizing.”
“What?” Cayleb blinked in the imagery floating before Mab’s eyes. “That’s ridiculous!” he said, although there was a suddenly thoughtful edge in his voice. “Khapahr’s his chief of staff—oh, I know he’s not allowed to use the term, but that’s what he is. Are you trying to tell me Commander Khapahr is slinking around—probably to organize the flight of his admiral’s daughters and grandchildren—without Thirsk knowing anything about it? That’s crazy, Merlin!”
“I didn’t say that was what was happening, either,” Mab pointed out. “What I said is that Khapahr’s been doing all the organizing. Nahrmahn and I—well, more Nahrmahn and Owl, even if I did help out—have been back over all the take from the SNARC monitoring Thirsk. We didn’t realize Khapahr was up to anything until April, but Nahrmahn and Owl found a conversation between him and Thirsk from early March—you can have Owl play it for you later, if you like—which was very interesting. He and the Earl were eating supper together, and Thirsk looked across the table at him and said, ‘I used to take the girls for sails, you know, Ahlvyn. They always liked to pretend we were sailing to an exotic foreign land. I wish I had the time and opportunity to do that with them again, maybe even get the grandkids out on the Bay again.’”
“All right,” Cayleb said after a moment. “I admit it’s an … interesting exchange, given what we think is going on now. But so what?”
“So Ahlvyn Khapahr is intensely loyal to Earl Thirsk, Cayleb,” Mab said very seriously. “And both he and Thirsk know the Inquisition has to be watching the Earl like cat-lizards stalking a spider rat. I think he understood exactly what Thirsk was saying to him, and that he’s been working at it on his own without any formal direction from the Earl. And I think Thirsk trusts him enough to leave that entirely in his hands, because both of them understand that the farther away from anything remotely like an escape plan Thirsk stays, the less likely anyone is to notice the planning is underway.”
“I suppose there could be something to that,” Cayleb conceded slowly. “I’d hate to have Sharleyan and Alahnah’s lives depending on someone else’s planning, though.”
“Of course you would, and I don’t doubt for a moment that Thirsk does. But assuming we’re right and he really is thinking along the lines of getting his family out of the line of fire, I don’t think he has any choice but to trust Khapahr to get it done.”
“Um.” Cayleb made a noncommittal sound and his image’s eyes were unfocused as he considered Mab’s argument. Then they sharpened again.
“Actually, now that I think about it, I’d be perfectly willing to leave Sharley and Alahnah’s lives in your hands, so maybe there’s something to your ridiculous theory after all. But whatever’s going on with Thirsk, do you think Dunkyn and Hektor will be able to pull it off?”
“Unless the weather screws them over as thoroughly as it screwed Ahbaht over, I think they’ve got a damned good chance,” Mab said.
“Good.”
The single word came out of the emperor like something between a prayer and a curse. It lay between him and the seijin for a long moment, and then he gave himself a shake.
“I know we didn’t have a choice, didn’t have this sort of an option, when it happened to Gwylym,” he said very quietly. “But I’ve still never forgiven myself for being so damned helpless.”
“Well, we’re not helpless this time, Cayleb.” Mab’s voice was just as quiet. “And if Dunkyn Yairley can’t ‘pull it off,’ I don’t think there’s anyone on the face of Safehold who could. For that matter, it’s not going to hurt a thing that no one in Gorath knows Dunkyn and his squadron have reached Talisman. Sort of hard to plan for threats you don’t know exist, now isn’t it?”
He and the emperor looked at one another, with smiles any shark might have envied. Then he consulted his internal chronometer and stood.
“I think it’s about time,” he said in a voice whose calm fooled neither of them. “Owl?”
“Yes, Commander Athrawes?” the AI’s voice replied instantly.
“Are we ready?”
“Yes, indeed,” the AI said, and no one could have missed the grim anticipation in that artificial person’s voice.
Owl had been designed as a tactical computer, a weapon of war. Constraints had been built into his software to prevent him from acting without human authority, yet when reduced to his most basic self, he’d been created to kill. Since he’d become fully self-aware, he’d internalized an entire set of philosophical, moral, and ethical constraints about how and when killing was justifiable, but they hadn’t changed his original function. What they had done was to teach him to hate Zhaspahr Clyntahn and the Inquisition with a pure and searing passion for the casual atrocities and deliberate murder they’d wreaked upon the people of Safehold. In retrospect, Mab thought, it shouldn’t have been particularly surprising that he’d reacted that way, especially after spending so much subjective time with Nahrmahn Baytz. After all, Nahrmahn had a very direct attitude towards people who killed or injured the innocent, and while Owl might have been built as a killer, that killer had also been built as a protector, a champion of the human race in its extremity. That was his function, as much as it had ever been Nimue Alban’s, and in this moment, Owl and Dialydd Mab were as one.
“Then I suppose we’d better get started,” Mab said now. “Be sure to leave Mahafee and his sergeant intact.”
“I’ll remember, Commander Athrawes. And—” there might actually have been a suppressed chuckle in the mellow voice “—I’ll endeavor to be certain none of the remotes are seen by any survivors, as well.”
“I think that would be an excellent idea,” Mab agreed, drawing a revolver with one hand and unsheathing his katana with the other. “Let’s go.”
He started down the hill, and as he did, a dozen combat remotes—manufactured in Nimue’s Cave but also armed with black-powder rifles instead of the more advanced weapons they might once have mounted—drifted out of the rain-soaked woods behind him and floated down the slope in his wake.
* * *
“—and I don’t want to have this frigging conversation again, Mahafee! It’s our job to move these motherless bastards to their new home as quickly as possible, and any of them who drag arse along the way need to be encouraged to move along smartly. That’s your fucking job, and if I have to discuss this with you again, I’ll have your guts for boot laces when I’m finished! I hope that’s clear enough even you can understand it?!”
Major Lainyl Paxtyn glared up into the face of the taller lieutenant. The major’s left fist was propped on his hip while his right hand rested—not coi
ncidently, Lieutenant Ansyn Mahafee felt confident—on the hilt of his sheathed sword.
“Yes, Sir,” he bit out.
“And another thing,” Paxtyn snarled. “I don’t give a damn how wet the frigging wood is or how late we stop. I see you letting another work party wander out into the woods—in the dark—with only two guards, you and I’ll just have to have a little talk with Father Trynt. If they can’t drag in enough wood for themselves, as well as the guard force, then that’s too fucking bad. They can damned well freeze to death overnight, for all I care, but they are not going to have a chance to sneak off in the dark. Is that understood?!”
“Yes, Sir,” Mahafee repeated woodenly, and the major glared at him for another thirty seconds. Then he snorted, hawked, and spat contemptuously on the ground and stalked off. The lieutenant watched him go and wondered, distantly, how he’d kept his hand away from his own weapons. He’d known Paxtyn for less than two five-days, and it already seemed a lifetime spent in hell.
And if it’s bad for me, what about all these poor bastards we’re dragging to Glydahr? This sadistic son-of-a-bitch is—
He made himself bite that thought off. Whatever he thought of his present superior, Paxtyn was doing exactly what Father Trynt Dezmynd wanted him to do. And Dezmynd was no mere major in the Army of God; he was a Schuelerite upper-priest, handpicked by Inquisitor General Wylbyr for his current mission. Mahafee had seen enough in the last year or so to be less than confident that God or Langhorne could truly have approved the Inquisition’s actions here in the Republic of Siddarmark, but that was an even more dangerous thought, and he backed away from it with spinal-reflex quickness.
He felt like a coward for reacting that way, yet what could he do about it? He was the most junior officer of the entire prisoner escort. He and his platoon had been assigned to guard a canal lock south of Selyk. They’d seen that assignment as a well-deserved rest after the ferocity of the combat they’d experienced against the heretic Duke of Eastshare the previous summer, but they’d stood their duty alertly. And when the order came in to destroy the lock and fall back to Selyk, they’d executed those instructions with equal efficiency.