By Heresies Distressed

  Unfortunately, the combination of the speed with which Dairos had fallen and the promptness with which Gahrvai had marched out to meet them had taken Cayleb’s planners by surprise. When they hadn’t been planning on landing in Dairwyn to begin with, they’d expected it to take much longer for the main bodies of the opposing armies to make contact with one another. And because that had been true, they hadn’t dared to count upon fighting a decisive battle quite that quickly. And, to be fair, judged purely by the casualties inflicted as a percentage of Gahrvai’s total strength, it would have been hard to call Haryl’s Crossing “decisive.” Judged by those casualties as a percentage of the strength he’d actually had on the field—and, especially, as a demonstration of the relative capabilities of the two armies—that was precisely what it had been, however, and Gahrvai had been far quicker to draw the appropriate conclusions than Cayleb could have wished he’d been.

  The Corisandian field commander’s decision to withdraw as quickly as possible into Talbor Pass had precluded the possibility of another, larger scale Haryl’s Crossing. He knew what Charisian rifles and artillery could do now, and even though Merlin’s remotes confirmed that his father was working on providing him with an improvised force of riflemen of his own, he wasn’t about to offer battle on Cayleb’s terms unless he absolutely had to. And so, Cayleb had found himself in undisputed possession of the entire Barony of Dairwyn, the southern portion of the Earldom of Coris, and a goodly chunk of the eastern part of the Earldom of Mahrak, far earlier than anyone had expected him to. And with the Corisandian Army far closer to intact than anyone had wanted it to be.

  The fact that the storm season promised to be just as active as Merlin had warned Cayleb it would be on the basis of his “meteorological satellites” (whatever they were) didn’t help things a bit, either.

  Thunder grumbled quietly from the east, as if to remind Cayleb of that very fact, and he grimaced. The storm season was bad enough in Charis, but Charis very seldom saw the powerful hurricanes which could sweep across Corisande. The sheltering bulk of Silverlode Island, which did get its share of hurricane-like storms, did much to explain that, although according to Merlin the pattern of ocean currents had at least as much to do with it. At any rate, the storms which came roaring in off the Great Western Ocean to hit Corisande were even more violent than the ones Charisians were accustomed to dealing with closer to home.

  As he listened to that distant rumble of thunder, Cayleb was glad, for several reasons, that he’d sent so much of his shipping back to shelter in Zebediah and Chisholm. One reason, of course, was that it reduced congestion in Dairos and got his vital transports as safely out of the way of foul weather—and far enough north to be outside the normal hurricane zone entirely, in Chisholm’s case—as he could. And if Zebediah was still right in the middle of the threat zone, the presence of a substantial number of Charisian transports and their galley and galleon escorts in Hannah Bay was a pointed reminder to Grand Duke Zebediah that any . . . adventures which might tempt him would be a bad idea.

  Useful though that was, however, the ships sheltering in Chisholm were almost certainly even more valuable. The continued presence of so many Charisian ships and Charisian sailors (who just happened to have Charisian marks burning holes in their purses) continued helping to buttress the Chisholmians’ view of themselves as part of the new, larger Charisian Empire. Even more of the Chisholmians who’d nursed reservations about the entire idea were finding themselves feeling much more comfortable with it as the deep and genuine respect with which the Charisians had already come to regard Empress Sharleyan sank fully home. And as they listened to the Charisians’ tales of the fortunes to be reaped by anyone who could go a-privateering.

  All of that was true, but however useful those other accomplishments might be, what Cayleb truly wished was that he had that shipping right here, closer to hand, instead. Without it, he simply didn’t have the troop lift for the amphibious tactics which had been the linchpin of their strategy from the beginning. He was sorely tempted to try using the shipping he’d retained in Dairos to carry out the same sorts of operations, despite the season, if only on a reduced scale. Gahrvai’s decision to settle down in Talbor Pass with his entire army, however, had dissuaded him. The Corisandian commander’s position offered him a prize that was far too tempting to pass up. But claiming that prize would require a much larger landing than he currently had the troop lift to support, while a series of smaller landings was likely to provoke Gahrvai into changing his present dispositions, at the very least.

  “Is he really going to go on sitting there?” Cayleb asked now, and Merlin shrugged.

  “That’s what it looks like,” he said, and Cayleb’s eyes narrowed slightly. There was something about Merlin’s voice . . .

  “Merlin,” the emperor asked slowly, “are you tired?”

  Merlin’s eyebrows rose, and Cayleb shrugged.

  “I’m sorry, but it’s just occurred to me that I don’t believe I’ve ever actually seen you tired. Once you and Maikel told me the truth, I realized why that was, of course. But now . . . I don’t know, there’s just something . . .”

  “I’m not really tired, Cayleb.” Merlin grimaced slightly. “PICAs aren’t subject to physical fatigue. On the other hand, until I came along, no one had ever operated a PICA in autonomous mode for more than ten days at a time, so no one had any actual experience on the long-term effects on the personality living inside one. From my own experience, I don’t really need sleep the way a flesh-and-blood human would, but it turns out I do need . . . downtime. A few hours, at least, every few days, when I can just shut down. It’s my equivalent of going to sleep, I suppose, and I really need it if I’m going to stay mentally fresh and alert.”

  “And you aren’t getting it, are you?” Cayleb asked shrewdly.

  “There’s too much that needs doing,” Merlin replied obliquely. “I’ve got SNARCs and remote sensors out all over the place, Cayleb, and Owl and I are the only ones who can monitor them.”

  “Can you possibly monitor all of them, whatever you do?”

  “No, that’s part of the problem. I spend too much of my time trying to figure out which ones I absolutely need to monitor, which reduces the time I have to do the monitoring in. And it’s virtually certain that I’m not monitoring at least one of the ones I ought to be watching. Then there’s—”

  “Stop,” Cayleb said, and Merlin’s mouth closed.

  “That’s better. Now, listen to me for a moment, Merlin Athrawes. Your ability to tell me what’s going on all over the world is an enormous advantage. Frankly, it’s even more important than the new artillery. In fact, I think it’s the single most important factor in giving us a chance to survive. I know that. Maikel and Dr. Mahklyn and Father Zhon all know it. But as you yourself have pointed out, you aren’t really an Archangel. You can’t be everywhere and do everything. You can’t even watch everything that happens across an entire world. Maybe you don’t need sleep the same way I do, but I can’t believe you’re so different from the rest of us that you don’t need to rest at least occasionally. Frankly, I think you’re just as likely to miss something because you aren’t . . . how did you put it? Because you aren’t ‘mentally fresh and alert’ as you are because it didn’t occur to you that something needed to be watched in the first place. People—including you, Captain Athrawes—make sure I get my sleep because I’m an emperor, and because I need to be rested and clearheaded when the time comes to make decisions. Well, you need to be rested and clearheaded for the same reasons. And also, in your case, because of how much I rely on you when it comes time for me to make decisions. If resting is what you need to do to stay that way, then I want you to do just that. Besides, you’re my friend. I don’t want you driving yourself too hard simply because you can.”

  Merlin looked at him for several seconds, then sighed.

  “I don’t know if I can do that, Cayleb,” he admitted.

  “Try,” Cayleb advised him. “Try hard. Beca
use if you don’t, I’m going to order you back to Dairos.” Merlin stiffened, and Cayleb shook his head. “I’m not going to argue about it with you, Merlin. Either you’re going to get—What? Two hours a night?—of the ‘downtime’ you were just talking about, or else I’m going to send you back to Dairos, so you can get the downtime during the day instead of watching my back. It’s not open to discussion.”

  For a moment, brown eyes locked with blue, and then Merlin sighed again.

  “It was bad enough when you were just a crown prince,” he complained. “Now this ‘Emperor’ stuff has obviously gone to your head.”

  “Was that a ‘yes’ I heard?”

  “All right, Cayleb.” Merlin shook his head, his expression wry. “I’ll be good.”

  . II .

  Vicar Zahmsyn’s Suite,

  and

  Vicar Zhaspahr’s Suite,

  The Temple,

  City of Zion

  “—response to the Address is still coming in, especially from the more distant bishoprics,” Zahmsyn Trynair said over his wineglass. “Frankly, I’m not entirely satisfied with what I’m hearing, though.”

  “No?” Zhaspahr Clyntahn smothered a fresh roll in butter and took a huge bite. “Why not?” he asked a bit indistinctly as he chewed.

  “I’m not convinced all of them fully understand the seriousness of the situation, even after what happened in Ferayd,” Trynair replied. “Of course, they only have the expurgated version of the Address, without the specific references to Holy War, and it’s probably taking time for the reports of the hangings to circulate, given this winter’s weather. I suppose that could explain the fact that they don’t seem to me to show the proper degree of urgency in all cases.”

  Clyntahn’s face tightened ever so briefly at mention of the Ferayd executions. Although he’d endured his own public penance with every outward appearance of humility and acceptance, there was no point pretending that the humiliation of “admitting his own fault” hadn’t filled him with white-hot fury. Or that he didn’t still blame Trynair as the person responsible for that humiliation. The fact that his intellect was capable of understanding exactly why the Chancellor had insisted upon it—and even the fact that he’d been perfectly correct to do so—didn’t do much about his sullen resentment. There was a new, undeniable strain in their relationship as a result, but by the same token, both of them were even more aware than ever of just how much they needed one another. And, for all his anger, Clyntahn knew it had never been personal. Or not very personal, at any rate. When it came to the survival of Mother Church (and the Group of Four), business was business, as far as the Grand Inquisitor was concerned.

  Even if it did still piss him off.

  Now he washed down the mouthful of roll with a hefty swallow of wine and shrugged.

  “If they don’t understand now, they will, soon enough,” he said a bit more clearly, and reached for his fork once more.

  Despite how little he and Trynair might like one another, particularly these days, both of them knew they were the two true poles of power within the Group of Four. As such, they’d taken to dining privately together at least twice a five-day, in addition to the larger suppers when Rhobair Duchairn and Allayn Maigwair were invariably present, ever since the Charisians had decided to create so much havoc. As was customary when serious Church business was to be discussed, the two vicars had dismissed their servants, and the Grand Inquisitor refilled his own glass before he looked back across the table at Trynair.

  “I’ve already made my displeasure clear to that idiot Jynkyns down in Delferahk.” He scowled. “If he’d kept proper control of the situation, we never would have had all that unpleasantness in Ferayd.”

  Trynair managed to nod without grimacing, despite the way what had happened in Ferayd remained a sore point between them. What bothered him even more about it, though, if he was going to be honest with himself, was that Clyntahn seemed in a fair way towards convincing himself that his own version of events there was the accurate one, despite the official findings of the Ferayd Tribunal and his own public confession and penance. It was bad enough trying to manage the repercussions of that entire disaster without having the Grand Inquisitor actively deluding himself about it!

  I wonder if he’s always actually been able to do that? Trynair thought. Is it possible that what I’ve always put down to cynicism and pragmatism has actually been complete—if delusional—sincerity? An ability to make his version of reality the “truth,” whenever the actual truth would be . . . inconvenient? Or is this something that’s only come out in him—or gotten stronger, at least—since the Charisians didn’t oblige him by all dying on schedule after all?

  The Chancellor had no idea how to answer his own questions, but at least he knew now there were currents inside Clyntahn which even he hadn’t recognized before. Potentially dangerous currents, and not simply dangerous to the Group of Four’s opponents.

  Yet even if that was true, or perhaps especially if it was true, it simply became more important than ever to keep Clyntahn both focused and under control.

  As if I didn’t have enough to worry about already! I don’t really know which is worse—Zhaspahr’s dragon-in-a-glassworks approach to anything remotely Charisian, Rhobair’s refound piety, or Allayn’s stupidity! I really am starting to feel like Master Traynyr!

  His raised wineglass hid his smile as his lips quirked involuntarily. He was well aware of the whispered Temple cloakroom puns linking his own surname with that of the traditional stage manager of puppet theater. No one was going to repeat any such jokes where he could hear them, of course, but they’d never really upset him particularly. After all, that was how he’d seen himself, in many ways.

  But the play used to be so much easier to direct, he reminded himself, and his smile faded.

  “I’m not as convinced as you appear to be that Bishop Ernyst could have prevented what happened originally, Zhaspahr,” he said mildly as he lowered his glass after a moment. “And, frankly, I don’t see how he could possibly be held responsible for the outcome of the Charisians’ attack on the port.”

  “No? Well, I damned well can,” Clyntahn growled. “If he’d insisted from the outset that the Inquisition have complete control of the ship seizures, without letting those ham-fisted, so-called ‘soldiers’ screw things up first, then none of the damned Charisians would have gotten out. Probably, as many of them wouldn’t have been killed, either, but even if they had been, Cayleb and his bunch of deviants wouldn’t have gotten the wildly exaggerated reports of what happened that put such a wild hair up their arses about Ferayd!”

  Despite his resolve not to renew his quarrel with Clyntahn, and despite all of the excellent reasons he had for that resolve, Trynair’s lips tightened. It was one thing to avoid conflict within the ranks of the Group of Four; it was another to let one of the two most powerful of its members engage in such dangerous self-delusion. Especially when the Charisians’ version of what had happened in Ferayd was getting such broad circulation.

  The letters and printed broadsides they’d left behind when they withdrew from Ferayd had included the proclamation from “Emperor Cayleb and Empress Sharleyan” which had made their reasons for attacking the city and burning the better part of it to the ground crystal clear. And as that bastard Rock Point had promised, the contents of Graivyr’s files had also been broadcast. It was hard to be certain exactly where they’d first been distributed, but printed copies of every single self-condemnatory word of the executed Inquisitors’ reports had mysteriously appeared from somewhere. And despite Clyntahn’s best efforts, at least some of them were being circulated throughout the mainland realms, especially in Siddarmark and Delferahk itself. The Charisians’ grasp of the value of propaganda, Trynair was discovering, was at least as good as the Church’s, and it seemed impossible to stop their printed broadsides and pamphlets from getting out.

  All of which only makes it an even better thing I insisted that we had to address the situation
ourselves, however Zhaspahr feels about it, the Chancellor thought grimly. I suppose he’s right when he argues that the tribunal’s findings help to buttress the Charisians’ claims about what happened, but it looks like an awful lot of people find our own “openness” and “honesty” deeply reassuring. And it gives them an out. They can accept that at least some of the Charisians’ claims are true, but they can go ahead and reject the points where their accusations don’t coincide with our own admissions. Like the question of just how much of the city was burned, and just how many civilians were killed.

  As far as Tryair knew, no Delferahkan civilians had been killed in the Charisian attack, but there was no way for Charis to prove that. No handy, captured reports which were bound to get out, anyway, and leave all sorts of embarrassing mud on the Church’s face.

  None of which meant that the Charisians hadn’t demonstrated a fiendish ability to distribute their propaganda—like their version of Ferayd—whenever and wherever they chose.

  Clyntahn seemed particularly irate about that. No doubt because he’d believed the Inquisition’s ability to intercept such inflammatory documents was adequate to the Church’s needs. What he was discovering, unfortunately, was that much of the Inquisition’s previous success had been due to the fact that no realm or kingdom had ever before dared to openly proclaim its opposition to the Church. These were no smudgy, poor-quality sheets run off on a hidden press in some malcontent lunatic’s cellar. These were every bit as professionally produced as anything the Inquisition or Office of Instruction had ever distributed, and literally thousands of them were mysteriously appearing in every port city.

  And unlike our efforts, they have the unfair advantage of actually telling the truth, don’t they, Zhaspahr? the Chancellor reflected grimly.

  Trynair considered asking the same question aloud, but only briefly. First, because it didn’t really matter a great deal either way, after the fact, and second, because nothing he could say would change Clyntahn’s view, and he knew it. Just as he knew that attempting to challenge the Grand Inquisitor’s version could actually be . . . hazardous.