Hecht hoped none of the Shining Ones heard that but feared that any hope for an absence of eavesdroppers would be a vain one.
“I’m going after Vantrad. If I surprise them and take over I’ll lock Beresmond up and run Clothilde off to Gherig. I’ll install the Grail Empress as Queen. Shining Ones will surround you. They’ll become you whenever you have to be seen. Lady Hilda will be your shadow. If Helspeth is forced to be in the presence of an outsider the Shining Ones will disguise you. Hourli says they can fix it so you won’t even smell like you.” He nearly suggested that, with practice, she might even be able to fool those who knew her well.
Better not give her any dangerous ideas.
She was the daughter of the Ferocious Little Hans and nothing would keep her from hitting the streets in disguise if the notion took her.
Despite all she had seen lately, she might not believe that a hostile Night might take advantage of self-inflicted exposure.
“There you go, drifting off again.”
“I apologize. I don’t know why it happens. It’s not just with you. I do it with everyone.”
“Instead of saying you’re sorry all the time, why not do something about it?”
Lady Hilda observed, “I’m sure your Night friends could scrounge around in your soul and figure out why your head don’t work right when you’re awake.” Swinging a well-honed double-edged blade, there. “They might even find out why you fall asleep in the middle of something crucial, like a future-changing discussion with your lover.”
Daedel was in a harsh mood. And she knew things she had no business knowing.
He turned a hard eye on Helspeth.
The Ege blood shone through then. The Empress was not intimidated, nor did she offer explanations. She had thought that Daedel needed to know.
“What is, is,” Hecht muttered, like a calming mantra. “It is, and cannot be changed. I will focus. I will take Vantrad. We will proceed from there. Moves are underway already.” Pella was pressing Iresh abd al-Kadiri in hopes of attracting regional attention to himself. A limited Righteous move along the Vantrad road should be interpreted as a flanking effort.
The Shining Ones would know the truth. He could imagine no reason they would betray him, yet still did not trust them fully.
A consequence of status gained? Was that what had turned Gordimer weird? Might the Lion’s paranoia have been due to more than dark prophecies and the Rascal’s evil whispers?
“And there he goes again,” Lady Hilda cracked, voice edged with irritation and possible contempt. “Despite the pretty promises. A man’s man indeed. And here I be in the oven of hell’s kitchen, being rendered down for jerky and people grease, for the sakes of ingrates, when I could be basking in the coolth of Alten Weinberg, having my way with some starry-eyed boy.”
She flashed a wicked smile at Hecht’s appalled response.
“I’ll get that Hourli creature to curse you. You know those sparky shocks you get during the winter? This curse will let me smack you with a big one any time your eyes glaze over. It will be like teaching a pig to dance.”
Hecht did not understand that but did grasp her general meaning. It might even work if he got stung enough.
He had earned himself a shock already.
* * *
Pella launched nuisance attacks against the Dreangereans. Despite strong cautionary advice from the Sha-lug, Iresh gave in to rage, perhaps seduced by the murmur of unseen powers. He launched two counterattacks directly into the face of falcon fires from prepared positions. Casualties were terrible. Desertions trebled. The Sha-lug refused to execute further unreasonable orders.
The Grail Empress and Commander of the Righteous, traveling with the battle group apparently flanking the Dreangereans on the Vantrad road, decided to tour the Holy City while they were close by.
They entered Vantrad with entourages but no large companies or heavy weapons. The locals relaxed. The Commander of the Righteous never made an aggressive move without his falcons.
Western pilgrims had visited in large numbers since the arrival of the Enterprise. Some of the most recent visitors had served with Lord Arnmigal for years.
The Choosers of the Slain, prepped with detailed instructions, isolated King Beresmond and Queen Clothilde while Righteous pilgrims secured key points of the city.
The Shining Ones added illusion and misdirection. There were few casualties and no fatalities, unlike the last time crusaders captured Vantrad.
Thirty-two hours after entering Vantrad, Lord Arnmigal set his seal to a document wherein Beresmond abdicated in favor of the Grail Empress. Local prelates added their own seals and pretended to be thrilled.
Temblors of change radiated quickly. Princes great and small, of every religious odor, quavered on dangerously shifting footing. Beresmond had been a spook, doing little but what Clothilde demanded. She was a shallow vessel. The Grail Empress and her warlord were sure to be harsher weather.
Clothilde resisted, though she controlled her tongue admirably. Those strange and wicked women with the Commander of the Righteous admonished her privately, revealing a detailed knowledge of her undercover transgressions. She was cunning and clever, if shallow and caring for no one but herself. She grasped the fact that hope depended entirely on abiding the favorable day.
She had friends. Allies, really. Among those were a few minor Instrumentalities, though none like the monsters guarding Lord Arnmigal. She would persevere. She would come back.
She was not wise enough to be afraid.
Hourli warned Lord Arnmigal: it was dangerously kind not to save the future from possible pretenders to Vantrad’s throne.
Lord Arnmigal was preoccupied with the Grail Empress. He cared little what people thought, though he did concern himself about their perceptions of her. He intended doing nothing to stain her reputation more than he had.
He failed completely to notice the Shining Ones sketching a fog around his all-too-revelatory behavior.
He and she settled in comfortably, against inconsequential resistance, which the Shining Ones handled easily. Wife began to appear with Lord Arnmigal as a more glamorous and warmer Grail Empress. Her audiences thought that must be because she had added the Holy City to the Imperial diadem.
Lady Hilda enjoyed the change, at the real Helspeth’s expense.
The Praman community fell into anguished despair. The Believers were being battered and decimated everywhere, with the Hu’n-tai At now gnawing at the Realm of Peace in the east.
The Dreangerean host southwest of Vantrad evaporated. Even its Sha-lug components fled in despair.
Pella strutted like a gamecock when he reported. He had learned from masters and had learned quite well. He had lost only a handful of men.
* * *
Vantrad’s citadel boasted a quiet room worthy of the paranoia of Queen Clothilde. It was perfectly maintained and one of the stoutest ever built. Its walls were three feet thick. It had been reengineered and improved by senior brethren of the Special Office. Titus Consent met Lord Arnmigal there following some sleight of hand meant to divert invisible watchers. Hecht asked, “What’s with the sneakery and shadow dancing?”
“Just Plain Joe is back from visiting his pal, Bo Biogna, out by Gherig.”
Lord Arnmigal probed his Else Tage memories for the lie of that land.
Gherig loomed on high ground to the south. The land in front fell away to a plain, then gradually rose again to the north. Those highlands became the Neret Mountains and haunted Idiam. The Well of Days, site of Indala al-Sul’s signature triumph, lay not far north and east.
Lord Arnmigal opined, “I hope Joe enjoyed himself. He comes nearer being a true good man than anyone I know. He deserves more joy of life.”
“I would argue that we all do. God won’t give it to us.”
“He got back quick. Did he find out something important?”
“In a nutshell. Nobody out there is making a big deal, maybe because they haven’t seen the implications. I thin
k our demonic allies have and are hoping we won’t.” Titus raised a hand, forestalling Hecht’s impatience. “The Dreangerean villain, er-Rashal, has created a spell that makes firepowder explode at a distance or at least fizzle and clog the falcon.”
Lord Arnmigal gulped some air and chewed.
“The spell reaches beyond the reliable killing range of most falcons. Falconeers who can fire don’t have much hope of actually hitting anything.”
“And the Shining Ones know.”
“They do. And want to keep it quiet.”
“So they think they see a way to be safe from the mortal instruments of a would-be Godslayer.”
“If they can get hold of er-Rashal’s secret.”
“They don’t have it?”
“They do not. Only the Dreangerean has the spell, and that only inside his head. Spying on him won’t do any good.”
“Unless they catch him in the process.”
“Maybe. But they have to be careful not to show their interest. Also, the sorcerer has put up some formidable supernatural barriers. I doubt they can get close enough to watch him work.” Consent went on with other news from the frontier, adding some speculation. “Madouc hasn’t seen all the possibilities but he’s definitely worried about Asher. The Special Office types at Gherig are pressuring him. Too, Joe says some Pramans have joined Madouc. Indala’s men, supposedly there to help handle er-Rashal.”
Hecht grunted. That was puzzling. Indala helping Madouc with the Rascal? With the Special Office, Black Rogert, the Shining Ones, and who knew what all else there to see?
Er-Rashal had somebody really worried. Something major must be about to break.
The old Norns came to mind, silently spinning, lamplight painting their silhouettes on the paper screen that was the wall between them and the universe, a boundary neither man nor god dared violate.
He spurned the image. Illusion! Wicked imagination! Only the God Who Is God could write one’s destiny …
He suppressed a burst of hysterical laughter.
“Boss?”
“We have a world of people playing their own games, me included. Suppose I just jumped in like a bear into a gaggle of puppies?”
Titus considered. “That might be too risky.”
“Good. Then that’s what we’ll do. Nobody will expect it.”
“Boss…”
What else to do now? Vantrad was in hand. Iresh abd al-Kadiri had been chased off. The Enterprise had achieved most of its goals against almost feeble resistance. All of the Holy Lands cities had submitted to the Grail Empress. The natives were not happy. If they behaved, however, changes at the royal level would mean little to farmers, herders, shopkeepers, and artisans. They would face the same old challenges and complain the same old complaints. They would lie to the tax collectors with fabulous imagination. They would bully neighbors who failed to demonstrate an adequately enlightened attitude toward the divine. Life would go on much as it always had.
The Commander of the Righteous, however, would have to make new choices soon. Once Shamramdi fell the Enterprise would have to find an expanded mission or begin to come apart. King Stain might get no chance to assemble his reinforcing wave.
Dreanger would be recovered for the Chaldarean faith. Lucidia, too, with the capture of Shamramdi. But that would set the Enterprise face-to-face with the sons of Tsistimed the Golden and the Hu’n-tai At.
There was the du Tancret option, of course. The dearly held dream of the most fanatic Chaldareans would be to capture and destroy Jezdad and the holiest holies of al-Prama.
“Boss? You still in there?”
“Eh? What?”
“Are you serious? What you suggested? Us heading out to Gherig?”
“Sure. To deal with er-Rashal. It doesn’t take a lot of thought to see that he’s the biggest threat at the moment. Once he goes down we can impose whatever realignment we want in this region.”
He had no desire to obliterate al-Prama. The Faith had been a part of him. Never had he entertained the notion of that religion’s annihilation. He would have been outraged had the suggestion been offered.
“Boss?”
“Yes?” Irritated now. Titus ought to be off to get things started.
“What does it mean when the Shining Ones say, ‘He lost his shadow somewhere’?”
That startled Lord Arnmigal. He knew that must have meaning but could recall none. “I’m not sure. It sounds portentous, though. Why?”
“Wife and Hourli say it about you. It bothers me.”
Hecht had overheard the phrase himself recently without paying heed or realizing that he was its object. “‘Lost his way,’ wouldn’t quite fit, would it? I’ll ask Hourli. She’ll turn up fast once she hears that we’re headed east.”
An air-clearing session with Hourli might be especially useful before the cloudy side developed deeper shadows. Once the Adversary began threading lies into things …
42. Gherig: Congruence, Conjunction, and Union
Nassim Alizarin stood alongside the crusader Madouc of Hoeles. He could not have imagined that possibility two months earlier. They shared the parapet of a Gherig watchtower. Several others, equally ill at ease, were observing traffic below Gherig with them. Nassim felt ensnared in a surreal fantasy. The Master of the Commandery had accepted his story and offer of alliance. Madouc of Hoeles was seriously practical and pragmatic in spite of his religious convictions. Madouc grasped the magnitude of the threat developing in the Idiam. He had seen other resurrections. He had been warned by his own Special Office: this could be the ugliest resurrection yet. He would employ any tool or weapon to abort the menace. Nassim’s renegades might be a godsend.
No one knew the devil er-Rashal better. No one hated him more.
Rogert du Tancret, on crutches, radiated ill-concealed spite. Nassim Alizarin had been a curse on his existence. Nassim Alizarin had come within a toad’s whisker of annihilating Gherig, and Rogert du Tancret with it. Nassim Alizarin had made it necessary for him to go round on these sticks. Black Rogert was biding his time. He would have his revenge.
Black Rogert might be black but he never considered achieving his revenge by allying with the Dreangerean evil.
The dark-haired, dark-eyed, wide little bully laid looks on Madouc that were no more friendly. Madouc could expect his own day of reckoning.
Rogert du Tancret had chosen to play against character, biding his time though he was not known for his patience or subtlety. Cunning had him smile exactly when the converted and motivated ought to show enthusiasm.
Nassim and Madouc were observing a wild swirl and swarm of newcomers sent out by the Commander of the Righteous as they put up a canvas and trash-wood city surrounded by a ditch and a freestone wall. Villagers disgruntled by the loss of pasture had been complaining since the first new crusader appeared. Nassim wished he could help. Those people had supported him well.
They would not resist. The newcomers had slaughtered scores of Believers who had tried to raid their camp near Triamolin. Their woman commander was an abomination made flesh. She devoured Praman souls.
Since that massacre the Widow’s story had become widespread, growing madly in the retelling. Publicly, Madouc of Hoeles credited every wicked accusation. He hinted that more and darker remained to be seen.
Madouc had the Special Office mumbling in his ear.
He observed, “Those people seem professional but you can tell the Brothens from the Connectens by each group’s casual style.”
Nassim did not see that. He saw Arnhander mobs caught up in efficient chaos. Setting a semipermanent camp was not something new to them. He saw very little real wasted motion. “Ah. And now they’ve started building a conduit to bring water from the spring.”
Young Az eased up beside Nassim, on the side away from Madouc. Nassim had been careful to conceal the youth’s identity. Possession of Indala’s favorite grandnephew might be a temptation too potent for bleak, brooding Black Rogert.
The Master of the Com
mandery knew Azim was no Sha-lug. Age alone did not give that away. What made one Sha-lug was difficult to verbalize but plain to the veteran eye.
Nassim turned toward Azim slightly. The boy had gone out among the Believers with Old Az, tasting their unhappiness, trying to show the elders why the Mountain would ally himself with the oppressor.
Only Ansa, foreigners, and strangers had suffered because of the Dreangerean. That did not make him an instrument of the Adversary. Such people were barely human.
“It didn’t go well,” Nassim guessed. “Too tough a sell.”
“True, but there will be no bad behavior. They will remain toads in their holes. They are terrified of the Widow, who is more real and far nearer than any fabulous Dreangerean.”
“Indeed. They might be less rattled if the Adversary himself turned up dancing.” The Adversary seldom took the form of a fighting woman.
One of Black Rogert’s few remaining loyalists eased up to his lord and whispered. Du Tancret blanched. He gasped. He slammed both hands to his chest. His eyes rolled up. He shook like he was going into a seizure.
Everyone gaped.
Du Tancret suppressed the shakes, visibly reclaiming control. He engaged in obvious internal debate momentarily. Then, “My lords. My lord of Hoeles. A courier from Vantrad brings word that the Grail Empress and Commander of the Righteous have compelled Beresmond and Clothilde to abdicate in favor of Helspeth Ege.”
His audience boggled, to a man. Impossible! The Master of the Commandery declared, “The Commander of the Righteous would not arrogate a crown!”
Du Tancret bobbed his head. “I did not mean to suggest that. You’re right. He didn’t seize the throne himself. He made the Grail Empress Vantrad’s Queen.” Muttering, he added, “Surely he’ll be rewarded royally.”
Madouc faced Nassim, one eyebrow raised. What would the Praman side think?
Nassim could do nothing but shrug.
He was not supposed to know the Commander of the Righteous. Nor did he, anymore. His recollections of Else Tage amounted to little more than nostalgia. He knew nothing about the man behind the layers of identity and character he had acquired since being sent out to die in exile.