Rex Regis (47 page)

“… avoid the master if you can … for a time…”

“… heard him talking to himself about imagers … they with those Telaryns?”

“… don’t think so … the ones at Fiancryt…”

“… better see if the salon is set up…”

The two parted, one coming down the steps past Quaeryt and the other heading south along the corridor.

From somewhere on the upper level, Quaeryt heard the voices of small children. When he reached the top of the staircase, he turned to his right, hoping he had better luck. The third door he came to was ajar. Even before he reached the doorway of the corner chamber, he could hear voices, one of which sounded like that of Daefol. The door was open just wide enough for him to slip into the room, which looked to be an upper-level private sitting room.

Daefol stood near the window, looking down at the rear courtyard, while talking.“It’s intolerable, I tell you. Being forced to quarter two companies, even for a night.” The High Holder looked to the visibly pregnant woman in the loose-fitting but still stylish pale blue linen dress, trimmed with lace.

“You could have told them no.”

“With all those armed men? And with six regiments at Fiancryt or nearby?” Daefol winced at a peal of childish laughter that penetrated the sitting room. “They don’t have to be that loud.”

“They are children.”

“I just can’t believe that he rode in like that.”

“The commander didn’t commandeer the hold house, dear.”

“Don’t condescend to me, Elajara. It’s still intolerable. Absolutely intolerable. If I’d had to talk to him another moment … He sounded just like one of Kharst’s courtiers…”

“He spoke Bovarian?”

“Most of the senior Telaryn officers do. Not as well as this one, and they’re not as condescending. Or stupid.”

“Tell me about the commander. Why did he upset you so much? Besides being condescending and stupid.”

“He was so arrogant … You’d have thought he was Bhayar himself … and he couldn’t even get his directions straight…”

“He couldn’t get his directions right? And he’s a commander?”

“He’s likely a commander by grace. I think his major does all the thinking.”

“But how could he end up here and think it was Fiancryt?”

“There’s a new bridge across the Aluse south of here. That’s what he said, and he’s too stupid to lie about that. That’s intolerable, too. That submarshal must have had his imagers create it, and they didn’t even have the courtesy to let me know.”

“I don’t understand about the imagers, dear. I thought you said all of Bhayar’s imagers were in the south.”

“So did I, but Paliast claims that some of the three have thrown in with the submarshal. It makes sense. That way Bhayar gets more imagers, and they have a patron.”

“What about the commander?”

“I just don’t understand why he’s here. He powders his hair to look older than he is.”

“Do you think he might be a minion of that imager who married Bhayar’s sister. The one you said has enthralled Bhayar with some sort of Pharsi spell?”

Quaeryt stiffened at those words, then smiled ruefully. That explanation made sense in light of Myskyl’s and Deucalon’s actions.

“The submarshal didn’t say enthralled. He said that the imager has convinced Bhayar to pursue unwise policies with regard to High Holders here in Bovaria and also with regard to the larger factors.”

“You’ve never been that enchanted with the factors, yourself.”

“No … but they were a necessary buffer between Kharst and us. This imager … and he’s apparently converted Bhayar’s sister as well … well … he’s already become the Minister of Administration for Bovaria, and he’s personally destroyed high holds all over Bovaria.”

“Why does Submarshal Myskyl care? He’s from Telaryn. I know you’ve explained this before, but I didn’t quite understand.”

Quaeryt had the impression that Daefol’s wife understood very much, and was trying to get the High Holder to think about matters more deeply, without being able to say so.

“He feels that, before long, the High Holders here and in Telaryn will turn against Lord Bhayar, and that some will try to unseat him. That will mean fighting, and no one will benefit from that.”

“Kharst destroyed the holds of anyone he felt was disloyal for years. No one did anything. Why would that change? Perhaps, dear, I’m missing something, but I really don’t understand.”

Quaeryt almost choked as he heard the sweet and seemingly guileless words from Elajara.

“You’re right. You don’t understand. Fiancryt and Ryel were close to Kharst. If anyone is vulnerable to charges of disloyalty, it would be the northern High Holders.”

“I suppose that’s true, but Fiancryt and Ryel are dead. I wouldn’t think Lord Bhayar would have to worry about them. Myranda, perhaps, but from what you say, she’s been most accommodating to the submarshal.”

“You’ve never liked Myranda.”

“Dear … I’ve never said a word. I’ve never acted in any way other than the most proper toward her. You know that’s true.”

Daefol snorted. “I’ll be in my study.” With that, he turned and headed toward the door.

Quaeryt quickly stepped away from the door, hoping that Daefol didn’t slam it on the way out.

“Dear … please don’t slam the door,” added Elajara. “You know how that upsets the children.”

Daefol did not reply, but he left the door wide open as he stormed out.

Quaeryt watched Elajara.

The young woman shook her head, then slowly stood and walked to the window.

After several moments Quaeryt, still holding his concealment, slipped from the chamber and walked slowly toward the stairs. He had heard more than enough … and doubted he could learn much more by staying.

For all his determination to make his way back to his forces, Quaeryt found that getting out of the hold house was more involved than getting in had been-at least getting out undetected, since there were two guards at the main entry. He also discovered that there were guards at side doors at the east and west ends of the long corridor, and that none of the chambers on the main floor had exits onto terraces or porches or verandahs. That left the serving and kitchen doors.

The main door from the side hall to the kitchen was closed, as was the one from the formal dining chamber. From the noise rising from behind those doors, Quaeryt was reluctant to open either, deciding to wait for someone else to open the one between the side hall and the kitchen. After what seemed a good two quints, but was probably less than half a quint, someone did, a footman who hurried out.

Quaeryt darted in, only to find himself in a small chamber filled with drawers and shelves, all of which seemed filled with platters, plates, serving pieces, goblets, and who knew what else. The chamber was empty.

The din came from the chamber beyond-and below-a long stone-walled room filled with tables and ovens … and at least four cooks and several assistants.

“… you send Deltryt packing?”

“… he was just hanging around…”

Quaeryt decided that no one was moving toward the stone ramp leading up to the pantry. He made his way down along the wall, just to be careful. His concealment seemed to hold. At least no one looked his way by the time he was on the lower level … and sweating from the overpowering heat in the kitchen.

“Use the old dried mutton … sauce it up and put it over anything … troopers will eat it…”

That was certainly true enough, reflected Quaeryt.

“… have to fix bread for all those troopers!”

“… could be worse, dearie,” cackled one of the older cooks.

“… woulda been … Kharst’s avengers at the door…”

“… or the three…”

“Enough chatter!” snapped a tall woman with a narrow face. “Fire up the old ovens! They’ll take twenty loaves each, and if you use all three…”

Quaeryt wondered how many retainers the hold had supported at one time if the kitchen could turn out sixty loaves at a time. Slowly, he eased along the side of the kitchen wall well back from the long battered preparation tables.

“What about the master’s and mistress’s dinner?”

“If you keep working it won’t be late…”

With all the cacophony in the kitchen and his primary purpose that of leaving the hold house, Quaeryt only picked up a few scraps of conversation as he made his way to the rear door. That posed another problem, because, even with all the bustling around, no one was leaving. They were going down steps to the cellars below, out to side rooms and pantries and cubbyholes, but not leaving.

Quaeryt kept waiting, but no one still departed.

Finally, he edged toward the door, and lifted the heavy latch, then gave it the slightest of pushes, as if the latch had not been closed, as though a gust of wind or a breeze had caught it, then slipped through. Behind him, he heard one of the cooks shout, “Who didn’t latch the door? Iliza! Close it, and make sure it’s latched firm!”

Even as Quaeryt stepped out onto the back steps, he had to dodge around a guard in blue livery, not so much on duty as spending a few free moments waiting for someone.

The guard stepped back and looked around, puzzled, then grinned at the kitchen maid who hurried toward the door. “Best not let it get unlatched again, Iliza.”

Iliza made a face and closed the door.

Quaeryt took his time walking across the courtyard toward the far buildings, looking around as he did. There was a fair amount of dust on the sandstone paving, but that was likely the result of wear on the soft stone as anything. At the same time, he had the feeling that as at several of the holdings he had seen or visited, the holding had once had many more servants and retainers than it did at present.

Kharst’s tariffs? Inability to compete against the factors in growing grains and crops?
Quaeryt shook his head. It could have been any of those, or just a decline in the ability of the High Holders. Certainly, Daefol didn’t strike him as the brightest of High Holders, although his wife obviously had more perception than Daefol.
But that doesn’t help if he doesn’t listen.

Quaeryt released the concealment inside one of the stables, where no one was looking, and then went to find Zhelan, who was in a dusty tack room at the end of the last and unused stable.

“Sir! I’m glad to see you.”

“Are there any problems?”

“No, sir. Not so far.” The major grinned. “I was very determined and very polite. I insisted on some rations for the men and some use of the kitchen for warm food. Elsior and Lhandor just drifted off, and no one noticed.”

“Are they back?”

“Lhandor is, not Elsior…”

“Once Elsior gets back, we all need to meet, all the officers, including the undercaptains. In the meantime, I’ll hear what Lhandor found out.”

Sitting on a short stool in the dusty tack room, he had Lhandor brief him.

“I didn’t find out that much, sir. I followed the stable hands and the assistant ostler. The old ostler talked about how the young ones should be thankful it wasn’t like the days before Kharst died, when the old holder had two hundred men-at-arms. He went on about how dealing with two hundred mounts was normal … and what a shame it was that they’d all died at Variana. He said something about imagers. I didn’t get it all, but it was something about imagers should be saved for dealing with rebels and disloyal High Holders, not for slaughtering honorable men following their master … One of the stable boys said his brother died there … another said it didn’t make much difference how a man died. If he was dead, did it matter whether he was frozen by an imager or run through with a sabre…”

“Did they say anything about Bhayar or Myskyl or Daefol?”

“The only thing anyone said about Lord Bhayar was that no one could have been worse than Rex Kharst. No one disagreed with that. No one said anything about High Holder Daefol, and the only thing anyone said about the submarshal was that they wished he’d just march his troopers back to Variana.”

Lhandor didn’t have that much to report, and before long, Elsior arrived.

“Sir … it took a while…”

“That’s fine. What did you discover?”

“I followed the guards, sir. They talk a lot, but they didn’t say all that much.”

Quaeryt nodded for him to continue.

“The guards don’t like Daefol that much. They call him Master DaFool, but not when the guard captain is around. He’s loyal to Daefol, I think.”

“Did they say anything about Myskyl or Bhayar?”

“Not much,” admitted Elsior. “There was something about being more interested in rebuilding part of the hold house at Fiancryt than in patrolling anything except the east river road. One said that he didn’t see much difference between the Telaryn regiments and the Bovarian ones. Neither fought, and both ate too much. Several guards said they were happy to stay here as long as the Telaryn troopers were anywhere close to Rivages.”

“Anything else?”

“One of them did say that we were fighting troopers, not barracks boys. No one seemed to hear him. Or they didn’t want to. Besides that, they talked about the serving girls and the nearest alehouse … other stuff like that.”

Quaeryt nodded slowly. He hadn’t expected to find out much, but he’d hoped. He turned to Zhelan. “Bring in the others.”

“Yes, sir.”

Quaeryt stood, but he had to wait only a fraction of a quint before Calkoran, Ghaelyn, and Khalis joined the others and he began to brief them. “I did manage to overhear some interesting conversation between High Holder Daefol and his wife. What Daefol said seems to support what I thought might be happening. Here’s the problem we face. The submarshal appears to be telling the local High Holders that Lord Bhayar has been unduly influenced by an evil imager who has married and enchanted his sister. According to High Holder Daefol, this evil imager has also decided to reduce the power of the High Holders and factors and has already destroyed scores of holds and holders. Therefore … it is up to the submarshal and perhaps others to rescue Lord Bhayar. I’m fairly certain that at least some of the regimental commanders agree with that story. As I’ve told most of you before, we cannot afford to deal with this in a military fashion. Lord Bhayar needs those six regiments, but we also cannot allow the submarshal to control them and march them south, with the High Holders behind them.” Quaeryt stopped and studied the faces of the officers, then waited.