Bazil Broketail (13 page)

She smiled, nodding agreement. “And you will advise him?”

“At first, but I am old, I will pass on and another will take my place.”

“You imagine you will be able to control the selection of that person?”

Burly chuckled. “I will have some say in the matter.”

“But Erald will be king. He will be able to make decisions on his own authority if he decides to. He will attract women, some of whom may not have the welfare of Marneri in mind.”

Well, it was true, but any chancellor worthy of his salt should be able to see off grasping females.

“And you think Besita will be more amenable to wise control?” purred Burly.

“She is a silly goose, we both know that. But she is also forty years old and has learned a few things about the world. With wise advice, either from yourself or from the Sisterhood, she will avoid the truly catastrophic mistakes we foresee from Erald.”

“She has never shown herself much interested in the throne.”

“You are recalling conversations you had with her when she was much younger. She was a foolish girl. We believe she will make a surprisingly good sovereign.”

“Advised by the Sisterhood?” That was rich, the woman would be a puppet for the machinations of the Grey Sisters.

Burly spread his hands. “Well, so what? The decision will be made by Sanker and none other.”

“Yes, that is true. In the meantime we need to find the spy that lingers on the margins of the royal family.”

Burly crossed his fingers on his ample stomach.

“What do you expect?”

“Someone to maneuver close to Erald. Or Besita. Or both.”

“I will check—as you know I monitor these things as a matter of course, Besita less than Erald, however. The heir’s chief interest at the moment has been a young woman named Wassmussin, a very pretty little thing of nineteen from Troat.”

“She is beautiful I hear.”

“Very, and Erald is much taken with her. However the prince is the son of his father and the grandson of Wauk the Great. He may be an idiot, but he has an enormous ego. There is little room in his heart for love of anyone else.”

She made a wry face.

“This itself is too little upon which to base the security of Marneri for the next decade or more.”

Burly raised his hands in a gesture of frustration.

“Besita will never be queen! The king has a positive hatred of her. It all derives from her mother; you must remember that he was cuckolded, made a fool by Losset. He is convinced that Besita is not his child.”

“Braid’s mother drank wine throughout her pregnancy. She drank to excess frequently, she died eventually of liver disease as a result. Erald was damaged in the womb by the effects of drink. He has all the classic symptoms and the look of such victims. We know that he will never improve and that he cannot grasp the simplest things about the process of government, yet he possesses a child’s ego and a degree of cunning. He can make no real emotional attachment, but he is torn by emotions that he has little control over. This is too dangerous a mixture for the throne of the white city by the Bright Sea.”

“Nevertheless, that is the king’s wish.”

“It is not unknown for dying kings to want to bring down their kingdom with them. In this case the king’s wish must be overridden by a higher authority—he is bound to the emperor.”

Burly shrugged. “Well, madam, you are correct. As always you have excellent sources of information. I doff my cap to the Sisterhood once more. I have detected this tendency in His Majesty’s heart more and more recently. He is dying young, much younger than he need have, but his family has a fatal weakness for drink. He is bitter and he has come to hate the world.”

“Then, Burly, you must remember your oath; you are bound to serve the imperial interest in this matter, not just the word of your king.”

Burly smiled at this. “I do of course remember my oath. I also wish to serve Marneri, and I know that that service must stretch beyond the life of my lord the king. Come then, lady, what do you wish me to do?”

She seemed pleased and relieved.

“I always did believe that you were still stout and true, Master Burly. I am glad to find that my faith in you has been rewarded.”

Her voice took on a quality as of a recitation, and he felt his heart tugged upward, by some mystery of magic, to a higher plane. A plateau on which the fate of nations was decided.

“ ‘Tis upon men and women such as yourself, Rodro Burly, that our great enterprise rests. They are barely a handful in the multitudes, but a handful that can think beyond the parochial concerns of their position and place. You know that we face the most terrible enemy in the history of the world and that any mistake might lead to utter catastrophe.”

She paused to search his face, her eyes were magnetic.

“As for what the office would ask of you, I can only say this: try to ease the king’s mind concerning Besita’s parentage. And keep your eyes open for new faces in the circles around Erald and Besita.”

Burly nodded slowly. “I will do all that I can. As I said, the king hates his daughter, he will not want to hear praises of her sung by me. However there may come a time when I can attempt to present a better side of her.”

Her warm smile was back.

“Burly, I’m sure you will exceed the emperor’s expectations in every way. I offer you the thanks of my office.”

Then she was gone and Burly heaved a sigh before ringing for an assistant and beginning a review of the Princess Besita’s current amours.

Besita was a sensualist, in this she shared her mother’s primary characteristic, but she was not addicted to wine. It was instead her passion for younger men that marked her as the child of Losset.

She was kept away from most of the centers of power in the city and most decision-making. She sat on the committee, but she was a lightweight, given only to cantankerous complaints about taxation. Young men passed through her bed fairly frequently, but she never kept them around for long.

On the face of it she made a worthless target for a spy. Easy enough to get to, but she lacked the king’s favor and knew nothing of the inner knowledge. Thus Burly was inclined to dismiss the thought that a spy would try to use her to reach the king. But it would cost him little in time or effort to investigate and the Sisters would be grateful. So he would get Lessis a complete report.

A thought struck him. Perhaps the Sisters intended to remove Erald themselves. It was often rumored that they had poisoned King Adalmo of Kadein and had killed the twin sons of King Ronsek of Ryotwa to pass his throne to his gifted daughter, Queen Vladmys.

All the rulers of Argonath lived with the same sense of unease. They were grouped by treaty within the empire, centered in Cunfshon. They provided legions to an army much greater than anything they could field as individuals, and thus they had survived and prospered despite relentless assault from their enemy. But they were ruled discreetly by the emperor through the Sisters and the Temple. Royal power was subtly circumscribed, always through “negotiation” and agreement. And on the occasions that an Adalmo arose to trouble these delicate arrangements, an accident happened and the source of the trouble vanished from the scene.

It had happened to Rugash of Talion, carried off by a strange wasting disease after he had murdered his son Valins. It had taken Pondenso the Magnificent of Kadein who had slain most of his own family during a reign of terror and was found barking mad one morning after consuming tainted wine.

Yes, the Sisterhood was constantly at work thus, pruning the royal trees to keep them strong and healthy. Burly was well aware of this. And he was glad of the opportunity to befriend such a power as Lessis of Valmes.

When Lessis finally slipped away from the lord chamberlain, the Temple bells were ringing for the hour before midnight. A chill wind blew down the hill into her face as she walked up the Strand to Tower Square.

At the Old Gate Lessis bid Viuris good night and sent her off to the Novitiate for some supper and a warm bed. Lessis went on through the old yard to the tower entrance and then up the main stairs, through the huge draughty hallways, to the apartment put aside for her use during her visit.

As she climbed she mulled over the events of the meeting. All in all she was satisfied. She had done her best to stir them up, and now Marneri would move to check the Teetol. As usual, Marneri’s example would shame the others, even wealthy Kadein to the south, into improving the position of the legions. By the summer campaigning season along the River Don, the legions would be ready.

Yet Lessis’s heart was heavy following her conversation with the king. Sanker was filled with bitterness. His son Erald was a cretin, damaged in the womb by excessive drinking on his mother’s part. That Sanker should exhibit such a fixed preference for Erald indicated the depth of his degradation.

Lessis feared that unless Sanker’s preference was changed there would have to be action from her office. Lessis also feared that she would be the one chosen to execute that action. Sanker of Marneri had been hers to manage throughout his tortured life. She had known Sanker since he was a little boy. He had been a good king for Marneri, and when the great crisis came he had stood aside when required to, although it had hurt him deeply that his views on military strategy could not be accommodated.

It would be distasteful in the extreme to be the one ordered to kill him. Lessis shook her head. It was a wearying world, and this staircase seemed longer than ever!

“My lady,” a voice whispered urgently to her from the dark on a high landing.

Lessis turned. A girl in the uniform of the Novitiate was standing there, her hands clasped together.

“Yes, my dear. What is it?” Lessis’s practiced eyes studied the girl for signs of an enchantment or the wispiness of an illusion generated by the black arts of the enemy. There was none, this was just a novice in the Temple Service.

“My lady, I’m terribly sorry to bother you, but I have to ask your aid for someone you know, someone who is in great trouble.”

Lessis frowned. What was this?

“You see, my lady, I have a friend—a dragonboy. He said he met you once, that you were very kind to him.”

Lessis nodded at once. “Yes, yes, I remember him. Relkin Orphanboy, I believe is his name. Comes from Quosh, down in Bluestone.”

“Yes, milady, that’s it.”

“Well, what is it now?”

“My lady he’s been entranced, and his dragon too. They’re a pitiable sight, you have to come and see.”

“Entranced? How? By whom?”

“I don’t know. Some say that a man visited them in their stall, a man with a black cloak and a physician’s bag.”

Lessis’ ears pricked up at this.

“Mmmm, and then?”

“Relkin has lost his wits—he doesn’t respond to anything with more than an empty smile. His dragon is terrified of everything, even his own shadow. He cowers in a corner, shuddering with fear, it is quite unlike him. I knew that Relkin had spoken with you the other night, and that you had helped him, so I dared to come here and trouble you.”

Lessis stared at the girl. Who would do this and why? And how would they bewitch a dragon?

“The tail of this dragon, what condition is it in?”

“Well, my lady, that’s another strange thing. The dragon had an injured tail until today. But today his tail has healed. It’s still bent a little, but he was using it earlier today—I watched him in the amphitheater.”

Lessis heaved a sigh. “Yes, yes, very odd indeed. Well, it sounds like I had better take a look into this. Lead me to the boy and the dragon.”

Shrugging off her weariness, Lessis followed the girl back down the steps.

“Tell me, my dear, what is your name?”

“Lagdalen of the Tarcho, my lady.”

“Lagdalen of the Tarcho, eh? An honored name. I know other members of the Tarcho kin, Lord Mahjuk of the Susuf for one.”

“I have never met the lord, my lady. I have never traveled further than eighty leagues from Marneri.”

“Yes, my dear, of course. But one day, perhaps, you will. Perhaps you will travel far and wide.”

“Only the mariners do that, my lady, and I will not be one of them. I will live here in Marneri all my days I expect.”

Lessis smiled. The girl’s smug certainty about her future aroused something in Lessis, something unfathomable, almost an urge to mischief.

Lagdalen led her down the stairs and out into the courtyard of the tower. They passed the stables, where sixty horses stood quietly in their stalls. Ahead loomed the mass of the Dragon House. At the gates the two women in the garb of Sisters of the Temple aroused no interest in the guard. They passed on down the wide corridors of the main floor. Here were housed the champions, those great dragons retired from the legions who lived in Marneri to train the young drakes from the countryside.

They reached a wide door into a less exalted passageway and passed the stalls of the apprentice dragons. These stalls were smaller, barer, with walls of wood and floors of stone. Dragonboys sat in the doorways, at work on armor and weapons. Small lamps glowed within the stalls.

They reached Bazil’s stall. Relkin sat on a stool by the wall, a couple of other boys crouched down beside him. The dragon was slumped in a vast heap, shivering beneath a blanket on his crib.

The boys beside Relkin looked up in alarm.

“He ain’t done nothing wrong!” exclaimed one of them.

“It’s alright, Meekil, the lady has come to help us,” explained Lagdalen.

Lessis had turned her attention to Relkin, who indeed appeared to have completely lost his wits. His eyes were vacant, his mouth slack-jawed.

Instantly she felt the spell surrounding him. A harsh evil structure, its components feeding on the boy’s life-force, destroying him to keep him in this state of oafish stupor.

It was crude but effective sorcery. Lessis exerted her sensing power and absorbed a little of the mark of the evil spell. Enough so that she would know any other spell laid by its creator.

From the trace she detected many things. It was the work of a man, of that she was certain. The spell had the body and linear strength of a spell from a masculine mind. But a relatively crude mind, and one that was inflated with its own self worth.