Closer to the Chest (38 page)

Such were the gloomy thoughts that occupied him when he went back to his room, and waited to be contacted. The room grew dim, then dark, and still there was nothing. Grimly, he kept up his shield and the slow, dim thoughts of “Pakler” on the other side of it, keeping himself busy by changing them from time to time, from food, to runs over the rooftops, to memories of destroying that herb shop, then back to food again.

And finally, when he had begun to think he'd surely been detected for the fraud that he was . . .

:Soldier Pakler.:
The Mindvoice was . . . odd. Not like any Mindvoice he'd ever heard before. Flat, expressionless.
:You will take your knife, but nothing else, go out into the hall, and turn right.:

Obediently he did exactly that. From there he was directed to a small door that proved to be an entrance into a walled herb garden. He was told to climb the wall, using a ladder that was in a shed, and use the wall to get to the rooftops.

From there, the strange, flat voice guided him. Twice he
was told to hide, once behind a chimney, and once by hanging over the side of a steep roof. Both times, he had no sooner gotten out of sight than he heard the sounds of men in the street—didn't dare try to get a glimpse of them to see who they were, but he suspected they were some of the augmented Watch patrols that the Prince had promised.

While he waited, he dared an experiment. He let another, not entirely anomalous thought creep over the surface of his shields. The suggestion of another, better path to travel, one with surer footing and more hiding places.

If the one Mindspeaking to him noticed the thought, he didn't even acknowledge the fact.

Finally, the voice directed him to drop down into a small yard in the back of another shop, and enter it. This was a small yard with some small, smelly vats of unidentifiable liquid in them, and he suspected they were dye. It was even easier to open this door than the last one; just pass his knife between the door and the frame and he could flick open the latch.

He walked into the shop, which had a generous window in front—a glass window, which was unusual. He looked around, as the smell of good leather hit his nose. Then it was obvious why he'd been told to bring his knife.

The shop belonged to someone who made small, fine leather objects; gloves, fancy belt-pouches, leather vests and bodices, cases for small, expensive objects, like fine tools, pens, or delicate instruments, all beautifully tooled or embellished. It broke his heart to do so, to see all that delicate work ruined, but he used his knife as the Mindvoice directed, and put defacing slashes through every single thing in the shop, no matter how small.

But he worked slowly, feigning that his knife was duller than it actually was, hoping somehow to be able to save some of these things. And whenever possible, he slashed the backs, not the fronts; the backs might be mended, and the owner
would have to discount the items for the repair, but at least she wouldn't lose everything.

But he had only been at this “work” a short time when the Mindvoice suddenly interrupted him.
:Stop,:
it said.
:You must leave,
now
! Return to the Temple at once, as fast as you can.:

Repressing his relief, he bolted out the back, clambered up the drainpipe to the roof, and ran for it.

•   •   •

The Mindvoice directed him to come in the front of the Temple—and the same Novice that had met him last night met him there tonight. “Well done, Pakler,” the Novice told him, slapping him on the back. “Sorry we had to interrupt you, but there was a special patrol of the Watch who had keys to every shop in that area. They were opening every door and checking inside before moving on.” The Novice frowned as he led Mags in. “Obviously the sluts went to whine at the King, and got him to order this. We'll have to put a halt to our night-work for a while, at least in the better parts of town, and there aren't any women owning shops elsewhere that we haven't already dealt with.”

“Does thet mean ye ain't gonna need me?” Mags replied in feigned alarm, stopping right there in the hallway, and widening his eyes like a frightened horse.

The Novice's frown turned to a smile. “Not a bit of it. We'll just put you to a different sort of work. Now that we know you can hear the Mindspeech, you're being appointed as one of the Elite Soldiers of Sethor.” He paused at the door to Mags' room. “Is there anything you need tonight? Food? Drink? The kitchen women have gone to bed, but I can have one brought to you if you're not particular.”

Mags thought for a moment he was going to gag, but evidently neither the Novice nor any other watcher noticed. “No, sor. Uh, no, thet ain't true. I'd admire me some wine.”

“That's easily done. I'll have some brought to you.” The Novice left him at his door, and he went inside, leaving the door open so the light from the torches in the hallway shone inside.

He'd taken off his boots by the time a boy turned up with an open bottle of wine, it looked about two-thirds empty, which suited him. “Novice Tarenton said ye was t'hev this, Sojer,” the boy said from the doorway. “What'd ye do tonight?”

Mags held out his hand, and the boy came into the room, handing him the bottle.
What would Pakler do? Boast. Definitely boast.
“Well,” he said, inflating his chest as the boy stood there in the light from the door, looking at him, wide-eyed and worshipful. “Seems I got skills.”

He spun a wild tale of running across rooftops, evading a dozen patrols of the Watch, utterly destroying the stock of a woman who was
clearly
some kind of witch, based on all the arcane symbols he saw carved and stitched into her goods. “Up to no good, she were,” he lied. “Bet she were puttin' evil spells on poor fellahs t'make 'em do whut she wanted, like i' th' old, bad times. But Sethor done give me strenth! An' when I left, there weren't nothin' i' thet place could harm a flea.”

The last, at least wasn't a lie.

“Cor!” breathed the boy. “I cain't hardly wait till I'm a Sojer like you!”

Mags reached out and ruffled the boy's hair. “Ye will be, soon 'nuff,” he said. “Now be off. An close door behind ye.”

He really
did
feel in need of the wine—which was quite good. Not really
excellent
wine, but then, someone like Pakler wouldn't know excellent wine if it stood up in the bottle and announced its quality to him. He drank it slowly, while he thought.

Now
he knew exactly how the Poison Pen had been delivering letters up on the Hill. There were three people involved, the delivery-thug, a Farseer, and a Mindspeaker. The Farseer
would keep track of their delivery man, while the Mindspeaker gave him instructions on where to go and which letter to deliver to whom, warning him if anyone was about to see him at work so he could hide. There may even have been more than one delivery man up there; that would make the job go quite a bit faster.

That was why the Poison Pen was no longer able to deliver letters personally once the shield against Farseeing had been put up.

So,
he thought, finishing the bottle.
I know the how and the why. I just need to find out the
who.
And somehow I need to let Nikolas know. And all without the Mindspeaker figuring out I'm not what I seem. . . .

•   •   •

There were only two candles burning in the room, giving just enough light that the people sitting in low chairs around an equally low table could see where to put their wine glasses. Gauze screens on the windows let in the lovely, cool breeze that stirred the curtains, but kept out the insects. It was too bad no one was in a mood to enjoy their surroundings.

“. . . so Dallen is lurking passively in the background of Mags' mind, and not even
Mags
knows he's listening,” Nikolas told Amily, Jorthun and Lady Dia. And Prince Sedric, who was attending this little meeting—which they were holding in the Prince's rooms, well inside the protections the spirit of the stone was holding against Farseers.

I can't believe how lucky we were that the Sethorite Farseer never learned enough about Lord Jorthun to keep an eye on him,
she thought. Then again, Jorthun's identity as the King's agent was known only to a very few, and none of those people were ones that were being watched by the Poison Pen.
Except perhaps me, now . . . I can only thank all the gods that I never led him to Jorthun.

“So Dallen is talking to your Companion, and also to Rolan.” Sedric chewed on his lower lip as he thought. “I am tempted to ask him to add my Companion to the list, but I think perhaps—”

:Tell him I will speak with his Companion,:
Rolan interjected, before he could finish his sentence.

“Rolan says he'll keep you informed,” Amily said, as Sedric mulled over his next few words. “It's all right, I think he can handle it.
I'm
not in danger of being discovered by a lot of dangerous fanatics.”

Sedric's face cleared. “That suits me. I don't want Dallen to be overburdened at a time when he needs to be watching closely for signs his Chosen is in danger.”

“Is
he in danger?” Amily asked, finally asking the one thing she wanted to know. “Can we get him out if something goes wrong?”

“Well, we know this system works without their Mindspeaker detecting anything,” Nikolas went on. “I was down in Haven last night; I was able to alert the Watch to check that leather-worker's shop, and according to what the Novice said to Mags, none of the Sethorites guessed the interruption was due to anything other than bad luck and vigilence on the part of the Watch.” Her father's voice took on tones of admiration. “I can't believe the mental work he did, creating a false mind on top of the true one, with hardened shields in between. That's the work of . . . well the most talented and skillful Mindspeaker
I
ever heard of.”

“He did manage to keep himself sane when he was a slavey in those mines for a good six months or more after his Gift emerged,” Amily reminded her father. “And that was without any teaching at all. But you haven't answered my question. He's in the equivalent of a fortress, and I don't know how we'd get to him in time if they discovered he was a Herald!”

They all looked at her soberly, as if to remind her that a Herald's life was not . . . safe. Then her father spoke. “Dallen
is confident that Mags can keep up his ‘double mind' quite easily. He is also confident that the Mindspeaker is not going to pay much attention to him, since he obeyed every command immediately and to the letter. Given all of that, Mags can do this.”

She nodded, slowly.
All right. If he doesn't know we can follow what is happening to him, he might actually be safer. I can see that.

“Let's get to the point of this meeting,” Nikolas replied, with a little nod to Amily of encouragement. “We know the why, the how, and the when this monster has been acting. But we still don't know
who
he is.”

Amily sipped absently at her wine. It had to be someone higher than a Precept, because this person was obviously giving orders
to
the Precepts. Did the High Priest know about all this? He had to know about a great deal of it at the very least; he'd be a pretty poor leader if he didn't know that his underlings were destroying shops under his nose. But he probably had some sort of plausible deniability set up, just in case the rest were caught.
I knew I didn't like him the minute I set eyes on him.
Did he know about the Poison Pen, though? He might not. That would only require one or two people at most, and perhaps the Poison Pen himself to write all the letters.
Nice thing about being a priest. No one really questions you about what you're doing if you're writing.

“I have already gotten answers to my letters, thanks to you, Sedric,” Jorthun replied, looking distinctly uneasy. “I have a strong suspect, and a theory. But I don't yet have any proof. If I am wrong—I do not feel it is right to make accusations, for one thing, and for another, if I name the wrong person, then the right one will be alerted and might act swiftly and impulsively . . . and that would quite literally put several lives in jeopardy. Of course . . . those people may already be in danger. I don't know, and I have no way to be sure just how far this man will go.”

They looked at each other, but it was Amily who spoke. “That's all very well, but if those people are already in danger I think
someone
should know. Who
are
they?”

“You,” Jorthun said to Amily. “And Lady Tyria, and possibly Helane.”

She was a bit taken aback by the fact that
she
was in danger . . . why? But then it struck her, all those letters telling her she should die and let her father be King's Own again. She might not be a threat to another woman's man, but by the Sethorite beliefs she was certainly stealing a man's job. “I can take care of myself, but shouldn't we warn
them
?” she asked, saying what Nikolas and Sedric were surely thinking.

“That is a problem,” Jorthun replied. “Warning them, or at least, doing so openly, would warn our target. But we should certainly take steps to protect them.”

Since that was pretty much a direct echo of what Mags had told her the last time they had been able to “speak,” she nodded. “Mags had an idea,” she said. “That I should befriend both of them; that way I have an excuse to keep an eye on them. We really can't take the chance that whichever Sethorite this is hasn't got more ordinary eyes and ears up here on the Hill.”

“My thought exactly,” Jorthun agreed. “I was going to suggest just that, and I think that will go a long way toward protecting them.

“But I have another idea,” she continued. “Can we tell all of Lord Lional's children
except
Helane? Mags and I have had dealings with the other three, and they're clever, steady, and Lirelle is the one that made Helane talk to her mother about the improper conduct of that so-called music tutor in the first place.”