Eye of the Labyrinth (23 page)

Chapter 42

Dirk emerged from the temple a little over an hour later, feeling relieved that he had finally done what he probably should have done two years ago. He felt more than a little guilty, too. It was going to be hard on Tia when she realized what he had set in motion. Perhaps he should warn her ... then again, she would probably slit his throat before he got halfway through his explanation, so maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to mention it.

The second sun was gone, and the evening market in the square was well under way in the red light of the first sun as he pushed his way back through the stalls toward the inn. He was about halfway across the plaza when he spied a troop of Senetian soldiers heading in his direction.

The stalls around him were mostly silversmiths and gem merchants, but over to the left was a multicolored pavilion filled with people. They all appeared to be watching some sort of contest in the tent, and occasionaly would break out into an enthusiastic cheer. As it was the most crowded place nearby, Dirk slipped between the two nearest stalls and ducked into the tent. He pushed through the crowd until he was certain he was hidden from view, and then turned his attention to the contest he had inadvertently come to witness.

There was a small podium in the center of the tent where two men sat. One of them was a heavyset man with an impressive beard, dressed in a flamboyant robe of purple embroidered with golden sigils. The man sitting opposite him at the table was much younger, dressed in a simple shirt and trousers. His fingers were stained with black ink, as if he was a scribe or some sort of clerk. He was staring intently at a large checkered board that sat on a table between the two men, which looked like two chessboards placed edge to edge. Behind the scribe stood another young man similarly dressed, and the two consulted each other frequently before making a move.

The pieces on the board were made of carved wood, painted black on one side, white on the other, and marked with numbers. Some of the pieces were squares, some were circles and others were triangles. There was also a stack of pieces on the board in front of each player. As Dirk watched, the young scribe finished his discussion with his friend and then moved a white circle to capture a black one next to it. He then turned the piece over so that it was now white and another cheer rose from the crowd.

“Fools!” the man next to him remarked scornfully. “They’ll never win by assaulting.”

“What are they playing?” Dirk asked.

“Rithma,” the man told him, glancing at Dirk curiously. Then he pointed to the large bearded man in the theatrical purple robe. “That’s Ingo the Invincible. Nobody’s ever beaten him.”

“So why do they keep trying?” Dirk asked.

The man pointed to the opposite corner of the pavilion where another large bearded man stood guarding a small chest sitting on an upturned barrel. “ ’Cause there’s a pot of over three hundred dorns to the first person who can beat Ingo with a greatest triumph.”

“What’s a greatest triumph?”

The man shook his head. “You’re not from around here, are you lad?”

“I’m from Avacas,” Dirk explained.

The man nodded in understanding, as if anyone from Avacas would automatically be stupid. “A greatest triumph is the hardest win,” his companion explained. “You need to wipe out your opponent’s pyramid with your four pieces lined up on his side of the board to form all three progressions at the same time.”

Dirk looked at the game thoughtfully then glanced over at the chest. Three hundred dorns was an awful lot of money. He and Tia barely had ten dorns left and they still had to buy supplies for the rest of the journey north. Returning to the inn with more money than they could possibly spend might also assuage his guilt a little ...

“Explain the rules to me,” he said.

“Well, white always goes first,” the man told him. “The circle pieces can move one square in any direction, horizontally, vertically or diagonally. The triangle pieces can move two places and the squares move three. Now, those stacks that each player has are called pyramids and they’re made up of other pieces, but they can only move the same way as their base piece can go.”

“Can you jump your opponent’s piece?”

The Bollow man shook his head. “No. You need a clear path. And you’re not allowed to shorten it, either, or make turns.”

“But you can capture them, right?” Dirk guessed, watching the young scribe turn over yet another piece belonging to Ingo so that the white side was uppermost.

“Aye. A captured piece can be turned over and used by you.”

“So the object of the game is to capture as many of your opponent’s pieces as possible?” Dirk asked.

“Sort of,” the man agreed. “You see, there are four ways to capture your opponent’s pieces: assault and ambush or sally and siege. In assault, you can capture and replace any piece of equal value. Now an ambush is when you have any higher-numbered piece next to his lower-numbered pieces whose sum or product are equal to it.”

Dirk nodded and listened as the man explained the rest of the rules, and began to understand why Ingo the Invincible had never been beaten. The man spoke of sallying and sieges, of captured pieces and attacking pyramids, and of pyramids that could be captured by their total, the value of their bases, one layer at a time, or the sum of several layers at a time.

“So how do you win?”

“Well, there are eight possible ways to win, five lesser victories and three greater victories. The first lesser victory is called—”

“But you don’t win the pot for the lesser victories, do you?”

“No, of course not, I just thought ...”

“Tell me about the greatest triumph then.”

The man shrugged. “All the greater triumphs require lining up at least three pieces in an arithmetical progression or a geometrical progression or a harmonic progression, and it can’t be done until Ingo’s entire pyramid has been captured. A great triumph is when you have three pieces lined up to form one of the progressions. The greater triumph is if you manage to get four pieces lined up to form two of the progressions simultaneously. The greatest triumph—and the pot—is four pieces lined up on Ingo’s side of the board to form all three progressions.”

“Does it matter if he manages to recapture any of the pyramid pieces?”

“No. Pyramids can’t be reassembled.”

Dirk thought about if for a moment. It seemed fairly straightforward. He just needed to remember the rules. The mathematics involved in the game did not faze him in the slightest, but the rules were rather convoluted. The problem was he didn’t want to draw any undue attention to himself by climbing up onto a podium in a crowded tent and taking on the unbeatable Ingo the Invincible.

“Have you ever played?” he asked the man beside him.

“Aye,” the man nodded with a smile. “Quite a bit. But Rithma’s a game for mathematicians and philosophers. Ask anyone in Bollow and they’ll tell you I’m a bit of a philosopher, but I’ve not got a head for the numbers.”

“But you’re allowed an adviser, aren’t you?” he asked, pointing to the young man giving the scribe directions about where to place the pieces.

The man looked at him quizzically. “You’re not suggesting I play with you advising me, are you, lad? You don’t even understand the rules.”

“No, I don’t,” Dirk agreed. “But I understand the mathematics. Care to give it a try? We can split the pot if we win.”

The man thought about it for a moment and then broke into a broad grin and offered Dirk his hand. “My name’s Davros. What’s yours?”

“Little Antonov,” Dirk replied with a grin, accepting the handshake. “What’s the stake to play?”

“Ten dorns.”

“I’ve only got five,” Dirk lied. He wasn’t going to gamble every last dorn he owned. It seemed only fair that Davros share some of the risk.

Davros patted his pockets with a frown. “I’ve not got a purse on me at present. Here! This should make up the stake.” He pulled a slender silver chain from the pocket of his vest and held it up for Dirk to examine. At the end of chain was a tiny bow and arrow, wrought of fine silver.

“It’s very pretty,” Dirk remarked, not sure of its value.

“It’s just a trinket, really,” the older man shrugged. “I made it for my niece, but she’s got so much jewelery now she’ll not appreciate it. Tell you what—if we win, you can keep it and I’ll buy her something really impressive with my share of the winnings.”

“That seems fair.”

“Are you sure you want to try this?”

Dirk nodded.

“Let’s do it then,” Davros agreed with a laugh.

It took Ingo another three or four moves to beat the young scribe and his friend. The two young men walked from the table, looking forlorn and rather surprised that they had been beaten. Ingo rose to his feet and accepted the applause of the crowd in a manner that reminded Dirk sharply of Marqel, back when she was just a simple acrobat on Elcast. It was something to do with performers, he thought. They all had that same manner, that same hunger for acknowledgment, for public acclamation.

“So who’s next?” Ingo called to the crowd.

“That’d be me!” Davros called back, stepping up to the podium.

Ingo turned and smiled benevolently at him. “Ah, my old friend Davros the Silversmith! Haven’t you suffered enough public humiliation?”

“Apparently not,” Davros replied. The crowd laughed and applauded him as he took the seat opposite Ingo and began to reset the board. Dirk moved around behind his chair and studied the placement of the pieces carefully.

“I see you’ve brought reinforcements this time,” Ingo said, glancing at Dirk as he resumed his seat.

“This is Little Antonov,” Davros said, by way of introduction. “He’s from Avacas.”

“Then this shouldn’t take very long at all,” said Ingo. “Your move, Davros. White always goes first.”

Chapter 43

Alenor had never seen a corpse before. She had never seen a body so devoid of humanity or eyes so blank and lifeless. The dead man was laid out on a slab in a small room at the back of the cells in the detention block that the Queen’s Guard used to hold criminals awaiting the queen’s justice. This was the first time she had been in this part of the barracks. The roughly dressed stone walls stank of stale urine and fear, which was only partly masked by the sharp smell of lye soap.

She was a little surprised that the smell of the mortuary or the sight of the cadaver didn’t make her swoon. Wasn’t that the appropriate thing for ladies of good breeding to do when confronted by something so brutal?

Alenor didn’t know who the corpse was. The freshly dead body had been provided by the Brotherhood in exchange for concessions from the Queen’s Guard that Alenor was sure she didn’t want to know about. The man had been in his late thirties, she guessed. His hair was dark brown, his half-open, lifeless eyes an unusual shade of green, but other than that, there was nothing remarkable about him. He had died badly, though, obviously the victim of some terrible torment at the hands of his executioners. She wondered what he had done to run afoul of the Brotherhood.

“Who is he?” the Lion of Senet asked.

Alenor looked to Alexin for the answer.

“His name was Jules Stark,” the captain informed him. “He was a petty thief, a gambler and a drug runner. We captured him during a raid on a dust den near the wharves.”

Alenor had heard of dust dens. They were usually hidden in out-of-the-way places in the seedier parts of the city, and provided a haven for those who craved an illegal dose of poppy-dust, along with those who traded in it.

“And why do you think that this corpse would be of any interest to me?” Antonov asked.

“Because we found this on him, your highness,” Alenor said, handing him a small envelope.

Antonov accepted it from her and examined the broken seal before opening it. He pulled out the folded sheet of parchment inside and took a few moments to read the contents of the letter, his expression betraying nothing. Alenor knew what the letter said. She had helped Alexin compose it. It had been quite a chore to come up with the right words—vague enough to make the letter appear genuine, yet specific enough to convey exactly what they wanted.

Antonov looked up at her. “You’ve read this?”

Alenor nodded.
Over and over,
she was tempted to say. “Yes, your highness.”

“And what do
you
think it means?”

“I wasn’t sure, your highness. That’s why I ordered my guard to interrogate him.”

Antonov looked down at the broken, battered corpse. “Your guard is as ham-fisted as they are incompetent, Alenor. They killed him.”

“But not before we learned what we wanted to know, your highness,” Alexin pointed out, looking a little offended.

“Which was?” Antonov prompted impatiently.

“Stark is Damitian. He’d just arrived in Kalarada when we apprehended him. It turns out he’s been supplying poppy-dust to a select list of customers in Kalarada for years. Most of his clients were merchants, even a few palace functionaries. Some of the names we extracted from him were Senetian, your highness.”

Antonov did not look pleased. “And the others?”

“Nobody really important. Except for one name.”

“Do you have a particular taste for the dramatic, Captain, or are you trying to drag this out for as long as possible just to irritate me?”

“The name he gave was Neris Veran,” Alenor blurted out, suddenly fearful for Alexin.

Antonov turned to look at her. “Neris Veran is dead.”

“Not according to this man,” Alexin said. “He claimed to know him; claimed that he’d seen him as recently as a few weeks ago. In Damita. According to Stark, he fled to Damita at the end of the War of Shadows and has been enjoying the protection of Prince Oscon ever since.”

It was not an unreasonable scenario. Oscon of Damita had been the only ruler of means to side with Johan Thorn, although since being defeated on the battlefield, the old prince had retreated into exile, leaving his son Baston to rule his principality. Damita was still nominally an independent nation, but with Baston on the throne, it was hard to tell where Damita ended and Senet began.

“And you expect me to believe that this man was supplying Neris Veran with poppy-dust?”

Alenor shrugged helplessly, her innocence all the more convincing because she was genuinely afraid of what she had got herself involved in. “I don’t know, your highness. I don’t even know if the information is genuine.”

“It might be a clever ruse by the pirates to throw me off the scent.”

“Really?” she asked, suddenly feeling faint.
This is never going to work. He’s going to realize this man has been dead for too
long. He’s going to know that he didn’t die here under interrogation.
Somebody probably saw them bringing in the body. He probably
knows everything and is just toying with us, to see how deeply we’re
involved ...

“You’ve been duped, Alenor,” Antonov announced suddenly.

“Your highness? I ... I don’t understand.”

Antonov smiled at her indulgently. “Of course you don’t understand, my dear. That’s why you should have come to me as soon as you arrested this man, not let your bumbling Guardsmen handle it.”

“Sire, we interrogated the man for hours,” Alexin objected.

“And learned precisely what he wanted you to hear, Captain. Interrogation is an exact science, and I seriously doubt that any of your men has the experience to do it properly.”

“But why would someone try to do such a thing?” she asked, her confusion quite genuine.

“You’re to be married soon, Alenor. There are any number of people who’d like to prevent that from happening.”

“But the letter—”

“A carefully worded plant designed to pique my interest. It’s obviously not genuine. The grammar is far too exact, the language much too fluent, to be the work of a barely educated petty thief.” Antonov looked down at the corpse again with a frown. “I suspect the intent was to make us think this man knew where Neris Veran was, in the belief that I would drop everything and go charging off to Damita to search for him.”

“But what if the information is genuine?” she asked.

He shook his head. “Neris is dead, Alenor. For years Johan Thorn was able to distract me by making me think otherwise. This is simply proof that they have nobody with even a fraction of his wit to lead them now.” Antonov laughed softly. He appeared genuinely amused. “As if I would fall for anything so clumsy.”

“What should we do?”

Antonov smiled at her. “There’s no need for you to worry about that, Alenor. I’ll take care of it.”

She nodded slowly and lowered her eyes so he could not see her fear. Fortunately, it made her look submissive, rather than deceitful. “I’m sorry I didn’t bring this man to your attention sooner, your highness. I’ll know next time.”

“I’m sure you will. Come now; let’s return to the palace. These gloomy dungeons are no place for a young lady.”

Alenor nodded meekly and accepted the arm the Lion of Senet offered her. She kept her eyes fixed firmly on Antonov, afraid that if she caught Alexin’s eye, she would betray them all.

Antonov had not believed them, but according to the message the Baenlanders had sent her, that didn’t really matter. It was not actually Antonov this intrigue had been designed to trap. All she could do now was wait and let the seeds they had planted sprout in more fertile soil.

In fact, nobody would know if their ploy had been successful until Antonov had a chance to speak to Belagren.