Much Fall of Blood-ARC (41 page)

"I already knew. I have sources not available to you," she said, dismissively.

He hated her. How he hated her. But he feared and needed her too. "At least that will be the end of his support among the damned commoners. He burned their precious little town. They will hate him now."

Elizabeth shook her head. "I promise you that by now they are already finding ways to say that it was all your fault, nephew. They will believe what they wish to believe. Do not concern yourself with the opinions of lesser people."

"That is what he has: an army of peasants," said Emeric angrily. "They are like lice. There are always more."

Elizabeth looked at her profile in the long mirror in his command tent, ignoring him. Adjusting the collar on her dress. Eventually he coughed. "So what are you doing about Vlad, aunt?"

"Nephew. I know he is dangerous. I have always known that. You underestimate him, and the magic and powers concerned with him. I am moving to trap him . . . And I have to do it myself. I will have him, but like all good ploys it takes a little time to get him to betray himself."

"You do not fail, Aunt. You are the wisest, the cleverest person I know," he said ingratiatingly, doing his best at flattery. He knew that he wasn't very good at it, that she saw through his efforts. But she still did respond to it. If family rumor was to be believed it was her vanity that had entrapped her in the first place. They said that she had not been particularly beautiful—but that she had had a very good skin. She had gone to extreme lengths to keep it that way, he knew.

"And I will not fail this time. I play a long game nephew. For very high stakes."

He knew that. He also had a good idea just what the stakes were. He had considered it himself. But he had her, so why risk it himself? "So what do you need me to do?"

She shrugged. "Much as you are doing, I think. It has relatively little bearing."

"It has quite a lot of bearing on the Kingdom, Aunt. I . . . we, cannot afford a rebellion here. Not a successful one. Hungary would splinter," said Emeric, hoping to finally get her onto the plane of his real, physical concerns.

"Any rebellion will be short lived without Vlad of Valahia. He is their hope, their darling, and their leader. Without him as a rallying point you will have a few minor fires, but no conflagration, Emeric. I will remove him . . . and that which I seek."

"How . . . I mean he seems very good at evading us. When he finally comes out to fight he has to lose. So he hides and runs."

"I know where he is," she said calmly.

"Well, tell me."

"It would not help. I attempted that when I sent your soldiers in, to ambush him."

"What will you do to catch him then?"

She smiled sweetly at him. "I am going to join him. With my assistants. Training and preparing them is what I have done while you chased around futilely."

One day he was going to kill her. "Join him . . .?"

"Yes. For a little while. And I will give him money and support so that he comes to rely on me. I told you he was dangerous. Here, in Valahia, not even I can just walk in and walk out with him. I could have done that in Buda. But not here. Not any more."

"He has a rag-tag army of peasant irregulars. How would they stop any decent force?" demanded Emeric.

She raised her perfect eyebrows. "How do you think he has stopped them so far? Military genius? This land works it's own magic for him. If I could just ride in and take him I would. But it is far more complex than you would understand."

"I am going to crush him militarily," snarled Emeric.

"Good. Do. If you can," she said, dismissively.

* * *

If the countess Elizabeth Bartholdy ever felt sorry for anyone, she could have felt sorry for this hapless idiot of a nephew of his. He was so easy to manipulate, she barely needed the magical controls she'd set in place on him. She needed Emeric to press Vlad, to make him even more reliant on her. If Mindaug was right it was all a question of timing. The wyverns would not be ready yet, and neither would he. When they were, she must be in place. Tonight she would call the Vila, and hear how things went on the magical side.

* * *

Emeric looked resentfully at his departing aunt. One day he would really have to kill the bitch. He was fairly sure it would not be easy, but would be possible. In the meanwhile he had to consider his kingdom. He needed a pretender to the principality of Valahia. The Danesti . . . Well, they might prove more of the same; far more trouble than they were worth. His mind turned to Ban Alescu of Irongate. Ambitious. Wealthy from extorting every ounce off the Danube trade with the Mongol. And entirely dependent on their overlord. His mother had been of boyar stock.

And there it was; how obvious: The man was clearly a bastard older son of Vlad's father. Really legitimate of course. Emeric would see that the papers and records were prepared. It was Vlad's mother whose marriage was a sham, and Vlad who was a bastard pretender.

Emeric smiled in delight at his own cleverness.

* * *

In the green light from their eyes the Vila's wet, naked skin looked green too. The rest of the pool was black as ink, the way they liked it. Elizabeth preferred slaves, but in the case of these ones, she was happy to at least pretend their relationship was one of equals. The leggy Vila-woman threw back her white-blond hair and looked out at Elizabeth from her pupil-less green eyes. Mindaug said they did not see as humans saw, but rather looked on essences. Elizabeth did not care. She had reached an alliance with them many years ago, and gave them their annual due of suicidal pregnant girls. Now, thanks again to Mindaug, she had found them useful allies. Yes, the others in compact—and there were some dark and wild ancient things—considered the Vila beyond the pale. But it did not stop them from knowing what was happening. It was from them that she had first heard of the compact, first heard of the wyverns . . . and the blood.

"They have hatched. They grow apace. The wolf people still guard them. They have been taken to be seen. To be imbued," said the Vila woman, her voice hypnotically low, purring and velvety. Elizabeth knew of the enchantments. She had taken steps against them. She used similar ones herself.

"So are the wolves with the Drac?"

The Vila trailed her fingers across her own flesh seductively. The creature could no more help doing that than humans could avoid drawing breath, regardless of the sex or interest of the audience. "No. They guard the wyverns."

"Excellent," said Elizabeth, smirking in satisfaction. The time would come for the changers. But she knew that they knew her for what she was. Vlad, her little spells had ensured, did not.

The guard coughed warily, keeping a good safe distance from Vlad. Vlad scowled to himself. They had seen him angry. And now they were even more wary about him. Yes. He was a solitary man. But he did need some contact. He needed to know what they were doing. He needed to know what was happening. And right now they were probably too afraid of him to tell him. "What is it?"

"Sire, there is a party on horseback. They do not look like Hungarians. And there is a woman with them. What do you want us to do about them? They have a white flag."

"Have Emil detail two squads of Arquebusiers to watch them from the ridge. Send one man to go and find out exactly who they are. Then come back and tell me."

Vlad returned to his thoughts. What had he done wrong? His men had not behaved like heroes. They'd been more like kill-crazed weasels. And then they had been heroes . . .

The guard returned. "She says to tell you that her name is Countess Elizabeth Bartholdy of Caedonia. And she has come with a group of loyal boyars and their retainers to join Your Majesty's cause." The guard paused. Then he said, reverendly. "She is the most beautiful woman I have ever seen."

Vlad nodded his agreement. "Take me to her," he said, smiling for the first time since the sack and burning of Gara.

* * *

Elizabeth was surprised how much he had grown—not in physical stature, but in presence. He was as pale as ever. Well, his grandfather had been like that, apparently. She sensed other changes in him. She smelled things that ordinary mortals did not. And she smelled sex. Fury welled up in her. Had she had held herself back so that some sweet little thing could claim his innocence? It was hers. He was hers. To use, corrupt and discard. To bleed.

He bowed smiling. "Welcome, Countess."

"I am so glad that you still wish to see us, Prince," she said, laughing musically, exerting the full force of her charms. "Having run away from me like that."

He reached up a hand to help her down from her mare. She felt the spell there on his hand still traced on his innocent flesh with her spittle and her juices—when he had not even realized what she was doing to him. She activated the charm. And was a little taken aback to find that, if anything, his resistance had grown. With that spell he should have been her sexual slave, unable to resist her, to have ripped aside her clothes and raped her right there, driven by uncontrollable lust.Uncontrollable by him, at least. She could have controlled him, of course. Or driven him to believe he'd done it. But she might have allowed him to do it, beating vainly at his chest and screaming, just for the way it would destroy him.

But he merely smiled at her again. Crocell had been right.

She was going to find this woman, this little love that he had acquired, doubtless with tenderness and vows . . . and kill her. Horribly.

Erik thought the large felt-lined tents which they had been assigned in the Golden Horde encampment were as defensible as a . . . piece of felt with a latticework of sticks. The setup was also such that the horses were kept in corrals some distance from their tents. "We will need to re-organize. We need to be able to keep our horses here," he said firmly. "And Tarkhan. We need to organize the tents in a defensive ring around your quarters."

For the first time since they had met him Borshar looked completely taken aback. "I will be staying in the quarters assigned to me by the orkhan. Not with you." His tone said 'and thank heavens for that.'

Manfred shook his head. "No, M'lord. The terms of our letter of safe conduct require us to accompany the emissary of the Ilkhan. Your welfare and safety is our responsibility."

"That responsibility ends here, among our own people," said Borshar stiffly.

Manfred smiled with ineffable urbanity. "No, M'Lord Tarkhan. These are Mongol of the Golden Horde. I know as well as you do, that they do not recognize the suzerainty of the Ilkhan. We cannot therefore abandon our duty of guardianship. To do so will violate the agreement and our honor. We will not permit that."

For a moment Borshar looked as he might dispute the existence of Frankish honor. But the knights of the Holy Trinity, in full armor and watching, seemed to un-nerve him. "Very well," he said. "Let me speak to our hosts."

"Erik will accompany you," said Manfred.

"Why?"

"I can pay you no higher compliment than to send my personal bodyguard with you. He is one of the deadliest men alive," said Manfred. "Besides he needs every opportunity he can get to hear the Mongol language spoken. He will be my aide, to make sure that translation is reasonably accurate, in the audiences you promised to facilitate."

Borshar nodded. "I am sure it can all be arranged."

And indeed, it was.

But Erik was unable to escape the feeling that the man was . . . almost pleased. Their new encampment was on the outer edge of the vast Mongol camp. And their horses were with them. But they had their backs to the river, and it was not a river that the armored men and horses could dream of swimming. There was some open land to the west, along the margin of the camp. Eric considered it as scarcely a better option than swimming. He was not surprised to discover that Falkenberg and Von Gherens regarded it in much the same light. It was a fairly somber Erik Hakkonsen that went back to Manfred and his new felt tent a little later, having extracted a modicum of information from the Mongol.

"I was wrong about how many men there are in this encampment," said Erik.

Manfred raised his eyebrows. "More I suppose?"

Erik nodded. "A Tumen. A regiment. 10 000 men."

"And thirty thousand horses," said Falkenberg. "That's their strength. They can change horses and just keep going. They're lightly armored. I've yet to see a single firearm, but they're good with those bows. They put a lifetime of training into them. Our armor is more effective against arrows than a ball. But our horses are less well protected, and they are accurate."

"Their horses are small, though."

Von Gherens nodded. "As much as two hands smaller than ours. But I think they will be tough little animals. Not needing a feed of oats ever day," he said, looking at Manfred.

"My horse needs it. It has a lot of me to carry," said Manfred. "So when are we going to get to present our credentials? If I am going to have to talk the sooner we get talking and get back out of here, the better."

"Ah, so you are feeling uneasy after all? I thought that was a good performance about our agreement with the Ilkhan."

Manfred shrugged. "Who wouldn't be nervous, surrounded by 10 000 men? Now if they were 10 000 women like that Bortai . . ."

Erik snorted. "You'd be in even more trouble."

"Probably true," Manfred acknowledged. "You should talk to her about this situation. I must admit I got uneasy when Borshar was so keen to abandon us. I know. I know. The Mongol have a long tradition of honor to emissaries. We have a written appointment to that effect. But . . . Go talk to the Mongol woman."

Erik went.

* * *

Bortai had watched and listened. How could she tell the Ilkhan's tarkhan that something was very, very wrong? Perhaps things were done very differently these days in the Ilkhanate. She had been told that they had become quite fond of dwelling in cities and palaces, not in the traditional fashion. But surely he knew where envoys and their escort should be housed? She looked for an opportunity to speak with him or one of his bodyguard, but the only person was who came to hand was her unfortunate Tortoise clan betrothed. She still couldn't think about that without a smile . . . well, outright laughter sometimes. And right now laugh was something she might as well do. She had put her head, and her little brother's head, right inside the lion's mouth. The tall white-blond Frankish orkhan had of course put his own head inside the lion's mouth too, but that was the work he had chosen as a mercenary. But . . . She still did not want him killed. He made her laugh, even if he was one of the lesser peoples.