Queen of Demons (60 page)

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Authors: David Drake

BOOK: Queen of Demons
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The anteroom was empty except for the chair where the officer had sat with his back to the door, watching events in the audience hall. The latter was a room of some pretensions, rising the full height of the building to a vaulted ceiling. The pillars along both sidewalls were decorated with bands of low reliefs portraying scenes from the island's history.
Ilna assumed it was history, in any event—there were no obvious deities among the figures. The carvings were very ably executed, a fact that made her feel betterdisposed toward Robilard. She knew it was foolish to assume that decency was connected with appreciation of craftsmanship—but emotionally she
did
assume that.
Dawn streamed between the support pillars on the east side of the hall, but oil-fed sconces flared on the walls as well. Servants were still lighting the last of these. The scores of people present didn't fill the large room, but their shuffling and whispers echoed like cicadas on a summer night.
Baron Robilard sat on a throne of patterned marble. It looked uncomfortable but old, and Ilna could appreciate the value of tradition. This morning Robilard had dressed in a doublet and trousers of velvet, well-cut and worn with a flair. Even though the emotion that animated him was anger, the baron looked far more attractive than he had as a supercilious statue in the procession of the day before.
In his left palm Robilard bounced a small wash-leather sack; he glared at the dark-haired woman who knelt between two soldiers before the dais on which the throne stood. Tamana, past a doubt. She was blubbering, and her broken sentences were scarcely intelligible anyway.
To the left of the baron's throne sat his wife, Cotolina. During the procession she'd ridden directly behind Rodilard's chariot in a chair with an azure awning. Her hair was pale blond, and her perfect features remained composed as she pretended to watch the twins under the care of a nurse beside her.
Lady Regowara, a buxom brunette in the same mold as Tamana but younger by five years, stood with her left hand on the throne's armrest in a gesture of ownership. She watched Tamana with an expression of greedy delight. That showed Ilna that the baron's current mistress was as great a fool as the former one had proved herself. A woman with any sense would have seen her own future in Tamana's present. Few women had any sense—and fewer men, so far as Ilna could judge, at least as far as their taste in women went.
The folk in the hall were soldiers, servants, and courtiers, in equal proportions. They watched with nervous anticipation. The soldiers flanking Tamana had the grace to
look embarrassed. The poor woman seemed barely capable of standing, much less posing a threat that required her to be guarded.
The soldiers who held Halphemos were much more serious about their job. The boy's arms were tied behind his back, and he'd been knocked about enough to blacken one eye and cut the cheek below the other.
The guard captain pushed a path through the spectators, though the crowd wasn't so dense that Ilna couldn't have made her own way to the front. The slight commotion caused Halphemos to glance around. “Ilna!” he cried. “You shouldn't have come here!”
One of the guards hit the boy in the pit of the stomach. Halphemos doubled up, gasping, and would have fallen except for the soldiers gripping his arms.
Ilna looked at the man who'd struck Halphemos. The soldier opened his mouth to snarl at her, then got a good look into her eyes. He turned his head abruptly.
“Snuggles,” Tamana whimpered toward the floor on which her tears were dripping, “it wasn't to harm you, it was just a little something so you'd love me the way you used to. And I wouldn't have taken it, only he bewitched me to get my pearl pendant. You know I'd never have parted with any of the jewels
you
gave me except for a wizard's spell!”
“Lift the wizard's face up,” Robilard ordered in a voice of cold anger. A guard seized a handful of Halphemos' hair, but the boy had already managed to straighten despite the blow to his stomach. He met the baron's angry glare with a quiet pride that did something to redeem him in Ilna's opinion.
Robilard dropped the amulet onto the dais and stood to grind it under his heel. Objects within the wash leather crunched. “You polluted my court with your wizardry,” the baron said. “I'll put you where the fish will end your pollution forever.”
He gestured to one of the front rank of courtiers, an older man and the only noble wearing a breastplate as
well as a sword. “Lock him in an iron cage, Hosten, and dump him into the sea. Well beyond the harbor mouth.”
The courtier bowed in agreement. The cicada-rustling of whispers rose to nearly a roar.
Ilna stepped forward and said, raising her voice to be heard, “Baron Robilard, I understand and share your anger, but we both know that Master Halphemos is guilty of nothing more than being a fool. If you'll release him to me, I will see to it that he works no more wizardry here—and I'll provide you with something of value in return. Certainly greater value than fish food.”
“Who is this?” Baron Robilard cried into the sudden tumult. “What's she doing here?”
“She is Ilna os-Kenset,” said the guard captain in a toneless voice. “She has come to see you.”
Ilna smiled faintly. The captain staggered as he completed her injunction, then looked around him in growing incomprehension. He had a horrified expression, as though he'd found himself in court wearing nothing but a ribbon on his private parts.
“In a week,” Ilna said across the shocked babble, “I can weave you a panel that will force everyone who comes before you to speak the truth.”
And so she could, though the reason she didn't think such a pattern was a work of evil was her certainty that Robilard would destroy it after a few days. The only folk who thought they wanted to know the truth were those who had no experience of it—and those few, like Ilna os-Kenset, who were willing to live with the consequences.
“Or another pattern that will benefit you and those around you,” Ilna added. “I realize that Halphemos misused his power, but you might take that as a warning not to make the same mistake yourself.”
Offering a pattern that compelled truth was a compromise between what Ilna thought Robilard would want and what he
should
want. She would much rather provide the baron with a panel like those she'd been spreading about Erdin before Cashel's disappearance called her away. The
value of cheer and feelings of well-being wasn't as immediately obvious to most people as sex, wealth, and revenge. Those last were things Ilna wouldn't provide.
Wouldn't provide any longer.
“You're a wizard,” Robilard said. His voice rose with each syllable.
“I'm a weaver,” Ilna said. “I'm a decent woman of Barca's Hamlet on Haft, and I will do what I say.”
The buzz in the hall had silenced, though folk shuffling to get a glimpse of the newcomer raised rasping echoes of leather on stone. The guard captain had skulked around the edge of the hall to vanish outside again. Other soldiers looked confused; those who held polearms shifted them from one side to the other as they waited for orders.
“Another wizard,” Robilard said, his voice returning to normal. Cotolina looked at Ilna with cool appraisal; Lady Regowara had moved behind the throne and was fingering an amulet of her own. “You must be mad to have come here. Well, the same cure will do for both, I suppose. Hosten—”
“No!” Halphemos shouted. “She has no part in this!”
Halphemos tried to pull away from his handlers. They had a struggle to hold him but they didn't, Ilna noted, begin hitting the bound prisoner again.
“Halphemos, be quiet,” Ilna said. “I'm taking care of things now. You've caused enough trouble already.”
“She's completely innocent!” Halphemos shouted at the baron. “If you harm her, I'll—”
The Gods only knew what the boy thought he
could
do. Make empty threats, she supposed, and make the situation still worse.
She stepped in front of Halphemos and jerked the pattern of yarn taut. “Stand silent till I release you!” she commanded.
Ilna was furious, with herself and with the injustice of the universe. The boy had good instincts—and all the trouble he caused stemmed from those good instincts. It
wasn't fair that someone like Halphemos should do so much harm!
The soldiers had flinched back when Ilna spoke. When she faced Robilard again, he spread a hand before his eyes. Ilna sneered and flung the length of yarn onto the dais.
“Baron,” she said, “I come to you for justice, not mercy. Release Halphemos to my custody and I will pay any reasonable price.”
It crossed Ilna's mind that she and Robilard might mean different things by “reasonable.” Well, he'd learn her definition quickly enough if they varied excessively.
Robilard lowered his hands. He was trembling with fury—because he'd been afraid, and because this girl wizard had seen his fear.
“All right, weaver!” he said. “This is what you can trade me for the freedom of your friend, here. Tonight I'll celebrate the anniversary of my rule as Baron of Third Atara. Go to my ancestor, the Elder Romi, and ask him to grace my dinner. If he comes, I'll release—”
Robilard gestured toward Halphemos, struck mute and motionless between his guards.
“—that one, who thought to aim his wizardry at me. Otherwise, you'll join your friend if you haven't managed to get out of my kingdom by that time.”
“All right,” Ilna said. She was furious: at Robilard, at Halphemos, and not least at herself for what she'd committed to do. She didn't fear death, but she knew that doing what the baron demanded would bring her very close to the boundaries of evil and darkness which she'd sworn to avoid. “I'll need a guide.”
Hosten, the soldier, looked up at his baron with a worried expression. “Milord,” he said, “were you serious about … ?”
Robilard glared at the noble imperiously. “Make it so, Lord Hosten!” he said. “Unless you're afraid?”
Ilna smiled faintly to hear the youthful bravado. It settled her own fear. She might be doing the wrong thing,
but she'd said she would do it. Therefore the discussion was over.
Hosten's lips tightened. He turned to the nearest guards and said, “You four, come with me,” in a colorless voice. He walked over to Ilna, bowed, and said, “Mistress Ilna os-Kenset? We'll escort you to the Tomb of the Elder Romi.”
“Yes,” Ilna said. Ignoring the rest of the gaping, whispering crowd, she touched Halphemos' forehead and said, “You can awaken now, Alos. Don't cause any more trouble. I'll be back.”
She took two steps toward the door before she paused and turned. “On my honor,” Ilna said to Halphemos and the rest of the gathering, “I
will
be back.”
 
 
Cashel stepped onto the walkway behind the palace. Back in the room Zahag grunted and complained about the hour. In a world where servants provided food, the ape saw no reason to get up before noon.
Cashel wasn't forcing Zahag to rise. The ape wasn't quite sure of his safety on Pandah except when Cashel or Aria was there to protect him, though. He might be right, but Cashel wasn't about to change his own schedule because an ape was lazy.
Silya sat cross-legged on the railing, bowered among the grapevines. Because she was in public she had clothing on, a light cotton tunic instead of the richly decorated robe that she'd worn when Cashel fell back into King Folquin's court.
He stopped. “I said I didn't want to see you,” he warned.
Silya spread her empty hands in a gesture of unconcern. “I understand, Master Cashel,” she said. “Still, you're going to be dealing with my brother, whom I have no reason to love. I can give you some advice on that. It won't delay you since the ship won't be ready till the
middle of the afternoon. But of course if you're afraid … ?”
She gestured again. Whatever the wizard's age, she was remarkably agile to be able to balance on the narrow railing while shifting her weight as she spoke.
Cashel grinned, imagining Silya as a wren. They were pushy, quarrelsome birds apt to use their strong beaks on the eggs of their neighbors … .
But Cashel wasn't an egg, and he wasn't afraid of Silya or anybody else on earth. “What do you want to show me?” he asked, holding his quarterstaff out to the side so that he wouldn't seem to be sheltering behind it.
“Come down into my quarters,” Silya said. “Don't worry. You proved you could leave easily enough, and I've only hung some matting for privacy instead of replacing the wall.”
“I wasn't worried,” Cashel growled.
He lifted himself over the railing, feeling as awkward as a hedgehog in comparison to the wizard's birdlike motions. Still, hedgehogs got where they were going, and so would he.

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