Sasharia En Garde (13 page)

For in the early days Canardan had built his alliance one by
one, courting at least one person in every influential family.

She said, “Look. You don’t want to talk in front of me. Why
don’t I step outside while you decide what you can tell me? My plan is to find
my daughter. After that, I will find out if my husband lives.” Her lips
trembled. “I have waited years without knowing. I can wait a bit longer.”

Kreki said in a quick, breathless voice, “We do not know
anything about Prince Mathias, except that he disappeared ten years ago. But
Magister Glathan is dead. Word is, Commander Randart had him shot in the back.
Crossbow. After a truce.”

Atanial covered her face with her hands, then heaved a sigh.
“All right. I’ll wait outside.”

She pushed through the back of the pantry. Nobody stopped
her. She nearly ran into one of the servants, a pretty young girl with a long
red braid busy scooping dried peas into a cup. Atanial excused herself, then
slipped through the empty kitchen to the door.

Outside, the rain had stopped. A fresh, cool breeze soughed
through the line of pines planted on the ridge at the edge of the property,
just beyond the fruit trees.

Atanial stepped out, breathing deeply. Her feet throbbed
dully, but the acute pain of walking had lessened.

A faint glow worried at the extreme edge of her vision. She
looked up. In one of the recessed attic windows flickered the warm, golden
flames of two candles. Cozy. She wished she were in the bedroom behind that
window, whether guest or servant’s room, large or small. All she wanted was a
nice, soft bed—

“Your highness,” Kreki whispered from the kitchen door.
“They want to talk. Our passwords, signals, what we’re doing.”

Passwords and signals. Why did that seem wrong? Atanial
frowned. The vague sense of disquiet was too quick, undefined. Her mind was too
tired and scattered. Her aching feet—Math—Magister Glathan’s death—and riding over
it all, Sasha and this mysterious pirate—

“Here we are.” Kreki opened the pantry again. “You might
remember Fereli Kinn, the royal wardrobe mistress.”

The gray-haired woman rose. “Forgive me, highness,” she said
gruffly.

“You thought I abandoned you.” Atanial summoned a smile.
“And in a sense I did. I beg your pardon. I take it the queen couldn’t protect
you either?”

“The rumor is she’s mad.” Mistress Kinn flushed, curtseyed,
sat. “So the king turned us all off, except for her three personal maids. No one’s
seen her since, except once a year, standing by the king, on Oath Day.”

“I don’t think you knew Arlaen Sharveshin.” Kreki indicated
the older man. “He was a herald-scribe in our day. His son Tam is in the king’s
guard now, as our ears.”

Atanial noted Tam’s brown tunic.

“We meet here when we dare,” Kreki said. “And exchange
news.”

“Like? I mean, what is the most important thing facing you
now?”

An exchange of looks. Kreki leaned forward. “The mustering
of the army. We don’t know if the king intends some terrible purge here, or to
invade elsewhere.”

The man spoke up, a low rumble. “My son hears rumors of a
possible invasion of Locan Jora. Take our lands back.” The boy inclined his
head.

“But we haven’t any word for sure. We cannot get close
enough to Randart. He keeps only his own picked men around him. The king is
guarded by Randart, by the royal mages, and finally by the royal valet, Chas.”

Atanial breathed out slowly. “I remember Chas. I caught him
in our rooms at least a couple of times, going through Math’s things. He seemed
to have plausible excuses.”

“He’s a very tricky spy. So anyway, we keep trying to find
out the plans. We fear, from the mustering of supplies and the way training has
been going, that this is not a vague future plan. It has a date. Probably next
spring, judging from the cloth stockpiled in the border castles.”

When no one had anything to add, Atanial turned to her own
issues. “Tam, you’re in the guard. What can you tell me of this pirate holding
my daughter?”

“Nothing.” Tam spread big, callused hands. “Nobody can
figure out where Zathdar came from. He was suddenly there, some years back,
attacking the king’s fleet. Breaking trade holds.”

Kreki said to Atanial, “What I was just reporting to the
others is this. I received two notes from my son. One two nights ago. Hastily
written and sent by mage-box. It was only two lines, to tell me that their
particular group had been discovered long ago by the king, but they had left
the tower after a fight. Your daughter and the pirate defeated the guards.”

Atanial gripped her fingers together. “That sounds like
Sasha.”

“I received another note, even shorter, last night. Again
just two sentences. The king apparently knows about the resistance group run by
my nephew Nadathan, who is also a mage student. The other stated that the
pirate—he calls himself a privateer—declares that his family name is Jervaes.”

“Common name deriving from Sartoran origin,” Arlaen rumbled.
“Various versions all over the southern continent here.”

“At least that sounds somewhat civilized. I mean, he offered
a family name, right? Didn’t call himself Slubbertegullion Squid-Guts or
Bloody-Skull Liver-Squisher, right?” At the others’ puzzled looks, Atanial
sighed. “So no one knows his motive, beyond piracy?”

No one spoke.

“Another thing to find out.” Atanial’s stomach growled. When
would that dinner arrive?

“We thought we ought to tell you the passwords and signals,”
Kreki began.

“Oh! Like the one in the attic window?” Atanial pointed
upward.
That
was what had tweaked at
her.

The others gazed in dismay.

If only she wasn’t so hungry! It was hard to think. “Two
candles? Window?”

Arlaen rubbed his jaw. “We did not post any candles.”

Tam lunged to his feet, his face blanched. “Not our signal.”

Arlaen’s eyes widened in horror. “We have a spy here.”

Kreki glared at the others. “Who is the traitor?”

They stared back, their faces shocked, angry, puzzled.

Arlaen whispered, “Tam. He has to get out.” He gripped hold
of his son and muscled him, protesting (“Let me fight! Let me fight!”) toward
the door. Then he stopped short, Tam stumbling with a subdued, “Ow!”

Arlaen said, “What if the spy is out there? How can I get
Tam out?”

“It could be anyone. Even the servants,” Atanial added,
remembering the young woman just outside the cellar door when she left
previously.
But no one pays attention to
servants
, Math’s voice came, with gentle irony, out of the past, the time
they all disguised as cooks when Randart had driven them into a trap . . .
 
“The girl with the red curls.
Servant. Pouring peas. She didn’t act surprised when she saw me. Did you tell
her anything?”

Kreki breathed out. “No. But Marka has been with us for at
least five years.”

“So how much does she know? You say your nephew was
betrayed. And I overheard that Canardan was hot on your boy’s heels when he
came to Earth. Well, your son told me so himself. Though I didn’t believe him
at the time.”

Arlaen gazed at his son in dismay. “They’ll put Tam here up
against the wall.” His voice lowered, rough and husky. “They’ll have to.”

His agony was the agony of any parent.
What happens to your child happens to my child
, Atanial thought,
but her mind moved rapidly to memory, and then to action. “Tie up that
red-haired girl and take her clothes. Tam, you are about to turn into a girl.
Fast
.” The order was out before she
could stop herself.

This time everyone sprang to action, the men vanishing
through the doorway.

Kreki thrust a wad of papers into Fereli’s hands. “We have
to burn these.” She scratched a light, dropped the flame onto a ceramic bowl,
and they began ripping.

Aching feet forgotten (well, not actually, but ignored)
Atanial slammed through into the pantry, then stopped short at the barrels.
She’d left her sword in the wagon back at Lark’s house, and had forgotten about
it. Now she had no weapon but the knife, and that she was reluctant to use
unless her life was definitely threatened.

Math had said once,
I’ll
keep training Sasha, but no steel in her hands until she knows the cost. Flour
and pepper, yes. We’ll teach her to blind them and run.

Blind them and run. Atanial was beginning to sort through
the bags when Kreki banged out of the pantry, bearing a long, wicked knife, and
marched into the kitchen.

Her nerves firing with warning, Atanial followed her through
another narrow storage room, this one full of bed and bath linens, and up a
creaky old stairway. Kreki’s speed increased until she was almost running. When
she reached a narrow doorway, she burst into Marka’s tiny bedroom, saw the two
candles in the window still burning and raised her knife.

The red-haired girl lay on the woven-rag-rug floor with her
hands bound and her mouth gagged. Kreki brought the knife down. Atanial froze
in the doorway, a squawk of protest forming in her throat. Then Kreki’s hand
came up, brandishing the red of a long, curling braid.

Atanial leaned against the wall, and even the Sharveshins,
in the middle of ransacking the girl’s clothes trunk, reacted with relief. Tam
sank onto the bed, and Arlaen pressed back against the slanting attic so he
would not make a shadow on the window.

Kreki squatted down next to the terrified girl. “Give me one
good reason why I shouldn’t kill you now, you despicable traitor,” she uttered
in a trembling voice.

Atanial looked at Tam, who uncertainly clutched a gown. Her
mind was moving again, more rapidly than before. Kreki was clearly too angry to
think. Tam’s gaze averted from the girl on the floor. If she was a spy and he
was a spy, had there been some quiet time between two attractive young people,
both willing to hear and receive information, perhaps while exchanging kisses?

Atanial watched Marka’s tear-filled eyes flicking between
Kreki’s knife and the boy on the bed, and knew she had it.

She cleared her dry throat, wishing they’d actually gotten
to eat that dinner. Or at least sample some ale. “Marka must have had a
reason.” She smiled ruefully down at the girl. “Of course she had a reason.
I’ll bet it was a good one, too. She doesn’t look like she did it for evil
reasons.”

Now Atanial had all their attention.

Atanial knelt next to Marka, who studied her with the tense
forehead and squinted eyes of pain, anger, fear. Confusion.

“Let’s have that gag off,” Atanial murmured. “You won’t
yell, will you? You don’t want to die, and no one wants to kill you.”

A tiny nod.

Atanial took out her own knife as Kreki gripped hers
upraised in silent warning. The girl gasped, working her lips and tongue as
Atanial said, “Your reasons might have to wait. But here’s the important thing.
Do you really want to see Tam dead?”

“N-no.” Marka gulped on a sob.

Tam opened his mouth, but his father gripped his shoulder in
warning.

Atanial said, “They probably have us surrounded by now,
don’t they? You comforted yourself with the fact that they have orders to
capture
us. But think about it.”

“They wouldn’t—they
promised
—”

“My dear, you’ve been living a lie. Surely you can
understand that they might lie to you? Just like they asked you to lie to the
Ebans and the others?” Atanial glanced Tam’s way.

Marka licked her lips, fresh tears coursing down her cheeks.
“You think they have orders to kill me?” Her chest heaved with sobs.

“If the orders came through the War Commander,” Kreki said
decisively. “Yes. He hates spies, though he uses them.”

“The king?” Atanial asked softly, wondering how much
Canardan had changed.

Kreki shook her head. “He hates actually doing away with
people. Which is the only hope
we
have,” she added with irony.

Atanial turned back to Marka. “But Tam, they would execute
right away, because he’s in the guard. Do you want that to happen?”

“No.”

“All we need are the passwords to get Tam through the line,”
Atanial said, and Kreki gasped. She hadn’t thought of passwords, but she had
not spent as much time around Randart as Atanial had, back in the old days.
He’d always used codes and passwords.

Fresh tears welled in Marka’s eyes, dripping into her ears.

Atanial brushed the tears away. “We’re going to leave you
here, but hidden, so they won’t find you. After we leave, you can get yourself
free, and away. And do whatever you need to do. But at least get Tam through
that line, or he will be dead by morning.”

“Hackleberry,” Marka whispered, her anguished eyes lifting
toward Tam. “The password is
hackleberry
.”

Atanial looked up at Tam. “Take Lark with you.” She nipped
the braid from Kreki, shook it so it unraveled, and pulled a sash from the
half-spilled contents of the trunk. “That around your head tying on the hair, a
bonnet over your head. The skirt on your waist. Get through the lines now. With
Lark. She’s got to get home and warn her family.”

Tam and his father fixed on the sash and hair in a matter of
heartbeats, and then Tam dashed out, wrestling the skirt into place.

Atanial used another sash to bind Marka’s mouth, but far
more gently.

“All right, the rest of us have to cause as much confusion
as we can so Tam and Lark can get through.”

They left Marka on the floor, her candles still burning in
the window. She promptly wriggled under her bed to hide.

Atanial did not see Tam or Lark as she made her way through
the house to the front door. The front parlor was dark, which gave her eyes
time to adjust. She eased the door open a crack and peered out. At first the
night looked peaceful, but as her night vision got better she saw movement
among the pines, and heard a sudden rustle in the orchard.