The Baker's Boy (70 page)

"My
apologies, Your Highness, I meant of course that I hope for an audience."
He could see the queen did not believe him, but it mattered not; she would see
him now.

"Leave here
at once," she said haughtily, turning her back. Baralis made a great show
of bowing to the king and then left.

He sauntered back
to his chambers at a leisurely pace. He was most pleased; the incident had gone
as planned. Not only had he forced an audience, but he also had the chance to
remind the queen just how vulnerable her position was.

Tawl cursed the
snow; it would delay his arrival at Bevlin's for at least one more day. They
had ridden from Ness two mornings ago and he'd known then that snow was on its
way-the clouds had formed a gray blanket in the sky and the earth had softened
a little underfoot.

He was glad of his
new cloak and tunic. If Kendra had sewn it as she claimed she would, then she
had done a fine job. The workmanship was flawless, the seams straight as reeds,
the fabric beautifully cut. The cloth merchant had taken the liberty of having
the cloak lined in the very color Tawl had refused. Nabber had taken a great
liking to the vivid crimson and insisted on wearing his cloak inside out.

Tawl had been
relieved when he picked up the clothes to find there was no sign of the girl.
He found the idea of seeing her again unsettling. He had behaved badly to her.
He had been ready in fact to force himself upon her. He'd had plenty of women
in his time-but inexperienced ones were another matter and he usually stayed
well clear of them. An inexperienced woman needed love and romance, needed
wooing with care. They formed attachments quickly and were easily heartbroken.
Tawl never stayed long in any place and he knew it would not be fair on such a
woman to love her and leave her.

So he found his
comforts with more seasoned women. Preferably older women, for not only were
they more skilled in the arts of lovemaking, but they also felt the strong pull
of physical desire that a young girl could only feign. Tawl liked his women to
be willing and eager, and also worldly enough to understand when he moved on in
the morning.

As a knight he was
pledged never to marry. Valdis saw women as a threat; a rival claim on the loyalty
of their knights. When the order was first founded marriage had been allowed,
but following the Fifty Years War when nearly five thousand knights died, many
of them leaving wives and children, the powers that be decided it was best in
the future to avoid the tragedy of families left with no one to care for them.
So marriage was forbidden. What began as a device to save wives and children
from starvation eventually became a means of control. A knight was supposed to
repress his natural desires and put the energy of his passions into serving
Valdis.

Tawl, like so many
other knights, found he couldn't live without the comfort of women. It seemed
to him that Valdis, by disapproving of lovemaking, was in fact condemning
women. They were looked upon as faithless distractions, who only served to
dilute and divert the noble intentions of the knighthood. Tawl had known many
women in many towns, and he knew in his heart that Valdis was wrong. Women had
just the same capability for nobility as any man, and a greater potential for
love and kindness. Valdis had made a mistake by stopping its knights from
marrying; a man with a family cherishes and nurtures humanity. And wasn't that
the founding precept of the knighthood: to protect the sanctity of human life?

Tawl drew his
cloak about his chest. None of this excused his treatment of the cloth
merchant's daughter. At very least, knights were expected to exercise
self-restraint. The girl had obviously been a virgin, out more for adventure
than seduction. He knew he shouldn't have kissed her, but the worst part was
that he had been close to losing control. He had hardly known himself. If the
embrace had continued a second longer, he would have been in danger of raping
the girl. It little mattered that the girl was half-willing. She was young and
hardly knew what she wanted. Tawl turned his face to catch the chill breath of
the north wind. It was not like him to do such a thing. The girl had been too
young. It was true that she had been about the same age as Megan, but Megan had
been matured by her time on the streets and was schooled in the ways of
passion.

Megan. Tawl
wondered what had become of her. He trusted that she had built herself a better
life. Maybe she was now a seamstress or a flowergirl-with nineteen gold coins
in her purse she could afford not to work for a few yearseven in an expensive
city like Rorn. He hoped that she no longer walked the streets. The life of a
prostitute was hard and often dangerous. It robbed a girl of her youth, her
looks, and eventually her spirit. As long as she was anywhere but the streets
he would be happy.

They were free of
the foothills now, the land gently sloping before them. Fields and meadows were
sprinkled with the first lowland snow of the winter. He was worried about the
boy: his cold had not gone away, his cough had worsened, and there was a flush
of fever on his brow. To Tawl it was one more reason to get to Bevlin as fast
as possible-the wiseman would be able to cure the boy. One sip of the lacus
would probably do it.

For the past few
days Tawl had felt a vague tension growing within him, as if he carried a
weight upon his shoulders, bearing him down, sapping at his spirit. He'd been
short-tempered with Nabber and now the incident with the cloth merchant's
daughter. He was filled with an impatience that he could not altogether
understand. An impatience to see Bevlin. Being in the wiseman's presence seemed
to offer the possibility of relief from his burdens. Bevlin would take him in
and renew him, ready him to continue his task of finding the boy.

Tavalisk was at
his bath. The large marble pool was being filled with warm water and perfumed
essences. Servants were busy laying out what would be needed: fragrant oils for
washing, pony hair brushes for scrubbing, linen wraps for drying. The
archbishop himself sat in a robe of cauled silk, nodding distractedly at Gamil,
who was muttering on about church policy whilst a young girl cut Tavalisk's toe
nails. Apparently, He Who Is Most Holy had called upon his archbishops to urge
leniency toward the knighthood. Leniency indeed! What did His Holiness know of
world events, perched as he was in the very grand yet very distant city of
Silbur? There was nothing he could do, he had no real sway: religious offices
were only as powerful as the man who held them. And His Holiness had never been
a great man.

"Careful with
those scissors, girl," warned the archbishop, ignoring his aide and
continuing to read his copy of Marod.

"Your
Eminence has remarkable feet," commented Gamil. "Completely free of corn
or bunion."

"Yes, I have,
haven't I?" Tavalisk put down his book. "It comes from a life of
studied repose. One cannot expect to have such perfect feet if one walks upon
them all the time."

"Your
Eminence is most fortunate to be in a position where walking is not often
required." Tavalisk looked up sharply, but could see no sign of irony upon
Gamil's face.

"The work of
great men, Gamil, is done sitting. Lesser men such as yourself make their
living while standing upon their feet." Tavalisk noticed the bath
attendants were waiting in readiness. He stood up and one rushed forward to
remove his robe. Gamil discreetly looked away as the pale and fleshly body of
the archbishop was revealed.

Tavalisk slipped
down the few steps and into the steaming water, his body reddened like a cooked
lobster. The water was a little hotter than he normally preferred. Only when he
was immersed up to his neck did Gamil see fit to look upon the archbishop
again. "I have penned the reply to Lord Maybor, Your Eminence. I will have
Hult bring you a copy of it later."

"Very good.
It should be sent this day." Tavalisk daintily lifted his foot onto a
raised shelf and one of the attendants oiled and rinsed it.

"I have
received word from Valdis, Your Eminence."

"How are they
taking the expulsion of their knights?" The archbishop raised his other
foot to be cleaned.

"Tyren is
most displeased. There is talk of issuing a letter of condemnation."

"A letter of
condemnation! How very typical." Tavalisk was scathing. "Why I quake
with fear at the very thought of it. Tyren is playing the pious bigot
again."

"There have
been riots in Toolay, Your Eminence."

"Riots,
indeed. You have done well, Gamil." The archbishop looked up and noticed a
certain smugness on the face of his aide.

"It was
nothing, Your Eminence, merely a few wellplaced actors; one pretended he was a
knight and burnt Toolay's flag, the other incited the passions of the
crowd."

"Burning
Toolay's flag, indeed! I can see I'd better watch out, Gamil, lest you get too
clever for your own good." Tavalisk lifted a plump arm to be washed.

"I was
inspired by Your Eminence's own cunning." Gamil was now trying to flatter
his way out of a sensitive situation.

"You would do
well, Gamil, never to forget just how cunning I can be." He smiled benignly
at his aide. "So, can we expect Toolay to pass a law banning the knights
in the near future?"

"I would
think so, Your Eminence."

"And what of
our own knight?" The bath attendant was now rubbing oils into the
archbishop's chubby shoulders. "He left Ness several days back. I suppose
he will be arriving at the wiseman's but in the next day or so."

"Good. What
about the girl we are keeping; are we treating her well, Gamil?"

"About as
well as a prostitute deserves to be treated, Your Eminence."

"Now, now, Gamil,
we all know damaged goods bring a poor price at market."

"I will try
and ensure she is kept undamaged, Your Eminence. However, the dungeon she is
kept in is small and damp and the air seeps up from the middens."

"Well, do
your best." Tavalisk turned to the attendant. "More perfumed
essences, girl."

"If Your
Eminence will permit, I will be on my way. I have much to arrange."

"Before you
go, Gamil, may I make a suggestion?"

"Certainly,
Your Eminence."

"It would not
be such a bad idea if you yourself took a bath once in a while. It is not
fitting that an aide of mine goes around smelling like a week-old
cuttlefish." Tavalisk watched with pleasure as Gamil blushed a
particularly virulent shade of red and then beat a hasty retreat. As soon as
his aide left, the archbishop picked up his copy of Marod. The page was well
worn by now. He read it once more:

When men of honor
trade in gold not grace

When two mighty
powers join as one

The temples will
fall

The dark empire
will rise

And the world will
come to ruin and waste

One will come with
neither father nor lover

But promised to
another

Who will rid the
land of its curse.

Tavalisk smiled
softly, the germ of an idea forming within his mind.

Maybor was waiting
in the castle stables. Traff had called him to a meeting. The stables were
large and spacious, but few horses graced the lines of stalls. Many young lords
and squires were off warring with the Halcus, taking their men and horses with
them. Maybor was thinking it was about time Kedrac joined the war-his other two
sons had left ten days ago to join the fighting to the east of the River
Nestor. It would do his eldest some good to get away from the court.

The past few days
Kedrac had made a point of ignoring his father. When they had last met by
chance in the dining hall, his son had made a point of cutting him dead, not
even acknowledging his presence. It was a spectacle that had been seen by many
at the court and had been a topic of much snide conversation ever since.

Yes, thought
Maybor, it would do them both good if Kedrac left the court for a few months.
It would give the boy a chance to cool down, and Maybor himself would be
relieved from the strain of conflict that he felt whenever he saw his son.
Kedrac was far too rash and strong-willed for his own good. Maybor remembered
Kedrac's mother, his first wife. The woman had not only been deformed but had
also been quite mad. Maybe that explained his son's temperament. Maybor
preferred the company of his two younger sons and secretly wished that one of
them would succeed him as lord. Unless Kedrac got killed at the front, that
would probably never happen.

He was disturbed
from his thoughts by the arrival of Traff. At his appearance Maybor felt a wave
of loathing. He hated mercenaries-one minute they fought for the kingdoms, the
next for the Halcus. Anyone willing to pay could be their master. He had fought
in enough battles to know that mercenaries were first off the field at the sign
of a rout and the first to rob the dead in victory. Any man who had fought
honorably as a soldier hated mercenaries.

Traff made a point
of checking the surrounding stalls. "Can't be too careful where Lord
Baralis is concerned," he said by way of an explanation. "That man
has means to get anywhere in the castle."

"Oh, has
he?" Maybor deliberately kept a bored tone to his voice, though in reality
he was most interested in finding out anything about his adversary.

"Yes, the
whole castle is crisscrossed with tunnels. Baralis is the only one who knows
how to use them."

"I know of
the tunnels." Maybor knew that Harvell the Fierce was supposed to have
built a few tunnels for purposes of seduction and escape, but he had no idea
they were as extensive as Traff said. If Baralis had access to many rooms in
the castle, he might even have entree to his own chamber; that would certainly
explain the two attempts on his life. "Have you been in these
tunnels?" he asked casually. "Maybe." Traff was still playing
his hand close to his chest.