The Folding Knife (38 page)

He'd been in there many times, of course, but never when it was crowded with people. He looked for Basso and saw him straight away; he was wearing his plain black (had he just come from a debate in the House?), but round his neck he wore the thin gold chain and seven-pointed star of an Adept of the Three Circles Fight--just one degree below Master, and the highest award you could earn without staying on to do postgraduate research. For a split second it crossed his mind that Basso must've borrowed it for the occasion, or maybe it was one of those honorary degrees that you get for being famous. But he knew his uncle wouldn't wear an order he wasn't entitled to. Basso caught his eye and grinned; he grinned back, and felt cheerful again.

His first bout was solo, a display of three compulsory forms, two of his choice and one freestyle, his own composition (he'd be marked on his choice of components as well as his accuracy and style). As he started the routine, he let his mind wander; it was better to do solo forms in a mindless state. Basso had been very keen for him to do this. It had been Bassano's own idea, but the level of support and encouragement had been exceptional, even coming from his uncle. Why, he wondered; because Basso himself was an Adept, or because it was the proper thing for a young gentleman to do? Both perfectly sound reasons, neither satisfactory.

He was broken out of his train of thought by enthusiastic applause, so presumably he'd finished the routine, and done so without tripping over his feet. Fine. Now it was about to get difficult.

The first fight was standard academic fencing, walking sword against walking sword, with Zeuxis, his Director of Studies. Naturally, Zeuxis kept a stone face during the salute, but he knew he'd get a fair bout. Zeuxis liked him; he'd structure the bout to allow Bassano to display his strengths. In the event, he did better than he'd expected, conceding only three hits and even scoring one of his own. That meant a bonus mark.

Next was the Cazar. The school bought its Cazars from the Eudaimonides Brothers, dealers in quality personnel since
AUC
878. You had no idea which one you were going to face in the exam, but Bassano had made a point of fighting as many of them as possible during the course, with a view to learning their technique, those he hadn't fought he'd researched with other students who had, and he knew them all by sight. Today's Cazar he'd never seen before in his life. They must've bought one in specially for the exam. What the hell?

His salute was distinctly mechanical (the Cazars never saluted back), and then he started to circle. As he did so, he caught Basso's eye, and saw him wink.

Bastard, he thought (and the Cazar swung at him; he sidestepped back and left, giving ground, maintaining his guard). My bastard uncle made them buy in a brand new Cazar specially for me.

In the event, his anger at Basso's treachery was exactly what he needed. The Cazar was tall, lean and fast, with a dangerous reach; at one point, the tip of his sword came so close to Bassano's cheek he was sure he'd been scratched. But his footwork, though naturally good, was untrained, and Bassano caught him out with a perfectly executed volte in straight time. He rested the point of his sword on the bare patch of skin between the Cazar's cheek-flap and gorget, and saw him freeze; then he heard his sword clatter on the floor, signifying that he'd conceded the bout. He stepped back, lowered his sword and scowled ferociously at his uncle, who was looking the other way.

He was still thinking about the Cazar during his three-on-one bout, which he concluded in extremely short time with a double disarm and a coup-de-jarnac to the back of the third man's knee. Presumably Basso had done it because--he couldn't really figure out why Basso had done it. Because it would make him angry, and the anger would give him a lift and make him fight above his usual game; well, that was what had happened, so it was a reasonable explanation. Because the First Citizen's nephew must be seen to succeed incontrovertibly, to give the lie to people like the kids in the waiting room, who'd assumed the fights would be fixed. That was rational too. But (the true explanation came to him in the middle of his bout with the dock worker, and made him drop his guard just long enough for his opponent to whack him on the point of his left shoulder with the three-legged stool; two points away, and it hurt) the real reason was, Basso did like a little mischief, now and again. He made laws and invaded countries and adjusted the currency because it'd annoy someone. Well, Bassano decided (and he kicked the dock worker's legs out from under him and touched his sword-point to his jugular vein), it's worked. I'm annoyed.

The next bout was an anticlimax: duel against sword and buckler, one of his best forms, but the show he put up was strictly ordinary--good enough for a pass, but he'd been confident of scoring at least one bonus point. That just left the Sclerian.

The pitchfork (they'd been taught, and it came up again in revision and again in the mocks) is one of the deadliest weapons a man ever has to face. It has the speed, agility and unpredictability of the spear, together with a non-intuitive line (the prongs are on either side of the shaft, not in line with it) and a natural block, in the shape of the base of the head where the two prongs branch off. Added to which, a man armed with a pitchfork is highly unlikely to be a trained fighter, which means all his moves will be innovative, unfamiliar and difficult to read in advance. Students had died or been badly injured in previous years, and failure in this form meant you failed the whole thing.

As the Sclerian came out of the staff door, he examined him carefully. If Basso could make them buy in a new Cazar, could he somehow rig the Sclerian too? Maybe (the thought made him feel slightly ill) he'd rigged it the other way this time, and got them to give him a specially easy opponent, someone who'd been paid to throw the fight. Or possibly the opposite, and this was the All-Scleria Pitchfork Fighting champion.

There was, of course, no way of knowing. In the event, he got through, conceding a slight but painful scratch to his left leg, but eventually making a graceless but efficient disarm to win. That meant he'd passed; and when he glanced back over his shoulder, he saw his uncle grinning like an idiot, the happiest he'd ever seen him. Which was ridiculous, he thought; it's only a fencing degree. But he realised he was grinning too.

Afterwards, a quiet dinner for three at the Severus house--

"Shouldn't you be out celebrating with your classmates?" Basso asked, with his mouth full.

"Should I?"

Basso nodded. "It's traditional. At least, it was in my day. Highest overall score in the exam buys the drinks."

"Leave him alone," Melsuntha said. "If he doesn't want to get horribly drunk in some dreadful bar somewhere..."

Basso shrugged, and helped himself to some more lamb in turmeric and onion sauce. "All I meant was, you shouldn't feel any obligation. If you want to go out on the town, we quite understand."

"No, thanks," Bassano replied with a grin. "Why should I spoil the whole of tomorrow with a hangover, nausea, flatulence and heartburn, with a bunch of people I never liked much anyway, just to conform with a stereotype? Not my idea of a wonderful time. Anyway," he added, "even if I wanted to, I haven't got the energy. A good feed, to take away the taste of that garbage they made us eat in the school, and then at least twelve hours' sleep on a soft mattress. Now that," he added happily, "is celebrating."

"You see?" Melsuntha said. "He's a civilised human being."

"Which is something he has no right to be at his age," Basso replied severely. "It's different for women, they're civilised from the moment they hit puberty. But young men between the ages of seventeen and twenty-two ought to behave badly and make idiots of themselves. It's nature's way."

"Really?" Bassano said. "I expect you can offer some evidence for that."

"Common sense." Basso poured himself some more wine. "Take deer. You get a load of young males, far too many for the local grazing to support, and not nearly enough does to go round. So, they fight, and most of them get driven off; and most of them are stupid, so the wolves and the hunters get them, which redresses the balance. Same with humans, except we don't let nature take its course. We do our best to stop adolescent males getting themselves killed in fights, or smashing themselves up in racing chariots, or falling off bridges while dead drunk. Result, we have far more of them than we need, which is why you can't walk down Portgate on the morning after May Week without treading in broken glass and vomit."

"There's war," Bassano said seriously. "That gets rid of a lot of them."

Melsuntha was frowning, but Basso ignored her. "About the only good thing you can say about it, and on balance, I feel there ought to be a better way. Well," he added, "there is. Do what the Cazars do."

"The Cazars," Melsuntha said, "expose girl children on hillsides at birth."

"That's not what I meant," Basso said. "When a boy turns fifteen, he's sent out to be fostered with a relative or friend of his father, and he doesn't come back for three years. Treated as cheap labour, not allowed to mix with the family, made to sleep in the barn, up at first light and out with the sheep. You don't get many stroppy seventeen-year-olds in the Cazar Peninsula."

"I see," Bassano said. "And you're thinking of making that the law here in the Republic."

Basso laughed. "The other thing the Cazars do," he said, "is send all their surplus manpower abroad: here, or Scleria, or the Eastern Empire. It gets them out of everybody's hair, they send money home, and most of them don't come back."

Melsuntha was glowering at him. "And you approve of that."

"Good God, no," Basso said, "it's barbaric. Efficient and, in the circumstances, thoroughly sensible; there's barely enough land to support the ones who stay home, so if they didn't do it that way, the whole lot of them would starve, or wipe each other out in horrendous land wars. The system works, so they stick with it. Hasn't ever occurred to them to try and find a better system. Doesn't mean to say there isn't one."

Bassano shrugged. "I'm grateful I'm not a Cazar," he said. "It's one of a great many things I'm grateful for. But I'm not quite sure how we got here from the dubious pleasures of excessive drinking."

"We may have wandered from the point a little," Basso conceded. "And it goes without saying that I was talking drivel, just to provoke a discussion."

"I never know with you, Uncle," Bassano said. "You often seem to take pleasure in sabotaging your own best arguments before you make them, just to see if people agree with you."

"He was talking drivel," Melsuntha said. "Trust me."

"There you go." Basso laughed. "Something people never seem to grasp is that you can make out all sorts of bad arguments in favour of a good thing, but that doesn't spoil the good arguments. It's like saying I shouldn't be First Citizen if idiots vote for me."

"Fine," Bassano said. "What good thing are we talking about?"

"Ah," Basso said. "I hadn't got that far yet."

"He was talking drivel," Melsuntha said firmly. "Now he's going to say something sensible. At least, I hope he is. Where I come from, we have yet to learn the art of appreciating drivel for its own sake."

Basso leaned back in his chair and drew the tip of his finger down the inside of her arm. Bassano noted that she shivered, and he looked away. "Something sensible," he said, "by special request. All right, what about this? Bassano, I want you to go away. I want you to leave the City and go and sleep in a barn for three years. Well, more likely a tent, but the principle's the same."

Bassano blinked. "Really? Why on earth would I want to do that?"

Melsuntha, he noticed, had crossed her arms. She wasn't frowning, but he sensed that she didn't agree with whatever Basso had in mind.

"Because," Basso said, "the Vesani Republic is going to go to war with the Mavortine Confederacy. We will, inevitably, win. That'll be the easy part. Staying won will be extremely difficult."

"Staying won," Bassano repeated. "Translation, anyone?"

"Occupying the place," Basso said. "Taking it over and turning it into a province of the Vesani empire. Which doesn't exist," he added quickly, "apart from the little bit we nibbled off Auxentia, which we don't call conquered territory because that wouldn't go down well in the House. Well, fine. We're going to conquer Mavortis, and we're going to change it out of all recognition. And I want you to help me."

There was a silence; not as awkward as Basso had expected. Then Melsuntha said, "That's not what your uncle and I don't agree about. I think it's a splendid idea."

"You do?"

"Of course," Melsuntha said crisply. "My people aren't fit to govern themselves. Fortunately, no foreigners know about the mineral reserves in the north. Otherwise, we'd have been invaded and conquered years ago, most likely by the Sclerians."

"Not a pleasant experience," Basso put in.

"When you say minerals..." Bassano asked.

"Iron," Melsuntha replied. "And copper, some tin, possibly some silver, quite probably a substantial amount of gold, though I don't know where. But gold jewellery is quite common even in poorer clans, and we certainly don't import gold from anywhere else."

"The iron is the important one, though," Basso said. "We could certainly do with it. Six price rises in four years, and the Auxentines--"

"Can I just stop you there for a moment?" Bassano said quietly. "We need iron and they've got it, so it's perfectly all right for us to invade." He pulled a sad face. "What's the difference between that and what they did to us? After all, gold's just another mineral."