The Tyrant's Law (Dagger and the Coin) (41 page)

Basrahip shook his massive head. Somewhere far in the distance above them, someone started screaming, but Basrahip took no notice of it. Geder put it down as being part of the ceremony.

“The battle against the lies of the world must be fought. Long or brief, costly or quick, it does not matter. She will prevail, and we with her.”

“It’s just that they won’t come to parley,” Geder said. “Ternigan says he’s tried calling it eight times now, and they won’t come down. And the walls at Kiaria are too high for speaking trumpets to reach the men at the top.”

Basrahip paused, and Geder went down a couple more steps before he realized it and turned back and up at him.

“Is there something you are asking me, Prince Geder?”

“Well,” Geder said. “I don’t want to … I mean. I was only wondering if there were any other gifts that the goddess had that might help with this particular problem?”

“There is one other,” Basrahip said. “Patience.”

Geder nodded. The screaming from the temple was getting louder, and there were more voices now. Basrahip looked back toward them, then turned to Geder and sat on the stair.

“We will be tested many times. The world will resist her truth because the world is a thing of lies. But she cannot be beaten and all who stand against her will be ground down. The world is entering into her, and we are her bearers. You and I.”

A particularly high and sustained shriek caught Geder’s attention. Basrahip chuckled and put a hand on Geder’s shoulder and pointed up the stairway with a gesture of his chin.

“Them as well,” he said. “All of us are her creatures. And those who are not will be, or they will be erased from all places under the sky.”

“But it’s going to take patience.”

“Yes.”

“I’m sorry. It’s just that after Nus fell and Inentai, I thought …” He waved the thought away. “I’ve kept you long enough, though. Take care of your new initiates, and let me know if there’s anything more I can do to help.”

“I will, Prince Geder,” Basrahip said, then rose and ascended again. At the bottom of the stair, a massive bronze door had been cast in the image of a huge lion. Geder walked through it, and two priests closed it behind him. The thick metal rang with a sense of finality and the sounds of human voices went silent. Geder sighed and began the long descent to his own rooms. He was beginning to regret putting the temple at the top of the spire. It was wonderful for the symbolism and security, but it was such a long walk.

Another decision he was beginning to regret was having the reports from the expeditions brought directly to him. When he’d given the order, he’d thought it would be interesting. Diverting. He’d read book-length essays about adventurers before, and as near as he could recall he’d expected the letters from the field to be similar. And also that this way, he would have the feeling of being part of it. An adventurer himself. In practice, it felt like reading any other report on the small functions of the empire.

But he’d asked to do it, and to turn it away now would make him seem unreliable and petty. So when the aged servant delivered his personal correspondence in a silvered box, it was stuffed with things he didn’t actually want to read.

“Will there be anything more, Lord Regent?” the old man asked, his bow a model of obsequiousness that bent him almost double.

“No,” Geder said. Then, “Yes, bring me some food. And coffee.”

“Yes, my lord,” the man said. With a sigh, Geder pulled out the first letter. Emmun Siu was in the back country of Borja. He had lost one of his men when they came to an obscure village near the foot of a strange mountain and the man had fallen in love with a local girl, married her, and refused to continue with the expedition. He had found three different sites where there had once been buildings, but thus far there had been nothing of interest apart from a particularly well-preserved wall with an image that appeared to be a pod of the Drowned circling a complex device. In Lyoneia, Korl Essian was apparently being very careful in how he went about buying provisions for his two teams, and his descriptions of them filled twenty pages on both sides. Dar Cinlama, who had started this whole mess in the first place, was interviewing Haaverkin along the coast of Hallskar concerning their different social orders, which in this case appeared to be something between extended family and gentleman’s club. Cinlama went into some detail about the different rituals and their significance—one order would set small stones to match the positions of the stars, another enacted a complex play involving eels and a man in a bear’s skin that appeared to be a retelling of an ancient war between Haaverkin and Jasuru and also very possibly the origin of the Penny-Penny stories that had spread through the whole world by now. They were the most interesting reports, and they were from the man Geder liked least of all the explorers. He read the letter through to the end, though, and took what pleasure he could from it.

Then there were the other letters. Most were disposed of by his staff, but invitations from the highest families were still presented to him directly out of courtesy to the nobles. The end of the season was almost upon them, and with it one last paroxysm of fetes and balls, feasts and teas. There were five marriages he’d been asked to speak at. The last wedding he’d been to had been for Jorey Kalliam and Sabiha Skestinin.

Another letter lay at the bottom of the box. It was written on decent paper, but not the thick near-board of the others. It wasn’t a hand he recognized. He tore off the thread it was sewn with, and unfolded it. All the air went out of the room.

Tell Aster I miss him, and you, and that terrible cat-piss stinking hole we lived in. Who would ever have guessed those would be the good old days?

Your friend, Cithrin bel Sarcour

It wasn’t a long letter, and he read it ten times over. All he could think was that she had touched this page. Her hand had been against it. She had made this fold in the paper. He held it to his face and smelled it, looking for some trace of her scent. Cithrin bel Sarcour.
Tell Aster I miss him. And you.

The servant came back, a plate of delicately spiced eggs in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other.

“Get me a courier,” Geder said. “Get me the fastest courier we have.”

“Shall I call for pigeons and a cunning man as well?”

“All of them.
Everyone
,” Geder shouted. “I need word to reach Fallon Broot
tonight
.”

He canceled all of his plans, rescheduled the meetings. And the word went out to Suddapal by every means he had. The Medean bank in Suddapal was not to be interfered with in any way. Its agents were to have total freedom of the city to conduct any business they saw fit. They were not to be questioned or detained. If there was any concern regarding the activities of agents of the bank, they were to be referred to Cithrin bel Sarcour at the bank, and her judgment on the matter was to be considered final. This by order of the Lord Regent himself.

When it was done, he took Cithrin’s letter in his pocket, called for his private carriage, and rode for Lord Skestinin’s little manor house as if chaos itself were after him.

Jorey seemed surprised to see him, which was fair. He hadn’t seen anywhere near as much of Jorey as he’d meant to when the court season started. Things had just piled one upon another until all the days were full. Sabiha made her greetings in the drawing room, and then left the two of them alone. Geder gave the letter to Jorey with trembling hands and Jorey read it soberly. When he was done, he read it again, then, frowning, handed it back.

“What do you think I should do?” Geder asked.

“Well, I suppose that depends on the situation in Suddapal. If you think that the bank—”

“Not about that,” Geder said. “About writing back to her. About … maintaining relations. With her.”

Jorey leaned forward, his elbows on his knees. He looked older than he had just a couple of years before. He looked like a man grown, and Geder still felt like a boy. At least in matters like this.

“I’m not sure I understand what you’re asking me, my lord.”

“
My lord
,” Geder said. “It’s only us here. You don’t have to do that. But Cithrin is a singular woman. She’s smart and she’s beautiful and she’s powerful in her way. And once I’m not Lord Regent anymore, I’m only going to be Baron Ebbingbaugh, and even then, I don’t know that she’d care to be a baroness. And of course there would be a scandal because she isn’t of the noble class, and Aster would have to induct someone with Cinnae blood—”

“You’re asking,” Jorey said, “how to
woo
her?”

“I am,” Geder said. “I don’t know. You’re my only friend who’s ever won a woman. How did you make Sabiha love you?”

Jorey blew out a long breath and sat back in his chair. His eyes were wide and he shook his head like a man trying to wake from a dream. “Geder, you never fail to surprise me. I … I don’t think what happened with me and Sabiha will help you. The situation was so different from what you’re saying.”

“I don’t need you to write letters for me,” Geder said, with a laugh meant to lighten the mood. “It’s just I’ve never done this before. And I’m afraid … I’m afraid she’ll laugh at me. Isn’t that silly? Here I am, the most powerful man in the world, for the time being, and I am so desperately afraid she’ll think I’m funny.”

“You aren’t,” Jorey said. “You’re a thousand different things, but funny isn’t one.”

“Thank you,” Geder said. “What … what can you tell me? How do I write to her? What do I say?”

A servant’s footsteps came down the corridor, paused, and then trotted away quickly. Sabiha was keeping the world at bay. Geder felt a little warmth in his heart for her, just for that.

“What did I do? I talked to her. And I listened to her. I don’t know, Geder. It wasn’t a campaign of war. I didn’t draw battle plans. I saw her at some function. I don’t even recall what, and I thought she was handsome and smart and had twice the soul and spine of anyone else in the room. I wanted to know her better, and I asked for the pleasure of her company.”

“And then it just happened,” Geder said.

“Well, no. There was a time she thought I was just looking to get her skirts up for a few minutes and then never speak to her again, and that took some getting past. And I wasn’t always my best self then either. But we came to understand each other. Trust each other.” Jorey raised his hands, helpless.

“And the other?” Geder asked.

“The other?”

Geder looked down. His skin felt like it was burning in the sun. He wanted nothing in the world more than to leave now. Walk away and pretend the conversation had never taken place. Except he needed to know, and there was no one else he could ask. When he spoke, his voice was low and steeped in shame.

“How do you tell a woman that you … want her?”

“Oh,” Jorey said. And then, “God.”

“I shouldn’t have asked.”

“No, it’s not that. It’s just … I don’t know. I’m vaguely grateful and amazed every time Sabiha comes to my bed, and we’re married. How do you tell her? Honestly? Gently. With humor or soberly. Howl it at the moon. I don’t know.”

Relief flooded Geder’s heart like water on a fire.

“I thought I was the only one,” he said.

“No,” Jorey said. “I think men have been trying to find the way to say that for all the generations there have ever been, and the fact that there are generations at all means we must get it right sometimes.”

“Thank you, Jorey,” Geder said. “I should get back to the Kingspire, I think. I have a letter I need to write.”

“Yes,” Jorey said. Just as Geder reached the door, he spoke again. “Good luck, my lord.”

The carriage drove through the night, wheels clattering against cobbles, horseshoes striking stone. Geder leaned against the thin wood and looked out through the window.

“Cithrin,” he said under his breath, “I think men have tried for all the generations there have been to say what I am trying to say now, and that there are generations means they got it right sometimes.”

He could do this. And if he stumbled and got some things wrong, it would be all right. She would understand. It was Cithrin. He closed his eyes and remembered her.

Cithrin

Cithrin:

I don’t care how long it took you. I’m just so happy you wrote. Finding your letter there among all the others was the best moment of my day or week. Maybe of the year, and I helped win a war this year, so that’s even better than it sounds. I thought at first I was only dreaming or that I’d made a mistake. I miss you too. More than I ever thought I would. I know you’re a woman of trade and that the bank has its duties for you, but I was so disappointed when you left Camnipol without our getting to spend more time together.

I am so sorry that the army has been bothering you. I’ve given orders that you and the agents of the bank aren’t to be bothered. If there is any question, Broot will bring it to you and whatever you tell him will have the force of law. I’ve gotten a bit of a reputation as a dangerous man to cross, more through luck than anything I’ve really done, so I don’t think he’ll give you any problems, but if he does, write to me, and I’ll have it taken care of. There are some real advantages to sitting a throne, along with all the unpleasant parts.

And also, I wanted you to know how much I miss you too. Even with all the time we spent together, I felt like we hardly got the chance to explore who and what we are to each other. The last night—the one night …

Oh, this is so much harder to write about than I thought it would be. Jorey says I should be honest and gentle, and I want to be. Cithrin I love you. I love you more than anyone I’ve ever known. All this time that I’ve been running Aster’s kingdom and fighting to protect the empire, it’s been a way to distract myself from you. From your body. Does that sound crass? I don’t mean it to be. Before that night, I’d never touched a woman. Not the way I touched you. Since I had your letter, I can’t deny it anymore. I want you back with me. I want to sit up late at night with your head resting in my lap and read you all the poems we didn’t have when we were in hiding. I want to wake up beside you in the morning, and see you in the daylight the way we were in darkness.