Valdemar 05 - [Vows & Honor 02] - Oathbreakers (17 page)

“A good point,” Kethry conceded with such relief that it was obvious to Tarma that she had been thinking something along the same lines. “Are you sure you'll be all right?”

Tarma tried her improvised bed, and found it better than she'd expected. “Best doss I've had in my life,” she replied, wriggling luxuriously into the soft blankets, and grinning. “You'd better find out what happened to Idra pretty quick,
she‘enedra.
Otherwise, I may not want to leave.”

Kethry sighed, reached up for the sconce beside her, and blew out the candle, leaving the room in darkness.

 

The following day Tarma managed to frighten the maids half to death, rising from the pile of bedding on the floor with sword in hand at the first sound of anyone stirring. The younger of the two fainted dead away at the sight of her. The other squeaked and ran for the door. They didn't see
that
maid again, so Tarma figured she had refused to go back into their suite; defying any and all punishments. The other girl vanished as soon as Kethry revived her, and they didn't see
her
again, either, so she probably had done the same. The next servants to enter the suite were a pair of haglike old crones with faces fit to frighten fish out of water; they attended to the cleaning and picking up of the suite, and took themselves out again with an admirable efficiency and haste. That was more like what Tarma wanted out of servants; the giggly girls fussing about drove her to distraction at the best of times, and now—well, now she wasn't going to take anything or anyone at face value. Those giggly girls were probably spies—maybe more.

Kethry heaved a sigh or two of relief when they saw the last of the new set of servitors.

After wolfing down some bread and fruit from the over-generous breakfast the second set of servants had brought, Tarma headed off to oversee the further training of the horses, concentrating on the gold and the dapple. The gold she wanted schooled enough that he wouldn't cause his rider any problems ; the dapple she wanted trained to the limits of his understanding. She hoped
that
might sweeten the Horsemaster's attitude toward them.

She kept her ears open—and as she'd hoped, the stable folk were fairly free with their tongues while they thought she couldn't understand them. Besides several unflattering comments about her own looks, she managed to pick up that Idra had gone off rather abruptly, but that her disappearance had not been entirely unexpected. Her name was coupled on more than one occasion with the words “that wild-goose quest.” She learned little more than that.

Of the other brother, Prince Stefansen, she learned a bit more. He'd run off on his brother's coronation day. And he'd done something worse than just run, according to rumor, though what it was, no one really seemed to know. Whatever, it had been enough to goad the new king into declaring him an outlaw. If Raschar caught him, his head was forfeit.

And
that
was fair interesting indeed. And was more than Tarma had expected to learn.

 

“That doesn't much surprise me, given what
I've
heard,” Kethry remarked that evening, when they settled into their suite after another one of those stifling evening gatherings. This one had been only a little less formal than their reception. It seemed this sort of thing took place
every
night—and attendance was expected, even of visitors. “I'd gathered something like that from Countess Lyris. It was about the only useful thing to come out of this evening.”

“I think I may die of the boredom, provided the perfume doesn't kill me off first,” Tarma yawned. She was sprawled on the floor of Kethry's room on her featherbed (which the maids had not dared move.) Her eyes were sleepy; her posture wasn't. Kethry knew from years of partnering her that no one and nothing would move inside or near the suite without her knowing it. She was operating on sentry reflexes, and it showed in a subtle tenseness of her muscles.

“The perfume may; I don't think boredom is going to be a problem,” Kethry replied slowly. She leaned back into the pillows heaped at the head of the bed, and combed her hair while she spoke in tones hardly louder than a whisper. The candlelight from the sconce in the headboard behind her made a kind of amber aura around her head. “There is one
hell
of a lot more going on here than meets the eye. This is what I've gotten so far: when Idra got here, she supported Raschar over Stefansen. The whole idea was that Stefansen was going to be allowed to exile himself off to one of the estates and indulge himself in whatever way he wanted. Presumably he was going to fade away into quiet debauchery. Raschar was crowned—and suddenly Stefansen was gone, with a price on his head. Nobody knows where he went, but the best guess is north.”

Tarma looked a good deal more alert at that, and leaned up against the bedside, propping her head on her hands. “Oh, really? And what came of the original plan? Especially if Stefansen had agreed to it?”

Kethry shrugged, and frowned. It was a puzzle, and one that left a prickle between her shoulder-blades, as if someone were aiming a weapon for that spot. “No one seems to know. No one knows what it was Stefansen did to warrant a death sentence. But Raschar was—and is, still, according to one of my sources—very nervous about proving that he is the
rightful
claimant to the throne. There's a tale that the Royal Line used to have a sword in Raschar's grandfather's time that was able to choose the rightful heir—or the best king, the stories aren't very clear on the subject, at least not the ones I heard. It was stolen forty or fifty years ago. Idra apparently volunteered to see if she could find it for Raschar, the assumption being that the sword would pick
him.
They say he was very eager for her to find it—and at the moment everyone seems convinced that she took off to go looking for it.”

Tarma shook her head, slowly. Her mouth was twisted a little in a skeptical frown. “That doesn't sound much like the Captain to me. Sure, she might well
say
she was going off looking for it, but to really do it? Personally? Alone? When the Hawks are waiting for her to join them and it's nearly fighting season? And why not rope in one of Raschar's tame mages to help smell out the magic? It's not likely.”

“Not
bloody
likely,” Kethry agreed. “I could see it as an excuse to get back to us, but not anything else.”

“Have you made any moves at old Jadrek?”

Kethry sighed. Jadrek had been
exceptionally
hard to get at. For a lame man, he could vanish with remarkable dexterity. “I'm courting him, cautiously. He doesn't seem to trust anyone except Tindel. I did find out why neither Raschar nor his father cared for Jadrek or
his.
The hereditary Archivists of Rethwellan both suffered from an overdose of honesty.”

“Let's not get abstruse, shall we?”

Kethry grinned. This part, at least,
did
have a certain ironic humor to it. “Both Jadrek and his father before him insisted on putting events in the Archives exactly as they happened, instead of tailoring them to suit the monarch's sensibilities.”

“So what's to stop the King from having the Archives altered at his pleasure?”

“They can‘t,” Kethry replied, still amused in spite of her feelings that they were both treading an invisible knife edge of danger. “The Archive books are bespelled. They
have
to be kept up to date, or, and I quote, 'something nasty happens.‘ The Archives, once written in, are protected magically and can't be altered, and Raschar doesn't have a mage knowledgeable enough to break the spell. Once something is
in
the Archives, it's there forever.”

Tarma choked on a laugh, and stuffed the back of her hand into her mouth to keep it from being overheard in the corridor outside. They had infrequent eavesdroppers out there. “Who was responsible for
this
little pickle?”

“One of the first Kings—predictably called ‘the Honest'—he was also an Adept of the Leverand school, so he could easily enforce his honesty. I gather he wasn't terribly popular; I also gather that he didn't much care.”

Tarma made a wry face. “Hair shirts and dry bread?”

“And weekly fasts—with the whole of his Court included. But this isn't getting us anywhere—”

Tarma nodded, and buried one hand in her short hair, leaning her head on it. “Too true. Ideas?”

Kethry sighed, and shook her head. “Not a one. You?”

To her mild surprise, Tarma nodded thoughtfully, biting her lip. “Maybe. Just maybe. But try the indirect approach first. My way is either going to earn us our information or scare the bird into cover so deep we'll never get him to fly.”

“Him?”

Again Tarma nodded. “Uh-huh. Jadrek.”

 

Three days later, with not much more information than they'd gotten in the first two days, Tarma decided it was time to try her plan.

It involved a fair amount of risk; although they planned to be as careful as they could, they were undoubtedly going to be seen at some point or other, since skulking about
would
raise suspicions. Tarma only hoped that no one would guess that their goal was Jadrek's rooms.

She waited for a long while with her ear pressed up against the edge of the door, listening to the sounds of servants and guests out in the hall. The hour following the mandatory evening gathering was a busy one; the nightlife of the Court of Rethwellan continued sometimes until dawn, and the hour of dismissal was followed by what Kethry called “the hour of scurrying” as nobles and notables found their own various entertainments.

Finally—“It's been quiet for a while now,” Tarma said, when the last of the footsteps had faded and the last giggling servant departed. “I think this is a lull. Let's head out before we get another influx of dicers or something.”

As usual, Kethry sailed through the door first, with Tarma her sinister shadow. There was no one in the gilded hallway, Tarma was pleased to note. In fact, at least half the polished bronze lamps were out, indicating that there would be no major entertainments tonight in this end of the Palace.

I hope Warrl's ready to come out of hiding,
Tarma thought to herself, a little worriedly.
This whole notion of mine rests on him.

:Must you think of me as if I couldn't hear you?:
Warrl snapped in exasperation.
:Of course I'm ready. Just get the old savant's window open and I'll be in through it before you can blink.:

Sorry,
Tarma replied sheepishly.
I keep forgetting
—
damnit, Furface, I'm still not used to mind-talking with you! It's just not something Shin‘a'in do.

Warrl did not answer at once. :
I know, :
he said finally.
:And I shouldn't eavesdrop, but it's the mindmate bond. I sometimes have to force myself not to listen to you. We've got so much in common; you're Kal‘enedral and I'm neuter and we're both fighters. You know
—
there are times when I wonder if your Lady might not take me along with you in the end—I think I'd like that.:

Tarma was astonished; so surprised that she stopped dead for a moment.
You—you would? Really?

: Not if you start acting like a fool about it!:
he snapped, jolting her back to sense.
: :Great Horned Moon
—will
you keep your mind on your work?:

To traverse the guests' section they wore clothing that suggested they might be paying a social call; but once they got into the plainer hallways of the quarters belonging to those who were not quite nobility, but not exactly servants—like the Archivist and the Master of Horse—they stepped into a granite-walled alcove long enough to strip off their outer garments to reveal their well-worn traveling leathers. In the dim light of the infrequent candles they looked enough like servants that Tarma hoped no one would look at them too carefully. They covered their hair with scarves, and folded their clothing into bulky bundles; they carried those bundles conspicuously, so that they were unlikely (Tarma hoped) to be levied into some task or other as extra hands.

The corridor had changed. Gone were the soft, heavy hangings, the frequent lanterns. The passage here was bare stone, polished granite, floor and wall, and the lighting was by cheap clay lanterns or cheaper tallow candles placed in holders along the walls at long intervals. It was chilly here, and damp, and the tallow candles smoked.

“Well, this explains one thing about that sour old bastard,” Tarma muttered under her breath, while Kethry counted doors.

“Seven, eight—who? What?”

“Jadrek. Why he's such a meddlar-face. Man's obviously got bones as stiff as
I'm
going to have in a few years. Living in this section must make him as creaky as a pair of new boots.”

“Ten—never thought of that. Remind me to stay on the right side of Royal displeasure. This should be it.”

Kethry stopped at a wooden door set into the corridor wall, a door no different from any of the others, and knocked softly.

Tarma listened as hard as she could; heard limping footsteps; then the door creaked open a crack, showing a line of light at its edge—

She rammed her shoulder into it without giving Jadrek a chance to see who was on the other side of it, and shoved it open before the Archivist had time to react. Kethry was less than half a step behind her. They were inside and had the door shut tightly behind them before Jadrek had a chance to go from shock to outrage at their intrusion.

Tarma put her back to the rough wood of the door and braced herself against it; no half-cripple like Jadrek was going to be able to move her away from the door until she was good and ready. The rest was up to Kethry's silver tongue.