Mistress of the Catacombs Read online

Those times were over, but workmen were restoring the buildings and grounds at the same rapid tempo as Garric rebuilt the government itself. The bungalow Ilna shared with Cashel, and now Merota, was meant for a senior gardener. It was a detached structure rather than part of a barracks housing the families of twenty clerks or servants, but it was neither spacious nor expensively decorated.

  Ilna had chosen the residence herself, mostly for the garden courtyard that gave her good light on clear days. Even that was a needless luxury: she could weave in the dark with perfect assurance. The chamberlain—he'd been replaced since then—had tried to insist that someone of Lady Ilna's stature must have more luxurious accommodations.

  Ilna's expression at the memory could have cut glass. There were many things that Ilna os-Kenset felt she must do, but none of those duties were imposed by others.

  Chalcus extended his left arm, bare except for its scars. He wore as usual only a single short-sleeved tunic. Because he was in money, the present garment was of linen dyed with first-pressing indigo. The hem and sleeves were embroidered in gold thread, and the sash was of fine black silk.

  He wore it with a swagger; but then, Chalcus did everything with a swagger.

  Merota gripped the sailor's thick wrist and forearm. She jumped, and Chalcus added a little toss, giving the girl the boost she needed to go over, shrilling delight as her tunics flapped like flags in a storm.

  “Why do you always swing her with your left arm, Master Chalcus?” Ilna asked suddenly. He'd said he was here to have a private interview with her. One result of the discussion could be that they'd never see each other again.

  “Swing me again, Chalcus!” Merota said.

  Chalcus hugged the child to his left side, but it was Ilna he faced with a broad grin. “Indeed, what would happen if some ill-wisher sprang from the lemon balm there—”

  He nodded to the bed of herbs with tiny white flowers. None of the stems were as tall as Ilna's knee.

  “—and my sword arm was all tangled with a lovely woman, eh?”

  Chalcus wasn't wearing a sword, and the short curved dagger thrust through his sash was no bigger than the knife every man in a rural village carried for routine tasks. The steel of the blade, however, was as incomparably better than that of knives forged by travelling blacksmiths as Chalcus himself was superior to the common run of sailors.

  “Then you'd kill him with your left hand!” Merota said, giggling.

  Chalcus looked down at her. “Aye, perhaps I would at that, child,” he said. “Now leave us, if you will.”

  Instead of arguing as Ilna had half expected the girl would do—expected until she heard the tone Chalcus used this time—Merota said, “Yes, Chalcus.”

  She turned and curtsied to Ilna. “Mistress Ilna,” she said, then reentered the bungalow at a swift but ladylike pace.

  Chalcus bent away from Ilna as though to smell the purple-tendriled mint along the east wall. “I've been thinking over where I might go next, mistress,” he said.

  “There's little use for my sort in a place like Valles, you know.”

  He turned and smiled at her. “You've a fine crop of herbs growing here,” he added in the same negligent tone. “Those who you cook for are lucky folk indeed.”

  Ilna allowed no servants in the bungalow, though with the child's tutors traipsing in and out there was work enough to keep the place in proper order. Ilna hadn't met the cook or maid yet who performed to her standards; and in truth, even if such a paragon appeared, Ilna wouldn't want to share her dwelling with a servant.

  “The garden's well enough,” Ilna said. “If I were to stay here, I'd want a dovecote, though. I've never liked chickens running around my ankles.”

  What did Chalcus expect her to say? Her! Did he think Ilna os-Kenset would beg?

  Instead of speaking, Chalcus took out his dagger and spun it from hand to hand. He caught it each time by the point, then spun it back.

  “I wonder, mistress...” he said as though to the shimmering steel. The blade was slightly curved and sharp for a finger's length along the reverse edge. “If you were on a ship about to sink, would you save the tall man ... or the short man... .”

  There was a rhythm to the blade, as crisp and regular as the dance of Ilna's shuttle across her loom. She found she was holding her breath; she grimaced angrily.

  “... perhaps a middle-sized man like myself?”

  The dagger slipped back into its scabbard as surely as water finds the drain hole. Chalcus met her gaze. His lips smiled, but his eyes did not.

  “I don't like ships, Master Chalcus,” she said, chipping her words out like hatchet strokes. “The last time I was aboard one, there was a crew of a hundred but only one man: you yourself, as you well know.”

  Ilna turned away, wishing she believed enough in the Gods that she could curse and not feel she was being a hypocrite. “Master Chalcus,” she said to the man behind her, “I regret to say that I don't know my own mind. Or perhaps I do, and I don't have the courage to act on it.”

  “Ah,” said Chalcus, an acknowledgment in a tone stripped of all implication. “Well, mistress, I haven't met the person whose courage I'd trust further than I would your own. We'll talk again before we act, either of us.”

  Ilna spun to face him. “Chalcus,” she said, “there are things I've done—”

  “Aye!” he said, the barked syllable breaking off her confession. “And I have done things as well, mistress. But we won't have that conversation ever, you and I, for we each already know the truth the other knows. Now, go to your loom and settle your mind—”

  He did know her; not that Ilna had doubted that before.

  “—while I chat with your guards and perhaps open a jar of wine. In a while we'll talk about what we will do, leaving the past to take care of itself. Eh?”

  Chalcus smiled; and he kissed her, which no one before in this life had done, and he swaggered back into the house calling to the pair of Blood Eagles at the entrance. Chalcus the sailor; Chalcus the pirate and bloody-handed killer.

  Ilna swept the cover from her loom and resumed her work, pouring her soul into the pattern her fingers wove.

  Chalcus the man.

  Ilna's fingers played the threads without her conscious consideration while her mind grappled with questions that were beyond any human's certain grasp. A spindle of rich brown yarn was nearly empty. She replaced it with a full spindle, and as she did her eyes glanced over the fabric she'd woven.

  To another it was merely a pattern of subtle hues and textures, an image that made the person who viewed it a little calmer, a little more happy. What Ilna saw in the muted shades..

  She slid from her stool and strode into the bungalow's central hall. She heard the sailor from the porch beyond, his voice lilting a complex joke to the pair of guards on duty. Even at this moment Ilna found herself hoping that Merota wasn't listening in also.

  "Chalcus!” she called. “Garric will be in the water garden. We've got to warn him. Now!”

  She swept out the front door. The Blood Eagles stiffened to attention; Chalcus by contrast looked as supple as the long silken cord around Ilna's waist, a sash for now and a noose at need.

  Ilna wasn't much of a runner, but she broke into a trot. This accursed palace was bigger than the whole of Barca's Hamlet, and she didn't know the terrain nearly as well.

  Chalcus was just as quick and agile on dry land as on shipboard. He swung along beside her. The only sign that he too felt the tension was the way his left hand reached down to steady the curved sword that he wasn't wearing at the moment.

  Chalcus didn't ask what the danger was, only grinned at her as they ran through a tunnel of pleached ironwoods. Maybe he didn't care.

  What Ilna saw in her fabric was Garric frozen in a cavern. Around him, holding him so there was no escape, were the eight legs of a huge female spider.

  And her mandibles were poised to suck Garric's life out.

  “A quarter past the seventh hour!” said the crier standing lik
e a colorful statue on his podium beside the flagstoned pathway. As Sharina waited for Garric, she glanced through the columns of the pergola toward the call. The servant turned his eyes aside so that he wouldn't seem to be spying on Prince Garric and his companions even though it was his job to call the time in their direction. On hot days Garric often worked in this corner of the compound with its tall hedges and fountains. Now he bent over the table, signing short parchment documents one at a time as Liane put them before him. A gaggle of aides and runners waited against need just outside the pergola, and a dozen Blood Eagles stood just beyond.

  Half the guards were turned outward, watching for threats which might lurk among the structures and plantings; the other six kept their eyes on those inside the pergola. Sharina smiled sadly. It wouldn't occur to Garric to worry that his sister might try to assassinate him; it wouldn't occur to a Blood Eagle not to worry.

  Fountains on each of three superimposed terraces splashed and gurgled as they fed a stream running in a channel of cut stone. The landscaping was as old as the palace compound, but recent repairs meant that some blocks of the soft volcanic rock were clean though most wore beards of moss that wobbled in the gentle current.

  An ascetic-looking man in sea-green silk knelt on the other side of the streamhead, apparently in prayer. He was a stranger to Sharina but from his dress not a servant.

  Garric finished the last of the patents and looked up; his eyes followed Sharina's. “That's the ruler of Laut,” he said. “My next meeting." He shook his head in frustrated wonder. “I'm supposed to be talking to him now.”

  “Echeus, the Intercessor of Laut,” said Liane, amplifying Garric's statement rather than correcting him. She filed the sheaf of completed documents and closed her little desk. “I'll ready the next group for your signature while you're with Echeus; those will be the judicial appointments for the three Ataras.”

  “Garric, if this isn't a good time—” Sharina said, a little irritated despite herself. She knew the demands on her brother's time, but the only reason she was here now was that he'd said he wanted to hear about Moon Wisdom as soon as possible.

  Her brother raised his hands. “Sharina, without the weight you take off me, and the organization Liane provides...” he said. He covered Liane's hand on the table; she turned it palm up and squeezed back fiercely.

  “Without those things,” Garric went on, “the kingdom could better run itself than be in the muddle I'd make of it. I don't mean to complain about the part of the job that's left for me.”

  He nodded, putting an end to the apology. “Now,” he said crisply, fully King of the Isles in tone and manner, “tell me about Tisamur and Moon Wisdom.”

  “The Inspector of Temple Lands has only three Assessors under him...” Sharina said. “For some reason he decided to send one to Tisamur.”

  “His wife has property there,” Liane murmured. “Well, perhaps that's fortunate.”

  “I talked to the Assessor, Kidwal bos-Kidrian,” Sharina said. “I believe she's a trustworthy witness.”

  Kidwal was a young woman from the minor nobility; smart, well educated, and very plain. It'd seemed to Sharina that the barely suppressed anger in Kidwal's presentation was more a reaction to life in general than at her difficulty in getting anybody to take action on her present report.

  “She says that the regular temples on Tisamur, at least those within several days' journey from Donelle“—the island's capital—”are either deserted or 've been surrendered to Moon Wisdom. Most of the priests and temple functionaries have joined the new cult, though a few have gone into lay businesses or are living on their personal wealth.”

  “Moon Wisdom confiscated temple lands?” Garric said, frowning. “Is the ... who is the ruler, a count? Is he behind this?”

  “A Council of Elders governs Tisamur,” Liane said. She touched her desk but didn't need to open it to withdraw a reference. “Wealthy individuals; all of them landholders, though many depend on trade for most of their income.”

  “Moon Wisdom is the government now,” Sharina said. “It's not imposed by force, it seems to be what people want. Lady Kidwal says she wasn't attacked even though she'd arrived openly without concealing her, well, duties. But those she questioned were derisive.”

  Sharina paused to recall the assessor's precise wording, letting her eyes follow the barn swallows darting above the water. She could see several mud nests plastered to the underside of the three-arched bridge crossing the artificial stream. Most of the meandering channel was narrow enough to step across, but the architect had provided a lotus-fringed pool so that the bridge didn't look absurd.

  “She said,” Sharina continued, “that one former Elder told her, 'Whoever saw the Lady, except as a statue being pulled by purse-snatchers in priestly robes? But I've seen our Gods, and so have many others.' And everyone listening nodded agreement.”

  “Did he say what these Gods looked like?” Garric asked, pressing the knuckles of his fists together. Liane looked particularly intent also. Sharina guessed they'd learned more from the vanished Hordred than they'd had time to pass on to her.

  “No,” Sharina said. “Kidwal asked a number of citizens, in Donelle and also outside the city. That was the only question that seemed to disturb them.”

  Sharina cleared her throat. “There's one thing more,” she said. “Kidwal was permitted to go where she pleased—not into the temple during services, but apart from that. She could talk to anyone, and she doesn't think she was watched or followed. She says very clearly that she wasn't threatened in any way.”

  “Go on,” Garric said. His expression was still but not calm. When Garric was in this—mood? But it was more than a mood—he seemed less like the brother she'd grown up with than he did a great cat, waiting for prey to come a few steps closer.

  “Despite all that,” Sharina said, “Lady Kidwal was frightened. Frightened enough to convince her chief to get her an appointment with me.”

  She swallowed. “Frightened enough to frighten me, Garric,” she concluded.

  Garric stood and braced his hands against one of the crossbeams supporting the pergola's roof. He bunched the muscles of his shoulders and thighs, straining upward to work the stiffness out of them. Echeus, waiting across the stream, turned toward the group in the pergola for the first time. He didn't get to his feet yet.

  "Hordred frightened me as well, Sharina,” Garric said. He grinned wryly at her. “That was before we saw him disappear.”

  He turned his head, and added, “Liane, can this Intercessor wait while I talk to Lady Kidwal myself?”

  “I'll meet with him if you like, Garric,” Sharina offered. “If it's just a formal audience, that is. But I really don't believe that Kidwal knows any more than she told me and I've passed on to you. It's what she feels that's important, and she can't give a reason for that.”

  “There are reports from Laut that something... odd is going on there also,” Liane said. “The Intercessor's coming to see you could be an opportunity to learn what he wants, if not necessarily what he plans.”

  Sharina's eyes narrowed very slightly. Liane was too polite to give Garric a direct order, but she was ordering him nonetheless. Still, it was for his good and the kingdom's, of that Sharina was sure.

  “All right,” Garric said. He hitched up his sword belt so that the heavy weapon rode more comfortably. “I'll talk to Echeus.”

  Echeus rose also, tossing a glitter of powder into the stream before he started toward Garric. The men would meet in the middle of the bridge unless one stopped for the other to join him.

  Two guards tried to precede Garric; he gestured them back with a curt command. The undercaptain in charge of the detachment eyed the Intercessor's aged dignity. He frowned, but he didn't argue the issue of safety with his sovereign.

  Movement from the side drew Sharina's attention. Escorted by another group of Blood Eagles, Tenoctris and Cashel were returning from their foray into the city.

  Cashel waved his quarterstaff
in greeting. On his left shoulder he carried a lump of stone. From the way his ripped tunics fluttered loose, he'd been to considerable effort getting it.

  Sharina smiled as she walked out of the pergola to meet her friends. Cashel's presence was a wall of security. For the first time since she'd seen Hordred vanish screaming, Sharina felt safe.

  Dragonflies and swallows whizzed over the sluggish stream, but they didn't get all the insects. When Garric stepped from sunlight into the shade cast by poplars near the water, a mosquito keened close to his left ear. He swatted, hoping to drive it away if not kill it.

  In Garric's mind, King Carus chuckled, and said, “There's more honesty in blackflies than in courtiers, lad. The bugs are just as quick to suck the blood of a shepherd as a prince.”

  Garric smiled. If he closed his eyes, he could imagine that he was herding sheep near the marshes fringing Pattern Creek. Mosquito bites weren't something he'd ever have thought would make him feel nostalgic.

  The Intercessor came from the other direction at a stately pace. Garric frowned, wondering who Echeus interceded with. Probably he interceded for the people of Laut or at least claimed to do so.

  Reise had given his children a classical education which couldn't have been bettered by one of the academies in Valles or Erdin on Sandrakkan. Unlike Liane, however, who had attended one of those academies, Garric and Sharina knew little more about current events than did any other peasant from Haft.

  Garric smiled again. His education taught him that "prince" meant "first." It was an honest claim, if not a humble one.

  Again Carus guffawed. “Princes don't have to be humble” he said, hooking his thumbs in his swordbelt and flaring his fingers. Carus was such a vibrant presence in Garric's mind that Garric had to keep reminding himself that others didn't see the ancient monarch—who had drowned a thousand years in the past.

  The hump of the arching bridge hid Echeus from Garric when they were on the opposite approaches, though both men were tall. Garric looked over his shoulder. His detachment of Blood Eagles followed at a respectful distance. In the pergola, Liane and Sharina greeted Tenoctris and Cashel. They were looking at a rock—a small boulder—on the table. Whatever had Tenoctris found this time?