Fire skt-2 Read online

  Fire stood staring at Archer's door, silent and shaking. She was quite certain he had never done anything to make her this angry before.

  She turned on her heel and marched down the hallway. She found the stairs and marched up them, and up, and up, until she burst onto the roof, where she set to marching back and forth. It was cold and damp, and she had no coat, and it smelled like coming snow. Fire didn't notice, didn't care. Her baffled guard stood out of her way so she wouldn't trample them.

  After some time the thing happened she'd been waiting for: Mila fell asleep. And none too soon, for it was late now, and Brigan was climbing wearily to the roofs. She mustn't meet Brigan tonight. She would not be able to stop herself from telling him everything, and Archer might deserve to have his laundry aired, but Mila did not.

  She marched down by a stairway that Brigan was not taking up. She traced the maze again to Archer's rooms and stood outside his door. Archer, she thought to him. Get out here, now.

  He emerged quickly, if barefoot and confused and a bit hastily thrown together; and Fire for the first time exercised her privilege of being alone with him, sending her guards to either end of the long corridor. She could not quite force herself to appear calm, and when she spoke, her voice was scathing. "Must you prey on my guard?"

  The puzzlement left his face and he spoke hotly. "I'm not a predator, you know. Women come to me quite willingly. And why should you care what I do?"

  "It hurts people. You're careless with people, Archer. Mila, why Mila? She's fifteen years old!"

  "She's sleeping now, happy as a kitten in a patch of sun. You're stirring up trouble over nothing."

  Fire took a breath, and spoke low. "And in a week's time, when you grow tired of her, Archer, because someone else has captured your fancy; when she becomes despondent or depressed, or pathetic, or furious, because you've snatched the thing away that makes her so happy – I suppose then she'll be stirring up trouble over nothing?"

  "You talk as if she's in love with me."

  He was maddening; she would like to kick him. "They always fall in love with you, Archer, always. Once they've known the warmth of you, they always fall in love with you, and you never do with them, and when you drop them it breaks their hearts."

  He bit the words off. "A curious accusation, coming from you."

  She understood him, but she would not let him turn this into that. "We're talking about my friends, Archer. I beg you – if you must have the entire palace in your bed, leave the women who are my friends out of it."

  "And I don't see why this should matter to you now, when it never did before."

  "I never had friends before!"

  "You keep using that word," he said bitterly. "She's not your friend, she's your guard. Would your friend do what she's done, knowing your history with me?"

  "She knows little about it, except that it is history. And you forget I'm in a position to know how she regards me."

  "But there must be plenty she hides from you – as she's been hiding her meetings with me all this time. A person may have many feelings about you that you don't know."

  She watched him, crestfallen. He was so physical in his arguments. He loomed and gestured, his face went dark or burned with light. His eyes blazed. And he was just as physical with his love and his joy, and this was why they all fell in love with him, for in a world that was dismal he was alive and passionate, and his attentions, while they lasted, were intoxicating.

  And she hadn't missed the meaning in his words: this thing with Mila had been going on for some time. She turned away from him, held a hand up against him. She couldn't fight with the appeal of Lord Archer to a fifteen-year-old soldier girl from the impoverished southern mountains. And she couldn't quite forgive herself for not realising this might happen, for not paying closer attention in her mind to Archer's whereabouts and his company.

  She dropped her hand, turned back, and spoke with weariness. "Of course she has feelings about me I don't know. But whatever those feelings are, they don't negate the feeling she does show me, or the friendship in her behaviour that goes beyond the loyalty of a guard. You will not turn my anger away from you and onto her."

  Archer seemed to deflate then. He slumped against his door and stared at his bare toes in the manner of a man accepting that he has lost. "I wish you would come home," he said weakly; and for a panicked moment Fire thought he was going to cry.

  But then he seemed to take hold of himself. He looked up at her quietly. "So you have friends now. And a protective heart."

  She matched his quietness. "I've always had a protective heart. Only now I have more people inside it. They've joined you there, Archer – never replaced you."

  He thought about that for a moment, staring at his feet. "You needn't worry about Clara, anyway," he said. "She ended it almost the moment it began. I believe it was out of loyalty to you."

  Fire deliberately chose to think of this as good news. She would focus on it ending, whatever it had been, and ending by Clara's choice – rather than on the small matter of it having begun.

  There was a short, sad pause. He said, "I'll end things with Mila."

  "The sooner you do, the sooner it'll be behind her. And you've lost your questioning-room privileges with this thing, Archer. I'll not have you there plaguing her with your presence."

  He glanced up sharply then, and stood straight. "A relieving change of topic. You remind me of the reason I wanted to talk to you. Do you know where I was today?"

  Fire couldn't turn away from the subject so easily. She rubbed both temples. I've no idea, and I'm exhausted, so whatever it is, have out with it quickly.

  "I was visiting the house of a retired captain who was an ally of my father's," Archer said. "By the name of Hart. A rich man, and a great friend to the crown. His young wife sent the invitation. Hart himself was not home."

  Fire rubbed her temples harder. "You do Brocker's ally great honour," she said dryly.

  "Well, but listen to this. She's quite a drinker, Hart's wife, and do you know what we were drinking?"

  "I've no energy for riddles."

  He was smiling now. "A rare Pikkian wine made from the juice of frozen grapes," he said. "They've a whole case of it hidden at the back of their wine cellar. She didn't know where it came from – she only just discovered it while I was there. She seemed to find it odd, that her husband should've hidden it away, but I think it was a wise thing for a known ally of the king to do, don't you?"

  Nash felt Captain Hart's treachery very personally. For indeed, it took little more than a week of redirected questioning, and of watching Hart while seeming not to watch him, to learn that Lord Mydogg on occasion made a present of his favourite wine; and to learn that the messengers Hart sent south to deal with his speculations in the gold mines met with interesting and obscure fellows along the way, at inns, or over drinking games, who were then seen to strike out in a northerly direction that was the straightest path to Mydogg.

  It was enough for Garan and Clara to decide Hart must be questioned. The matter on the table next was how.

  On a moonlit night in mid-November, Captain Hart set south along the cliff road that led to his second home – a pleasant, seaside cottage to which he retreated on occasion to find respite from his wife, who drank far more than was good for the health of her marriage. He rode in his very fine carriage and was attended, as usual, not only by his drivers and footmen but by a guard of ten men on horseback. It was how a wise man travelled the cliff road in the dark, so that he could defend himself from all but the largest company of bandits.

  Unfortunately, the company of bandits that hid behind the rocks on that particular night was quite large indeed; and led by a man who, if shaved, and dressed at the height of fashion, and seen in daylight engaged in some highly correct activity, might bear a resemblance to the king's steward Welkley.

  The bandits set upon the travelling party with great, bandit-like howls. While the majority of the ne'er-do-wells roughed up the members of H
art's entourage, went through their pockets, bound them with ropes, and collected Hart's very fine horses, Welkley and several others entered the carriage. Inside, an irate Captain Hart was waiting for them, brandishing sword and dagger. Welkley, with a highly athletic dodge to left and right that many at court would have found quite surprising, stabbed the captain in the leg with a dart tipped with sleeping poison.

  One of Welkley's fellows, Toddin, was a man whose shape, size, and bearing were quite similar to Hart's. After a patch of speedy undressing and dressing inside the carriage, Toddin was wearing Hart's hat, coat, muffler, and yellow monster skin-boots, whereas Hart was wearing much less than he had been before, and lying insensible in a pile of Toddin's clothing. Toddin now grabbed Hart's sword and rolled with Welkley out of the carriage. Cursing and grunting, they set to sword fighting very near the cliff, in full view of Hart's bound servants, who watched with horror as the man who appeared to be Hart fell to the ground, clutching his side. A trio of bandits picked him up and hurled him into the sea.

  The company of bandits now fled, with their plunder of miscellaneous coinage, fourteen horses, one carriage, and one captain inside the carriage sleeping like the dead. Closer to the city Hart was slipped into a sack and passed to a delivery man who would bring him into the palace with the night's grain. The rest of the booty was rushed away, to be sold on the black market. And finally the bandits returned to their homes, transformed themselves into milkmen, storekeepers, farmers, gentlemen; and threw themselves down for a short night's sleep.

  In the morning Hart's men were found by the road, bound and shivering, much ashamed of the story they had to tell. When the news reached the palace, Nash sent a convoy to investigate the incident. Welkley arranged a bouquet of flowers to be sent to Hart's widow.

  And everyone was relieved that afternoon, when word finally came from Toddin's wife that Toddin was in good health. He was a phenomenal ocean swimmer with a great tolerance for cold, but the night had clouded over, and the boat sent to pick him up had taken a long time to find him. Naturally, everyone had worried.

  When they first dragged Captain Hart before Fire, his mind was a closed box and his eyes were screwed shut. For days Fire could get nowhere with him. "I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that an old friend and colleague of Lord Brocker's should be so strong," she said to Musa, Mila, and Neel in the questioning room, after yet another session during which Captain Hart hadn't looked at her once.

  "Indeed, Lady," Musa said. "A man who accomplished all that Commander Brocker accomplished in his time would have chosen strong captains."

  Fire had been thinking more of what Brocker had endured personally than what he had accomplished militarily – King Nax's mad punishment for Brocker's mysterious crime. Fire watched her three guards absently as they brought out a quick meal of bread and cheese. Mila handed Fire a plate, avoiding her eyes.

  This was Mila's way now. In the last few weeks, since Archer had ended things, she'd shrunk somehow – gone silent and contrite around her lady. Fire, in turn, had been trying to be extra kind, careful not to subject Mila to Archer's presence any more than was necessary. Not a word had passed between the two women on the subject, but both of them knew that the other knew.

  Ravenous, Fire tore off a piece of bread and bit into it; and noticed Mila sitting mutely, staring at her own food but not eating it. I could flay Archer, Fire thought. Sighing, she pushed her attention back to the matter of Captain Hart.

  He was a man who had achieved much wealth after retiring from the army, gradually accustoming himself to comfort. Might comfort soften him now?

  Over the next couple of days, Fire arranged for Hart's cell in the dungeons to be cleaned and improved. He was given fine bedding and carpets, and books, and lighting, and good food and wine, and warm water to wash whenever he asked for it; and rat traps, which were perhaps the greatest luxury of all. One day with her hair swirling around her shoulders, and wearing a dress perhaps a bit more low-cut than was her usual style, she wandered down to his underground lair to visit.

  When her guard opened the door for her, he looked up from his book to see who was there. His face slackened. "I know what you're doing," he said. And perhaps he did. But it wasn't enough to stop him staring, and Fire knew she'd found her way in.

  She imagined a man in prison might be lonely, especially if he had a pretty wife at home who preferred wine and young men to her husband. She sat next to him on his bed during her visits. She ate whatever food he offered her, and accepted cushions for her back. Her nearness loosened him, and a battle began that was far from easy. At his weakest, Hart was still strong.

  * * * *

  Clara, Garan, and Nash soaked up what Fire learned like the sand of Cellar Harbour during a rainstorm.

  "I still can't get him to say anything useful about Mydogg," Fire said. "But truly, we're in luck, for he happens to know a great deal about Gentian, and he's less unwilling to spill Gentian's secrets."

  "He's Mydogg's ally," Clara said. "Why should we trust what he thinks he knows about Gentian? Couldn't Gentian be sending out false messengers for Mydogg to catch, just as he does with us?"

  "He could," Fire said, "but I can't quite explain it – the certainty with which Hart speaks. The confidence in his assertions. He knows the tricks Mydogg and Gentian have been playing on us. He's quite positive his knowledge of Gentian is not of that ilk. He won't tell me his sources, but I'm inclined to believe his information."

  "All right," Clara said. "Tell us what you've learned, and we'll use whatever means we can to confirm it."

  "He says Gentian and his son, Gunner, are coming north to attend the palace gala that happens in January," Fire said.

  "That's nervy," Clara said. "I'm impressed."

  Garan snorted. "Now that we know about his indigestion, we can torture him with cake."

  "Gentian will pretend to apologise to the court for his rebel activities," Fire said. "He'll talk of renewed friendship with the crown. But in the meantime his army will move north-east from his estate and hide in the tunnels of the Great Greys near Fort Flood. Sometime in the days after the gala, Gentian intends to assassinate both Nash and Brigan. Then he'll ride like blazes to the location of his army, and attack Fort Flood."

  The twins' eyes were wide. "Not nervy after all," Garan said. "Stupid. What kind of commander starts a war in the middle of winter?"

  "The kind that's trying to catch his enemy by surprise," Clara said.

  "In addition to which," Garan continued, "he should send someone anonymous and expendable to do his assassinating. What'll happen to his clever plan when he gets himself killed?"

  "Well," Clara said, "it's no news Gentian's stupid. And thank the Dells for Brigan's foresight. The Second is already at Fort Flood, and he's taking the First quite near there as we speak."

  "What of the Third and the Fourth?" Fire asked.

  "They're in the north," Clara said, "patrolling, but in readiness to fly wherever they're needed. You must tell us where they're needed."

  "I've no idea," Fire said. "I cannot get him to tell me Mydogg's plans. He says Mydogg intends to do nothing – sit back while Gentian and the king reduce each other's numbers – but I know he's lying. He also says Mydogg's sending his sister, Murgda, south to the gala, which is true; but he won't tell me why."

  "Lady Murgda to the gala as well!" Clara exclaimed. "What's got into everyone?"

  "What else?" Garan said. "You must give us more."

  "I've nothing more," Fire said. "I've told you everything. Apparently Gentian's plans have been in place for some time."

  Nash was clutching his forehead. "This is very grim. Gentian has a force of some ten thousand, supposedly, and we've ten thousand at Fort Flood to meet him. But in the north we've ten thousand scattered far and wide – "

  "Fifteen thousand," Fire said. "We can call on the auxiliaries."

  "All right then, we've fifteen thousand scattered far and wide, and Mydogg has what? Do we even know? Twenty thousand?
Twenty-one thousand? To attack wherever takes his fancy – my mother's fortress, or Fort Middle, Fort Flood if he wishes, the city itself – with days, possibly weeks, before our troops can organise to meet him."

  "He can't hide twenty thousand soldiers," Clara said, "not if we're looking for them. Even in the Little Greys, he can't hide them, and he could never get all the way to the city without being seen."

  "I need Brigan," Nash said. "I want Brigan here, now."

  "He'll come when he can, Nash," Garan said, "and we're keeping him informed."

  Fire found herself stretching out with the feelers of her mind to soothe a king who was frightened. Nash perceived what she was doing. He reached for her hand. With thanks, and with something else he couldn't help, he kissed her fingers.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  It was a curious matter of Dellian politics, the yearly gala at court to which everyone of any significance was invited. The seven courtyards were converted to ballrooms, and loyalists and traitors came together to dance, to sip from goblets of wine while pretending to be friends. Almost everyone capable of travel attended, though Mydogg and Gentian generally didn't dare, a pretense of friendship on their parts being a mite too incredible; and for a week or so the palace was bursting with the servants and guards and pets, and the endless requirements of guests. The stables were too crowded, and the horses fidgety.

  Brocker had explained to Fire once that the gala was always held in January, to celebrate the lengthening of days. She learned now that December was a month of preparation. On every level of the palace, Fire saw workmen engaged in repairs. Window-washers hung from the courtyard ceilings and wall-washers from the balconies, polishing glass and stone.

  Garan, Clara, Nash, and Fire were also preparing. If Gentian intended to kill Nash and Brigan in the days after the gala and then ride to Fort Flood to start a war, then Gentian and Gunner must be killed the day of the gala – and Lady Murgda might as well be disposed of, too, as long as she was around. Then Brigan must fly to Fort Flood and start the war himself, surprising Gentian's armies in their tunnels and caves.