Arts of Dark and Light: Book 01 - A Throne of Bones (82 page)

Theuderic had returned his attention to the head of their column, looking to make sure they hadn’t stopped to gawk as well. “Hmm?”

“Those people in the river,” she said, pointing with her chin. “Isn’t it too cold for bathing?”

“Ah.” He grinned. “No, my lady, it is not for a bath that these enter the water. It’s not a literal cleansing of skin, anyway. Unless I miss my guess, that man is an itinerant monk of the Immaculate. He’s preaching his religion’s absolution by ablution, I believe. Baptismus, they call it. They think their god stands ready to forgive anyone his past crimes if they will avail themselves of the water.”

“That water?” Lithriel looked incredulous as she looked over the brown, muddy water of the ford.

“It’s not the specific water that matters. The water itself is symbolic. They feel that the real forgiveness is a matter between the believer and the Immaculate.” He shrugged.

“Oh.” Lithriel cocked her head to one side, fascinated by the way the man pushed the old woman under the slowly moving water. “But even if gods existed, how can crimes be forgiven by them when they are not the one wronged?”

“Ah, but our good monk here would counter that all wrongs are ultimately crimes against God, even if they victimize another man.”

Surprisingly, she didn’t look as confused. “That makes some sense, I suppose. The man who raped me and broke my magic would be executed in Merithaim for the crime of costing King Everbright a sorceress.”

Theuderic cleared his throat and urged his horse on. They rode in silence as the woman came up again, spitting and off-balance, to the cheering of the onlookers. The joy on the woman’s face stood in deep contrast the blue of her lips brought on by the icy chill of the water.

“If it’s symbolic,” Lady Everbright asked a few moments later, “then why do it in the river at all?”

Theuderic grinned. “It would be more comfortable to do it in the baths, wouldn’t it?”

Three days later, he was forced to reconsider his assumption that the expulsion of the Amorran rustics would not concern them.

They were stopped by the city guard at the bridge that crossed the river marking the outer boundary of the great city. It was still an hour’s ride to the actual walls, but for all legal intents and purposes, they had reached Amorr. The guards were heavily armored but visibly nervous at the size of their contingent. Theuderic’s troop outnumbered them nearly four to one. As they’d approached, he’d noticed a rider galloping off in haste across the bridge, and he surmised that reinforcements would soon be arriving.

“You cannot enter,” said the guard with blue horsehair decorating his helmet, presumably the squad commander. He pointed to a written notice tacked onto the gate that blocked their way. “The city is closed to all foreigners by order of the Senate until further notice.”

Theuderic spread his hands in disbelief. “This is a royal embassy from His Majesty the King of Savondir to the Most Holy and Sanctified Father! You cannot possibly expect me to believe that an order applying to foreign residents has any relevance to a royal embassy!”

“Believe it, Savonder. You ain’t Amorran. You ain’t an ally. You’re a foreigner. You’re all foreigners, and so the Senate order applies, you understand? I got nothing against you or your party, you see, but our orders is clear. You ain’t coming in the city.”

Theuderic nodded and decided to try a different tack. Sometimes even the most unlikely intellect would respond to sweet reason. “I understand, sir, and I am not unsympathetic with your position. But allow me to bring two things to your attention here. First, do you see the two elderly gentlemen on the mules toward the rear?”

The bridge commander allowed that he did, in fact, see the two men in question.

“While they are admittedly somewhat the worse for wear given the journey, they are not only men of God, they are archbishops of the Church. They have come here at the express invitation of the Most Holy and Purified Father. I suspect you would not want to defy His Holiness? Furthermore, this sister here, as you can see, is not actually a nun.”

Lithriel, at his gesture, pushed back her veil.

The commander stepped backward in surprise.

“You’re an elf!”

“You are observant, man.” She stared down her long, slender nose at him, her eerie green eyes unblinking.

The Amorran looked thoughtful and just a little less pugnacious. “All right, I hear you, Savonder. What’s the second thing?”

“I assume you are aware of the Sanctal Scot which is collected throughout the demesne of the Church by the various potentates on behalf of the Most Holy and Purified Father?”

“We call it the calx tax, but sure, I know what you mean.”

“Now, do you see that wagon there?” Theuderic pointed. “And perhaps you recall that Savondir is a large and very wealthy kingdom?”

The commander looked from Theuderic to the wagon and back again. “You ain’t…you ain’t serious. That ain’t all…? Not the whole wagon?”

“Please don’t take my word for it. I suggest you have a look for yourself, Commander. Three hundred pounds of silver is a sight worth seeing, in my humble opinion.”

Lithriel snorted beneath her veil but fortunately, held her tongue. The Amorran jerked his head toward the wagon, and one of his men followed him over to the wagon. Theuderic didn’t dismount but urged his horse around so he could keep an eye on the two men. The six royal guards waited for him to nod his approval before they moved aside to permit the Amorrans access to the treasure.

With the practiced air of a man who’d searched many a cart for contraband before, the commander drew his knife and slashed through the rough canvas. Theuderic knew better than to protest. He simply watched in amused silence as the man realized that the chests under the canvas were locked. The Amorran’s discomfiture was increased when the two archbishops, curious about what was delaying their entrance into the city, rode up on their mules and immediately began vigorously protesting this unseemly violation of Church property.

Theuderic dug into his pouch, found the key, and held it out before him.

The bridge commander, discovering that two outraged archbishops in full tongue were considerably more intimidating than the sight of two old men on mules in the distance, was quick to seize upon the opportunity to retreat from the prelates.

“You’re not having us on about the silver, are you?”

“No, I am not. Nor about the archbishops either, as I believe you have discovered, my good man. Or the lady elf. Now, am I correct in assuming that you have no authority to let us pass?”

“You are correct, sir.”

“The correct form of address is ‘You are correct, my lord comte,’ but we shall let that pass. May I ask your name, Commander?”

“Paetinus Alvus, my lord, ah, my lord comte.”

“Well, Alvus, I have a plan. Since I suspect you have no idea where to even begin finding the individual with the necessary authority to permit us to enter the city, and you probably have no more desire to watch over thirty armed men than the archbishops and I have of sitting here for the remainder of the afternoon staring at your lovely bridge, I suggest a compromise. Why don’t you and several of your men escort myself, the archbishops, the nuns, and the silver to the Sanctal palace, where you can transfer the dilemma of this decision to a churchman of sufficient rank, if not to the Sanctified Father himself? I will give you my word that my men will wait here, more or less patiently, until they are given permission to enter by someone whose orders will be accepted.”

Alvus’s face screwed up with concern. “I’m not sure…”

“The alternative, of course, is that I simply turn around and ride away with the silver and a clear conscience. I have fulfilled my obligation in delivering the scot to the city. If the Sanctified Father and the Church won’t acccept this offering from His Majesty, well, I suspect I could find some use for it.”

“Of course they’ll accept it!” Alvus looked alarmed. “You can’t simply ride off with it after coming all this way!”

“I don’t see that you leave me any choice.” Theuderic nodded to the Amorran and began to back his horse toward where he would have room to turn it around. “As much as I have enjoyed our little conversation, Paetinus Alvus, I shall leave you to begin thinking about your explanation to the Sanctified Father, or more likely, to the ever-curious Congregation for the Doctrine of the True Faith concerning where the Church’s silver has gone and why you sent it away.”

Alvus went pale at the mention of the holy inquisitors. Theuderic could almost see the calculations taking place inside the man’s head. What was more likely to prove problematic for him: whomever was in charge of the city guards knowing that he’d let someone over the bridge, or the Church thinking he’d permitted a stranger to steal three hundred pounds of its silver?

“Fear not those who can kill the body, but rather those who can kill the soul.” Theuderic helpfully reminded the Amorran of a heuristic he had always found considerably more poetic than applicable to his own life.

“Wait!” Alvus cried before Theuderic had even managed to turn his horse about. “I will bring you to the palace! If you’ll only order your footmen to stay here until you send for them, I’ll even see that they’re given bread and cheese while they wait. But I’ll have to accompany you alone. I’ve got the only horse.”

“The archbishops and I should much appreciate your company, friend Alvus. I’m sure we need not fear being waylaid under your protection.” Theuderic did not permit himself so much as a grin as he waved to the man driving the wagon, indicating that he should come forward. “And if you would arrange to see that my men are provided with a bit of wine as well, I don’t believe it would be taken amiss.”

Once broken, it seemed the Amorran dam gushed plentifully. After mounting his horse, Paetinus Alvus rode alongside him and showed no hesitation to answer his questions to the best of his ability.

It seemed that one of the leading lights of the empire’s ruling council had been murdered by another council member, which would not have been of any great significance were it not for the fact that both men controlled massive family armies each comparable to the size of the king’s royal forces. It was little wonder that the Amorran council had never evolved into a monarchy, not when its nobles were permitted to wield such power.

The new restrictions on foreigners were somehow a consequence of this murderous political struggle, which Theuderic was given to understand had been ongoing for more than a decade. The garbled version Guermont had received from the northbound traveler made a little more sense now, as it appeared that the murdered man had been a champion of giving imperial citizenship to the occupied provinces, a policy that looked to have died with him. His murder, and its subsequent justification by the council, had given violent offense to the nobles of the provinces, and many of them were now known or rumored to be in open revolt against the council, if not necessarily the empire itself.

It was all very complicated and legalistic, which was to say, characteristically Amorran, and Theuderic despaired of attempting to understand it well enough to explain it to the Haut Conseil when he returned in the spring. He decided to take an optimistic attitude toward the affair and assume it would sort itself out before his departure.

Recent events within the Church were rather easier to follow, at least to the extent they were explicable to anyone outside the internecine battles that took place within the hierarchy. The new Sanctiff was from one of the usual noble families, but he was younger than usual and, prior to his elevation to the Sacred College three years ago, had spent his archbishopric in the provinces, thus rendering him somewhat of an enigma within the city. It was eminently clear that in Amorr, the difference between a man of the city and a man from anywhere else in the empire was nearly as vast as the difference between noble and commoner in Savondir.

Unlike the archbishops who now leaned in to hear the guard tell the tale, Theuderic had little interest in the man presently sitting on the Sanctal throne. He was rather more interested to hear of the murders that had helped put the young celestine on that throne. Mainly because murders by magic were nearly unheard of in Savondir, where its use was actively embraced. For anything of the sort to occur in a place so viciously anti-magic as Amorr was simply astonishing!

He was still marveling at the news of these peculiar and untimely killings when he saw they were approaching the city walls of Amorr. They stood some seventy piedz high, and while they didn’t have the benefit of the mountainous terrain helping secure them, thanks to the Amorran legions scattered around the empire they were effectively as impregnable as the walls of Malkan. No enemy had ever forced them, and it seemed impossible to imagine that any ever would.

Nor had the Amorrans relaxed their guard over the centuries. Their reputation for rigid discipline appeared to be well merited. Unlike the larger walled cities in Savondir, a rigid undeveloped zone was strictly maintained, preventing the houses and other buildings of the exurbs through which they had ridden from piling up against the walls. It looked as if a spell had been cast recently, flattening everything in a concentric ring.