Intrigues (41 page)

"I doubt if it's wise, but it will probably turn out to be necessary," Vallant answered Rion with a sigh. "If those people have a grudge against us, we need to know it before the fire starts fallin' on our heads. And we'll have to get our people out of harm's way, just as we did near the border to Astinda."

"And if there
isn't
any devastation in Gracely, we need to know that as well," Jovvi pointed out. "Someone made our people believe that they were destroying the countryside the way they'd been ordered to do. I can't fault them for not wanting to be destroyed or getting into a war to stop the destruction, but the course they chose bothers me. They could have put the nobles under control and kept them somewhere out of the way after freeing the bound members of the army, but the manipulators didn't do that. They left innocent people as slaves, and simply convinced the nobles that they were victors. I'd like to know why that was done."

"And if we don't like their answers, we can talk it over with them," Tamrissa said with a smile that was a bit on the grim side. "But there's something else we have to do before we continue on to Gracely. We have to check out that Bastions place Rengan mentioned, to see if his loyal supporters are still there. Whether or not they are, we ought to check out the rest of the neighborhood for those missing nobles. Remember, the more of them we leave running around loose, the more of a headache we'll be making for ourselves."

"Yes, that truth hasn't changed," Jovvi agreed with a sigh. "The authority they represent is no longer real, but troublemakers can rally around their symbol and force us to counter them. But if we can find enough of them, they can be the ones to help the former captives get back to the city under the guidance of the Astindans. Our own people can continue on with us."

"And our gatherin' up those loose ends will give the people here some extra time to recover before they have to get back on the road," Vallant pointed out, mostly to a disturbed Lorand. "We'll also collect all the horses, coaches, and carriages we can along with wagons and supplies, so most if not all of them will actually get to the city alive. After that the Astindans can send the nobles on their way."

"So you
have
allied yourselves with our enemies," Henich Rengan said suddenly in disgust, reminding them that he was still there. "Obviously the foolish Ruhl didn't lie about everything, but I wish he had. Even peasant rabble should know something about loyalty."

"Loyalty to what?" Vallant demanded, this time beating Tamrissa to the commenting. "To the useless fools who started the war with Astinda, causin' more death and horror than I ever want to see again? It's those useless fools who are now makin' up for what they did, and the Astindans are our allies, just as they should have been all along. You still think you can do anythin' you damn well please because of an accident of birth, but you'll surely learn better. Rion, get them out of here, please."

"With pleasure," Rion answered, and then the four former nobles were stumbling out in the same way they'd arrived. Rengan's eyes had narrowed with disturbance and his son Vodan appeared shaken, but the other two simply continued to look miserable. Those last two were the ones who bothered Vallant the most, but at least the Astindans would treat them fairly. Which was probably more than their own father would have done for them…

"It looks like we'll be traveling again tomorrow," Lorand said as he stood and stretched, obviously trying to appear casual instead of disturbed. "I think I'll see about getting something to eat, pay a visit afterward to the bath house, and then go to bed early. Anyone interested in joining me?"

Jovvi was the first to accept his offer, but the rest of them weren't far behind her. And Jovvi was the best one to sooth Lorand's mind about the necessity for gathering up whatever nobles were still running around loose. Vallant knew the odds were good that the innocent would be caught along with the guilty, but as he followed the others out of the room he also knew that that consideration couldn't keep them from doing the rounding up. The pendulum was now swinging back, and those who had been privileged would now find out what the other side of life was like.

But a small part of Vallant wished that he and his Blendingmates weren't the only ones who could make that happen. Switching off with someone else would have made it all so much easier…

Chapter 23

Lorand noticed that it was not yet noon when he and the others reached the area where the hidden nobles were supposed to be. There were quite a few houses in the area, so their "haul" ought to be respectable. He still felt uncomfortable with the idea of hunting people down and had spoken to Jovvi about it for quite a while the night before. But it was talking to Vallant that had eased his mind to some extent, since Vallant felt much the same way
he
did about gathering up escaped nobles. Jovvi looked at the matter more the way Tamrissa did, but since they were both women that was perfectly understandable…

"That noble's idea of a day's march is almost half a day's ride," Rion observed to everyone in general. "No wonder those people were ready to fall over."

"Most of the houses we passed had people in them," Tamrissa said, also offering an observation. "How are we going to find the house we want first, the one with Rengan's 'associates'?"

"The house called Bastions should be the one over there," Vallant answered her, pointing toward a mansion sitting on a gentle knoll in the near distance. "I had Jovvi question Rengan again, and he knew more about the location of the place than he admitted at first. He had to answer any question put to him, but holdin' back on what we needed to know but didn't ask about wasn't disallowed."

"It is now," Jovvi put in, annoyance flashing in her eyes. "I should have known better than to allow him that loophole, but you all know how I hate to control people. From now on I'll pay closer attention."

"I've been paying closer attention myself, but to the weather," Lorand put in as he glanced at the sky again. "It's going to be raining in a couple of hours, so let's not waste any time getting to that house and looking around. As it is, some of the rest of our people might not make it before those clouds open up."

"They're ridin' in groups of ten, but not all strung out," Vallant supplied in a supportive way. "Just because we didn't want to make noticin' us easy doesn't mean some of them are an hour behind us. They're mostly only a few minutes away, so they ought to get to shelter in plenty of time."

Lorand nodded to acknowledge the information, even though he'd known it well enough even before Vallant had spoken. The ride had been a pleasant one in spite of the threatening rain, but there was something disturbing Lorand that he just couldn't put his finger on. The closer they got to that house, the more the disturbance seemed to grow…

Vallant had begun to lead them forward again, and Lorand simply rode with the others as he tried to figure out what could be bothering him. The area was lovely, the temperature was comfortable, the humidity wasn't excessive even with the coming rain, the birds -

"Stop!" Lorand called, not realizing that he hadn't been the only one to speak until after the word was out. Both Jovvi and Naran had said the same thing at the same time, and that made the others pull their mounts to a halt.

"What's wrong?" Tamrissa asked, looking from one to the other of them with concern. "Have you discovered that we're going the wrong way?"

"Something's going to happen," Naran said, her expression disturbed as her inner sight examined images invisible to the rest of them. "There's a lot of … roiling and I can't quite make out the details, but something is definitely about to happen."

"Possibly that something will happen because we aren't alone out here," Jovvi added, her own gaze on the woods to the left. "We seem to have quite a lot of company."

"I noticed that too, right after I noticed that the birds were too quiet," Lorand put in his own bit as he stared in the same direction Jovvi did. "There's a large number of people in the trees over there, and I really don't think they're looking for berries and nuts."

Vallant seemed about to say something, but that was when the people in the woods chose to show themselves. The first of them stepped out from behind trees with the rest following, and Lorand felt immediate shock. Those who had lurked in the woods came out in pairs and groups of pairs, with a man behind holding someone in front of him by his arm around the front person's neck. The one behind also held a knife, and a large number of those being held were women.

"Now you've got a problem, don't you?" one of the men holding a hostage called, heavy amusement in his voice. "If you don't give yourselves up to us we'll kill these people and then disappear, and their deaths will be all
your
fault. Are you going to let innocent people die in your place?"

"I'll bet you believed those nobles when they told you how easy it would be to capture us," Tamrissa called back, saying just what Lorand had been thinking. "They dangled silver or gold in front of you, and the sight of it turned their every word true. Well, just remember that when you don't have hostages any longer, because as soon as you release them they're going to run away as fast as they can."

"The only way they'll be released is when they're dead," the same man countered, still highly amused. "You're not very good at bluffing, girl, so why don't you just keep silent and let men discuss what has to be - Yow!"

The man's shout of pain was echoed and accompanied by the same from every man holding a hostage. At the same time all the hostages were released, which told Lorand that Tamrissa had used Fire magic to free them. The former hostages did indeed start to run at once, and were quickly out of the easy reach of their captors.

"Maybe I'm not very good at bluffing because I wasn't bluffing," Tamrissa told the man who was no longer amused. "And now that I've … said my piece, you can have the next conversation with a man."

"Me, for instance," Rion took over, smiling as those who tried to chase after their captives ran into an invisible wall. "I don't speak quite as forcefully as Tamrissa does, but my efforts are usually adequate."

"And so are mine," Lorand put in, reaching to all the men but the one who had spoken. There was a total of twenty-five in the group, and twenty-four of the men suddenly became very sleepy. Lorand hadn't been sure he had the strength to affect twenty-four people at once, but the attempt became effortless as additional strength suddenly flowed into him. He knew at once where the strength came from, of course, and finally understood why Tamrissa had been upset by the experience.

"But
my
efforts are a good deal more gentle," Jovvi said as the men Lorand had touched folded silently to the ground. "I'd like you to tell us who you are and what you hoped to accomplish. Surely you didn't really think we could be taken
that
easily?"

"I'm Isbirn Gelin, leader of this group," the only man left standing replied at once, still rubbing his arm as he glanced around. "The life of an outlaw is usually a good one in this empire, as long as you know enough to stay away from the nobility. What we were trying to do was earn some extra silver the easy way, by seeing to a chore for one of the nobles. And why
shouldn't
you have been that easy to take? If your bosses sent you way out here, you can't be very important."

"You still haven't told me what that chore you agreed to do is all about," Jovvi said, and some of the gentleness was gone from her voice. "That means you were supposed to kill us, doesn't it."

"No, we were only supposed to kill you as a last resort," the husky Gelin replied, gesturing with one hand. "The noble told us that you'd probably be stupid enough to trade yourselves for our hostages, especially if they were mostly women. Once we made you our prisoners we were supposed to kill the hostages anyway, and then take you to Gan Garee. By the time we got there, the noble expected to be in a position to do some bargaining."

"I'm still havin' trouble followin' this," Vallant put in with a frown. "I could tell that you were no more than a Low talent when you tried to use your Water magic, so chances are good that your men aren't much better in their own aspects. With that bein' so, can you explain how you expected to capture six High talents with another sixty of the same not far behind them?"

"But … You can't be High talents," Gelin protested, his skin going pale enough to notice. "The noble said you would be nothings, out here doing the dirty work your higher-ups didn't want to bother with. Who would send High talents all the way out here to check on which houses have been recently used?"

"So that's what he told you we were out here for," Tamrissa said with a very unladylike snort. "And you believed
that
right along with the rest. Didn't it once occur to you to wonder why a noble would want us if we were that unimportant? If he was going to use us in his bargaining, we had to have
some
value."

"Maybe to the people who sent you, but not necessarily to anyone else," Gelin replied with a shrug. "The noble said that the new Seated Blending peasants were soft-headed instead of being practical, so he probably could have done a good trade. But that doesn't explain how he expected us to be able to capture High talents, does it?"

"That little mystery might explain something else, though," Naran put in thoughtfully. "The noble might have been high in the old government the way that army man Rengan said, but that doesn't have to mean he knows more about High talents and Blendings than anyone else. Rengan actually worked with Highs, but still knew almost nothing about them."

"That's an excellent point," Rion agreed at once. "We also must remember that our predecessors used Lows and ordinary Middles to do things for them, so that noble may have assumed we would do likewise.
He
considers Highs too dangerous to be involved with, and so might naturally assume that we would also avoid them whenever possible."

"Actually, that makes excellent sense," Vallant agreed with his own thoughtful expression. "It's stupid to keep throwin' away tools like the army and this bunch here, but it becomes less stupid if you realize that the man doesn't know what he's doin' for lack of complete information."