Scion of Cyador (12 page)

“Ha! Much as told the little sneak he was spirted on cold steel-or your cuprite blades-if he cheated a copper.” Svenyr takes a long swallow of the vinegary wine.

“I believe he understands.”

“You be meeting all the ships?”

“I told Neabyl that I would be… for a time, and when I can.” Lorn pauses. “What cargoes would you like to carry that you cannot obtain?”

“Can’t say as telling you that’d cause problems with the shareholders.” The captain frowns, then worries his chin. “Always could use more dyestuffs, specially up along the northwest coast-Suthyans won’t let us land anywhere but Armat, where they tariff high. Understand folk bring carts all the way from Rulyarth. Dyestuffs are welcome elsewhere, east of Armat, or going longhaul to Austra. Bright ones. Everyone’s got brown.”

“You know about the clay and china here?”

“Is old Kahlyr still doing that?”

“His son Jahlyr.”

“Good to know.” Svenyr swallows the last of the goblet. “Oh… the other thing is good spirits.”

“You port in Cyad ever?”

“Times…” answers the captain, his voice wary.

“There’s a newer house, Ryalor House-they have some good spirits you cannot find elsewhere.”

“Hmmm…” Svenyr shrugs. “If I get there, I’ll look.”

Lorn stands. “You’ve been most patient, and I trust we will see you in Biehl again.”

“One more time, anyways. Never promise more ‘n once.” The Sligan laughs as he rises.

The two walk out into the steamy heat of the afternoon. Lorn bows before he turns and leaves the Lorava.

He rides back to the compound silently, thinking over his mistakes, and what he can do to rectify them-if he can. Some, like the grower’s daughter, he cannot.

He has little time for further thought, not after he rides in through the gates, because it is his turn to lead the sabre drills for the new recruits, and he must hasten into a training tunic and then take up a padded sabre.

By the time the drills are over, his brown training tunic is soaked, and his arms ache. So do his feet. He is so tired when he reaches his quarters that after he cleans up he can eat but half the emburhka that Daelya has prepared and left for him, and but a third of the fresh-baked bread.

After eating he makes his way to his study, and sinks into the chair, sitting in the twilight.

With a deep breath, he takes out the chaos-glass and concentrates, seeking out the olive-grower Baryat who, Lorn is convinced from his use of the chaos-glass, is hatching some plot against him. Baryat is still at table, stuffing in large quantities of some sort of casserole, and Lorn lets the image slip. He will try later.

He takes out paper, and dips the pen before he begins to write.

Dearest of Consorts-

I have not heard yet from you, but I trust all is well with you and with those around you…

We have recruited almost a squad of younger men for the lancers, and have begun training them… be a long summer, I fear, but many show skill already… and I hope to have them ready for duty elsewhere by fall, though that decision will be made by others…

…might consider the possibility of sending dyestuffs through coasters or those traders who are welcome in the Suthyan port of Rulyarth… understand that many there would purchase… but cannot obtain dyestuffs, because the Suthyans insist all dyes come through the larger port of Armat… while I know not how a trading house might avoid this proscription, save through landing at nearby ports… it would appear that those who could might profit…

Lorn takes a deep breath and once more dips the pen. He can but hope that what he has gleaned from the ship’s master and those factors he has visited around Biehl will prove useful to Ryalth.

After he finishes, he must again seek out Baryat-and perhaps Neabyl-with the glass. And tired as he is, he must continue to work on seeking out lands he has not seen before, either in the glass or in person.

XXI

Chyenfel and Rynst stand alone in the high-ceilinged audience chamber of the
Palace
of
Eternal Light
, waiting for the Emperor Toziel to appear. Bluoyal has yet to join them, as is often the case in recent eightdays.

The First Magus looks at Rynst and murmurs, “The sleep wards will be ready within less than half a season. At that time, but a few lancers will be needed around the
Accursed
Forest
, as we had discussed earlier.”

“What about patrolling the walls themselves?” asks the Majer-Commander in an equally muted voice. “Will not some protection be required for the new wards?”

Chyenfel shakes his head, smiling. “No. That is their beauty. These wards cannot be seen nor touched.”

“While I would be most pleased to be able to send more lancers to the north, I must question this sudden announcement. Why did the ancients not attempt such? Did they not know of such?” Doubt colors Rynst’s voice.

“They did.” Chyenfel purses his lips, then tilts his head slightly, as if searching for an explanation. “Their words provided the knowledge and the keys to the sleep wards. Yet they feared that the wards would not work, and that the chaos-towers would be lost forever.”

“And you know more than they?”

“We have learned some that they did not know, honored Majer-Commander.” Chyenfel smiles briefly. “They had less experience with chaos, for chaos works not the same in the worlds of the Rational Stars. That we do know from what they wrote.”

“And,” adds Rynst with a gentle laugh, “you will lose the towers shortly in any event if naught is done. So you of the Magi’i have little to lose.”

“We lose more by providing the sleep wards, for we will not be able to provide as many charges for the firelances of your lancers, nor for the firewagons and the tow wagons of the
Great
Canal
… and many will fault us for such. That alone should tell you that we act in the best interests of all Cyador, and not just of the Magi’i.”

“That tells me that you have the best interests of Cyador at heart. You and the fourth magus.” Rynst’s words are low, careful.

“Is that why you watch the overcaptain in Biehl?” asks Chyenfel. “Do you think the son shares the honesty of the father?”

“He is more honest than most. Perhaps more honest than his peer Rustyl.” Rynst smiles, watching for a reaction he does not get. “The overcaptain has begun to rebuild the garrison and the compound, without a word from me.”

“He will face difficulties with the enumerators Bluoyal has suborned,” suggests Chyenfel. “And with the golds our Merchanter Advisor does not receive.”

“The senior enumerator has vanished, as I am certain you already know,” Rynst points out. “And the overcaptain trains new lancers with his full payroll-or so I have heard.”

“Bluoyal and the Emperor will not question such a ‘disappearance’?”

“The Emperor may not discover such for a time, unless Bluoyal tells him or his consort, and that would lead to questions Bluoyal would best wish to avoid,” replies Rynst.

“Yet you would let the overcaptain train his own Mirror Lancers? Would he dream of being… ?”

“He is young.”

“That did not halt Alyiakal, as I recall.”

“I think the overcaptain is not cast from that mold, but we shall see. Biehl provides a safe… distance for observation.”

“And from Cyad,” suggests Chyenfel.

“Have you not done the same with Rustyl?” asks Rynst.

“Like a good lancer officer, a good adept must see and do much throughout Cyador,” replies Chyenfel. “Your overcaptain has seen little but fighting, and there is more to Cyador than fighting outlanders.”

“And more than manipulating chaos,” Rynst says smoothly. “He will learn trade in Biehl, as you well know.”

“You’d best find him a consort,” suggests Chyenfel.

“Although little has been said,” says Rynst with a smile, “you know, as do I, that he has already found one. Not that he will he have much leisure to enjoy such, with what he attempts.”

“He is young,” observes the First Magus, his eyes flicking to the harbor. “Very young, even for his years.”

“You worry about his consort, though he is but a lancer?” Rynst watches the First Magus.

“Since he is a lancer, the worries are yours.” Chyenfel’s voice is firm and certain. He smiles. “You are rather fickle, are you not, Rynst? I thought that your favorite was the majer in Assyadt, the one your Captain-Commander has cultivated and placed so carefully.”

“In the Mirror Lancers, an officer faces far more dangers. One must develop many successors. Then… one may survive who has the training and the talents. As you pointed out, not all of those possible successors have the same patrons or goals.” Rynst closes his mouth as the rear doors of the chamber open and as Bluoyal hurries toward them to wait for the arrival of the Emperor and his consort.

XXII

Lorn sits at the desk in his personal quarters, looking down at the glass as he has done so many evenings before. It has been nearly an eightday since the Sligan vessel ported and departed, and but a single coaster has shown up since-and no larger vessels.

Still… it will take time for the word to spread, and longer yet for masters and traders to take risks, for they tend to trust little that is not certain. Lorn frowns, thinking about trust. In the end, is trade based as much upon trust as the value of the goods? He laughs. Another simple question with a simple answer. Of course it is, for no trader can verify in advance the true value of all goods. They may be poorly made within; or good grain may surround poor, good cotton be wrapped over that of lesser quality.

With a deeper breath, Lorn looks back down at the glass, concentrating and seeking Baryat yet again.

When the silver mists swirl and part, the image shows the grower talking to a tall and thin man wearing gray and a black leather vest, who holds a bow. Lorn frowns. Archers-good archers-can kill without being visible. Lorn understands the grower’s concern or anger, but he wonders again how much is grief over a missing daughter and how much is anger and fear over the loss of golds and possible discovery of past bribes. While Lorn remains troubled over the woman’s death, he has seen enough to know that all too many in Cyador do not value daughters over golds. Even that observation troubles him, true as he knows it to be.

Lorn’s eyes drop as he considers the trade laws of Cyador that Baryat has already violated. It has taken Lorn almost the entire eightday to read the copy of the tariffs and laws he has borrowed from Neabyl and to find the sections which apply to Baryat. Those laws are most clear. One who bribes an enumerator can lose all his lands, and his life. Lorn’s problem is simple, however. He cannot prove such bribery, nor who bribed whom. The reaction of the Sligan ship master, however, was yet another confirmation of Flutak’s corruption.

As for the grower Baryat, Lorn may be able to prove that Baryat has hired a mercenary to kill him-a different offense, and also punished by death.

Finally, he shrugs. Tomorrow, he will act. There is little he can do at the moment that would further what he intends.

He takes a sip of the water in the mug, then shifts the larger sheets of paper so they are beside his right hand before he refocuses his concentration upon the chaos-glass once more.

When the image-that of a farm valley with a road along the ridge to the west-appears, Lorn looks from the image in the glass to the paper beside him on the quarters’ desk, slowly drawing in the course of the stream, and the position of the hamlet that lies a good hundred kays west of Jera, nearly on the edge of the Hills of Endless Grass.

In nearly five eightdays of working with the glass daily-mainly in the evenings, he has developed both a series of maps, and a growing concern about the barbarian depredations. There are no Mirror Lancer outposts along the northwest coast of
Cyador-not west of Biehl, in any case. Inividra is the closest main outpost to Biehl, and it lies a good two hundred kays east-southeast of Lorn’s compound.

In the recent past, the Jeranyi barbarian attacks have been directed more at those sections of Cyador where the Grass Hills are narrow and more passable. The very ruggedness of that part of the Grass Hills that lies east of Biehl has been protection enough-that, and the fact that there is even less for raiders to seize that is close to the Grass Hills.

Lorn pushes away those thoughts for the moment, and concentrates on transferring what he is seeing to the map he is creating.

When the knives begin to jab into his eyes once more, he sets aside the glass, and stands, pacing around the small study of his quarters. As time has passed, he has become more adept, and can use the glass longer, but the end result is always the same. Or is that because he pushes until he reaches that point?

He pauses in his pacing to take yet another sip from the mug.

XXIII

In the early morning light that fills the commander’s study, as he waits for Helkyt to appear, Lorn reads through the Emperor’s Code once more-the lines of the tariff and administrative laws. He shakes his head in wonderment. While he had known that Juist had acted as a justicer for the communities north of the
Accursed
Forest
, he had not realized that the Emperor’s Code bestowed that right upon the senior Mirror Lancer officer in any district. And Lorn is the senior-and only officer-within two hundred kays.

Could he have used the Code against Flutak? Hardly, because he would have needed hard evidence of the kind he didn’t have, and wouldn’t have had, assuming he had survived Flutak’s attempts to kill him, since Lorn had no doubts that Flutak would have stopped with one attempt.

“Ser?” Helkyt peers into Lorn’s study. “You ever sleep, ser?”

“Enough, Helkyt, enough.” Lorn pauses. “We need to pay the olive-grower Baryat a visit.”