White Pagan, page 59
part #6 of Kestrel Harper Saga Series
“We may have no choice. We will approach Gamal, discuss the sharing of arms and militia…do likewise with Cordash if we must.”
“We came to their aid during Neth’s torments; they would be wise to return the favor,” Diona agreed, despite her reluctance for war.
“Wisdom may have little to do with it.” Wisdom and intention could not rout the Yellow Death.
Fen scratched his bearded chin. “Perhaps the Prime Magistrate will join in a blockade to sail towards Glevum, a show of solidarity?”
“Perhaps.”
Since the days of the last Elyri Persecution more than twenty years hence, the tiny island sovereignty had built an ample naval fleet under first Gabrielle and then Piran’s direction. With the aid of Enesfel and Elyriá for lumber, and Hatu for the expertise in shipbuilding, eighteen ships now patrolled the Bay of Phállá, protecting sea traffic from brigands. In exchange, the Prime Magistrate signed treaties with each of those kingdoms, the first of their kind in Káliel’s history, which allowed increased trade and consent for those ships to dock at any port required to restock supplies and manpower. It meant foreigners were now welcome on the once isolationist islands, allowing an exchange of culture unheard of as far back as the Sovereignties history stretched.
Merrek believed his Uncle Piran would aid him if asked.
“General, assemble the council, the advisors. We will speak with them at once. My Lady,” he bowed to Diona and took her hands. “You will join us and make effort to negotiate with Inness?”
“I shall.” She lacked confidence in her chances of success, but she had to try.
Sighing, Merrek went to the woman huddled against the wall and though he offered a hand to assist her up, Asta shook her head and rose on her own. “I mourn your losses, Asta; if we may help…”
“I want the heads of those responsible,” she said icily, not caring whose head that meant. She wanted blood, wanted vengeance, wanted peace in her head and heart. She wanted verification from Onea’s spies that it was true, not a rumor of hearsay with vague, unsubstantiated details. She would have none of those things until whoever had robbed her of her life, her husband, her eldest son, was brought to justice. Words spoken, she stalked from the room, and Fen, after an apologetic bow to the queen and prince-regent, hastened after her in the hopes of preventing any violent outburst or action that might be brewing.
Diona rubbed her eyes and sighed. The thought of what fate might await her daughter if she did not stand Neth’s armies down, was a painful one but she did not fault her cousin for wishing it if Inness was involved in the deaths of the de Corrmicks. If their places were reversed, Diona would seek the same retribution, no matter who the guilty party turned out to be.
***
Níkóá frowned as the last of the day’s crowd shuffled away with the meager rations of grain he could offer clutched to their chests. The soldiers gathered around the platform were there under orders of the queen in case a riot broke out over food, or the inadequacy of it. But the thin crowd of faded, skeletal forms was too weak and broken to fight. Each week that passed brought more death until it appeared that Rhidam would be left with none upon which to rebuild. This day, the crowd appeared no smaller than the last, the recorded number of recipients up by five, and the report from the ailing gdhededhá Rankin was that they had seen no new plague victims in this past week.
Some of the afflicted, like Prince Merrek, were beginning to recover, revived by what little care the gdhededhá, physicians, and healers from Elyriá offered. The chamberlain knew he was not alone in praying that the worst of the Yellow Death was behind them and that, with a healthy rainfall feeding the spring earth, there would be future food to share. Not enough, perhaps, as the number of those available to plant and harvest was low, but there was hope for the first time that recovery might be possible. Reports of similar improvement in conditions had arrived from Levonne, where Duke Cáner intended, as soon as conditions settled, to initiate a massive fishing campaign in the hopes of providing seafood to Enesfel’s population. The land needed that food, however stretched the catch might be.
That, at least, did not require waiting until an autumn harvest.
“My lord! My lord!”
It was unusual to see anyone running, given the poor health of most. Níkóá glanced at the chancellor, who shrugged, and then jumped from the platform to greet the man the protective soldiers restrained.
“What is it, sir?” he asked, waving the soldiers off. They released the man and stepped aside far enough to allow him to approach.
“I must get word to Inquisitor de Corrmick.” The fact that the title rolled easily off his tongue without reservation over the name, suggested the man was Association, though there was nothing to visibly suggest it. “The one she wants, the bard killer, I found him!”
Though skeptical, if it was true, this would be the best news any of them had received in weeks, besides the recovery of the prince and princess. “Where is he?”
“The Boar and Sow; I can take you there, but she wanted…”
“Peter, bring the inquisitors. I’ll go with him.” He was, in his own opinion, the better swordsman, the stronger fighter, while Peter was the more adept runner. The division of labor made the most sense.
Rather than argue, Peter rushed to obey. He was an obliging man by nature and took the order in stride. Both knew the Boar and Sow to be near the náós, a few streets from where the dead man was found. The area around Hes á Redh had been previously searched, every resident questioned, but that had been weeks ago. The shifting population, as the Yellow Death spread, made it difficult to keep track of everyone. If the murderer had been there this entire time, the inquisitors would be furious at having allowed him to elude capture. If the criminal was transient, however, back from wherever he had fled to after the crime, it was time to act before he moved on again.
Rushing after the informant, Níkóá asked, “How do you know it’s him?”
“k’dedhá Tusánt assures me it is.”
That was enough for Níkóá.
Despite its squalor and reputation for being an Association establishment, the Boar and Sow was one of the busiest taverns in Rhidam, visited by those traveling through on business, a hub of gossip and commerce that spidered outwards through the kingdom. The small, multi-leveled structure was situated on the main thoroughfare running from the náós to the Tegid and the bridge crossing it and stretching east towards the Llaethlágárá Mountains. Abustle with transitory traffic, only Association members who ran cons, gambling schemes, or made a living picking pockets were found there, making it less of an Association haven than many believed but enough of an attraction for them to give it a reputation.
Other Association members were wise enough to stay away, particularly when the diverse crowd and the petty thieving activity of some resulted in brawls with fists and blades that drew the attention of the Lord High Sheriff and his men. It was not the sort of place any dedhá would spend free time so if Tusánt had been there it had been to tend to the spiritual needs of the ailing or dying. These days, it was likely to be both.
“I’ll leave you to it,” squeaked the escort, leery of entering as he fidgeted and hung back in the shadows. “Was here before; it’ll look suspicious if I come back with someone like you.”
Níkóá frowned and looked at his clothes. While handsomely dressed and in better health than many, he did not think he stood out as either nobility or a member of the palace guard. He was armed, but he could be any other man, a traveler, a merchant, one of the sheriff’s men. “How will I…?”
His escort had already abandoned him, choosing neither to wait for Peter’s arrival with the inquisitors nor for any reward offered. If he was Association, he would be in touch in the future for that. If this was a trap, the chamberlain was about to find out. Níkóá straightened his tunic and sauntered into the tavern.
k'gdhededhá Tusánt was still there, leaning against the bar, speaking to the weathered sprite of a man behind it, a frail, red-faced fellow who looked to be one of the lucky few to recover after the Yellow Death finished with them. The only other person in the room was a tall, hairless fellow whose coppery skin suggested Hatuish blood or the mixed parentage of Cíbhóló and anything else. His lean glow of health revealed he had steered clear of the ravages of plague and he drank alone, near the fire, a satchel on the table at his elbow. He looked up when Níkóá entered but returned his focus to his drink, unfazed.
Brief eye contact, that of two men assessing each other, passed between Tusánt and the chamberlain, but they revealed no familiarity and the proprietor did not seem to recognize Níkóá when he leaned against the bar and requested a mug of ale. After twenty years as chamberlain, Níkóá thought everyone should know his face. He was still surprised when someone did not.
“No ale…stores are depleted…but I’ve wine if you want?” the attendant offered in a reedy, cracked voice, already pulling a tin cup from a tray behind the bar.
“Aye; a little would quench the thirst.” He waited as the wine was poured, brought it to his nose when it was served, and sniffed the bouquet. Not expensive spirits, barely aged and bitter to his nostrils, but it would be rude not to accept what little the man had to offer and so he slid his coin across the counter. “Any rooms?”
“All but one. No one’s traveling; too busy dying, or trying not to.”
Níkóá scowled. That meant the fellow at the fireside had either rented the room or someone else was here, and he had no way to be certain which would be the man he was here to apprehend.
“I can show you up if you’re interested…”
After fumbling in his pouch for more coins, Níkóá added them to the first. “Reserve one. I’m not picky, so long as it’s not infested or leaking.” The encroaching evening might bring others to board, but the shadow of death would keep many at bay for some time to come. A few coins paid for a room he would never use was no hardship.
It also presented a pretense for his being here. The k’gdhededhá offered no clues, as that would be contrary to the sanctity of confession.
Níkóá’s instinct, his Elyri intuition, suggesting the bald-pated fellow, no citizen of Enesfel, was his target, would have to be enough.
The tavern door swung open with a crash, the sort a brusque, boisterous fellow might make rather than a sound of anger or violence, and Fen staggered into the establishment, his short-legged carriage almost a waddle as he laughingly, one arm around Asta’s shoulders, made it to the bar.
“Inquisitor,” the proprietor chirped, suddenly nervous, pushing the coins Níkóá had paid him towards the stocky man. “It’s all legal, I swear. I’ve had the wine in storage for…”
“Not here for you,” Fen laughed, tossing another coin onto the pile on the counter. It rolled and Níkóá covered it with his hand to prevent it from dropping onto the muddy floor.
Asta, however, displayed nothing but intent on business, striding to the man seated by the fire after leaving Fen propped on the bar and growling, “You, sir, are coming with me.” Whatever angle Fen had been playing, it was undermined by the woman’s bluntness.
The bald fellow, hand on his blade as she approached, laughed easily, unconcerned about the small, boyish woman in men’s clothing who dared to confront him. “I think not,” he chortled.
“I am Inquisitor de Corrmick,” she hissed. “The queen demands an audience and will be obeyed.”
Níkóá, watching from the counter, absently pushed the captured coin towards the others as he noted the subtle shifts in aura and expression on the face of the man Asta confronted. Whether or not the man was guilty of murder, he was guilty of something, or knew something he was reluctant to have known. Níkóá wagered he was aware of what awaited him if a reading was forced by one of the Lachlans’ attending Elyri. When the man’s hand twitched, tightening on the sword hilt beneath it, the chamberlain acted.
Asta sensed the gesture as well. She rolled to one side, away from an intended strike, and skewered the man’s hand to the wooden table with her dagger as Níkóá’s sword stopped short of beheading their suspect. Fen, the farthest away, threw a knife that narrowly missed Níkóá’s head and embedded in the high backboard of the bench on which the target sat. The man squawked and froze, his gaze darting between the three of them. At the bar, Tusánt had departed without anyone’s notice.
“I’ve done nothing,” the man protested as Fen elbowed his way between Asta and Níkóá to scoop up the satchel from the table. “You have no grounds.” He flinched when Níkóá pulled the dagger from the wood by his head and winced again when Asta yanked her blade free from his hand. The chamberlain wrenched him to his feet.
“You stole a holy relic from Hes á Redh and murdered the man who caught you,” Fen barked.
“I stole nothing! There is no…!”
“An overheard confession is proof enough until the queen has you read and…”
Grabbing Asta’s wrist with his good hand, the bald man cut her accusation short. It was a commonly rumored belief that Elyri could extract memories, details, and confessions from a man’s head, a torturous ordeal that could kill a man if he resisted. What he did not know was that Níkóá carried that Elyri power and that the man’s hand on his bare arm, pulling it from Asta’s hand, had already opened his thoughts to the unknowing garnering of the truth.
“I stole nothing! I was charged with seeing him safely away with the package, nothing more.”
“Who?” asked Asta, as Fen growled, “That meant killing someone for interfering?”
“I was commanded to protect…”
“Who is this other you speak of?” Asta demanded again.
“I don’t know his name.”
“But you know who he is? This thief? You could identify him? Describe him?”
Hand bleeding profusely despite Fen’s effort to bind it with a dirty length of cloth the tavern proprietor provided, the captive answered, “Been following him for months but I don’t know his name…”
“Is he here? In Rhidam?” Capturing both the killer and the thief, now that they knew there were separate individuals as Asta had postulated, might help soothe some of the fury gnawing through her. They still did not know this man’s part in the plot.
“Don’t know where he’s gone. Last I saw him was outside the gates of St. Kóráhm’s.”
Inquisitors and chamberlain looked at one another. Cedric had intended to deliver the mantle to Kavan in Alberni. With the duke on a mission of his own, leaving the item in the care of the chellé hábhai would be a logical substitute. Cedric had not spoken of a partner or traveling companion, but perhaps this individual had agreed to the delivery in case Cedric failed. That did not explain Cedric’s death.
Or perhaps the stealing of the mantle, the visit to St. Kóráhm’s, and the murder were disconnected events and had nothing to do with each other. The jumbled imagery Níkóá gleaned from the man’s head showed that something had been delivered to the chellé, and this man believed it to be the relic he was following, but further proof would be needed before Níkóá would believe him.
“I will arrange a messenger to Alberni,” the chamberlain grunted. He was due to see to the welfare of Kavan’s estate, a duty he had been lax in fulfilling with the Yellow Sisters pillaging both cities. This was a duty he should see to himself. “For your sake, I hope k’gdhededhá Kesábhá supports your story…”
“There’s still Lord O’Grady’s death, and for that you are responsible.” The captive and chamberlain had not admitted to being the killer but she believed it to be true. She had not yet seen the healer’s drawing of the killer but would have this man’s room searched, his person, his pack, and proof from Ártur as soon as she dragged him before the queen and prince-regent. “We will sketch this bandit, Lord Chamberlain, so that you may send it to Alberni. A warrant shall be issued for the thief’s arrest; let’s pray this was a misunderstanding.” If k’Ádhá was with them, Tusánt might recognize the thief as well.
“Aye,” Níkóá agreed with a bowed head. He did not need a sketch. He had seen the thief’s face; it did not match the face of the man Ártur had already drawn for them. But having it in hand would hide the secret of his blood that much longer. The secret it would not keep, however, was that the thief, in all likelihood, carried the same mixed blood. An Elyri thief was as impossible to fathom as was an Elyri known to have once served the Crown as executioner. He wanted the full tale of these strange events, but getting to the heart of it would prove impossible without the mysterious burglar to question.
It might prove impossible even if they found him.
***
She was not alone. Those servants who could do so, townsfolk whom she had cared for and nursed to health, and dedhá Uwin of St. Wolson’s Faith, gathered in the manor as soon as the unfortunate news reached them. It was a constant stream of well-wishers and supplicants praying that their generous benefactor would walk amongst them once more. She was surrounded by too many to be considered alone, and yet not one of those she felt to be family were here and thus she felt alone. The closest to a family she had now were the servants who hovered and fretted and begged to be allowed to send word south, to summon her grandson, her son, or Lord Cliáth to her bedside, to sit until she faded. But Kavan would not be found in the Sovereignties, and if he was close enough, he would surely know the state of things and be with her now.
As for her son and grandson, hasty messages sent would be of little use. Either Gabrielle would recover before Piran or Merrek could come, or else she would die. Messages of death could be delivered just as easily after as before.
Unlike the plague in the south, in the north it appeared to be borne by water, of which there had been an overabundance during the past two years, when harsh torrents had fallen for days in succession, flooding fields so that nothing could grow. It contaminated drinking supplies with runoff from the mountains that had brought too much silt, stone, and debris with it. Something in that water, or perhaps in the water falling from the sky, brought with it boils, fever, and coughing that most often led to the death of its victims. Keeping the food supply dry, avoiding rot and mildew, was an ongoing challenge. Every drink of water came with the risk of contagion.
