actually.’
‘Naturally.’ She put her dagger away. ‘You didn’t have to be so rough,
though.’
‘I can put you back into exactly the same condition as you were when you
came in, if you’d like.’
‘No. That’s quite all right, Mirtai.’ He said it very quickly and backed
away from her. Then; always the opportunist, he sidled up to Alcan. ‘Don’t
you feel sorry for me?’ he asked in an insinuating voice. ‘Kalten!’ Mirtai
snapped. ‘No!’
‘I was only -‘ She smacked him sharply on the nose with two fingers, much
as one would do to persuade a puppy to give up the notion of chewing on a
pair of shoes. That hurt,’ he protested putting his hand to his nose. ‘It
was meant to. Leave her alone.’
‘Are you going to let her do that, Sparhawk?’ Kalten appealed to his
friend. do as she says,’ Sparhawk told him. ‘Leave the girl alone.’
‘your morning’s not going too well, is it, Sir Kalten?’ Stragen noted.
Kalten went off to a corner to sulk. The others drifted in, and they all
sat down to the breakfast two crewmen brought from the galley. Princess
Danae sat alone near the large window at the stern where the salt-tinged
breeze would keep the smell of pork sausage from her delicate nostrils.
After breakfast, Sparhawk and Kalten went up on deck for a breath of air
and stood leaning on the port rail watching the south coast of Cammoria
slide by. The day was particularly fine. The sun was very bright, and the
sky very blue. There was a good following breeze, and their ship, her white
sails spread wide, led the small flotilla across the white-cap-speckled
sea. ‘The captain says that we should pass Miruscum about noon,’ Kalten
said. ‘We’re making better time –than we expected.’
‘We’ve got a good breeze,’ Sparhawk agreed. ‘How’s your back?’
‘Sore. I’ve got bruises from my hips to my neck.’
‘At least you’re standing up straight.’ Kalten grunted sourly. ‘Mirtai’s
very direct, isn’t she? I still don’t know exactly what to make of her.
What I mean is, how are we supposed to treat her? She’s obviously a woman.’
‘You’ve noticed.’
‘Very funny, Sparhawk. What I’m getting at is the fact that you can’t
really treat her like a woman. She’s as big as Ulath, and she seems to
expect us to accept her as a comrade in arms.’
‘So?’
‘It’s unnatural.’
‘just treat her as a special case. That’s what I do. It’s
easier than arguing with her. Are you in the mood for a bit of advice?’
‘That depends on the advice.’
‘Mirtai feels that it’s her duty to protect the royal family and she’s
extended that to include my wife’s maid. I’d strongly recommend that you
curb your instincts. We don’t fully understand Mirtai, and so we don’t know
exactly how far she’ll go. Even if Alcan seems to be encouraging you, I
wouldn’t pursue the matter. It could be very dangerous.’
‘The girl likes me,’ Kalten objected. ‘I’ve been around long enough to
know that.’
‘You might be right, but I’m not sure if that’ll make any difference to
Mirtai. Do me a favour, Kalten. Just leave the girl alone.’
‘But she’s the only one on board ship,’ Kalten protested. ‘You’ll live.’
Sparhawk turned and saw Patriarch Emban and Ambassador Oscagne standing
near the stern. They were an oddly matched pair. The Patriarch of Ucera had
laid aside his cassock for the voyage and wore instead a brown jerkin over
a plain robe. He was very nearly as wide as he was tall, and he had a
florid face. Oscagne, on the other hand, was a slight man with fine bones
and little flesh. His skin was a pallid bronze colour. Their minds,
however, were very similar. They were both consummate politicians. Sparhawk
and Kalten drifted back to join them. ‘All power comes from the throne in
Tamuli, your Grace,’ Oscagne was explaining. ‘Nothing is done there except
at the express instruction of the emperor.’
‘We delegate things in Eosia, your Excellency,’ Emban told him. ‘We pick a
good man, tell him what we want done and leave the details up to him.’
‘We’ve tried that and it doesn’t really work in our culture. Our religion
is fairly superficial, and it doesn’t encourage the kind of personal
loyalty Yours does.’
‘your emperor has to make all the decisions?’ Emban asked a bit
incredulously. ‘How does he find the time!’ Oscagne smiled. ‘No, no, your
Grace. Day-to-day decisions are all taken care of by custom and tradition.
We’re great believers in custom and tradition. It’s one of our more serious
failings. Once a Tamul moves out of those realms, he’s obliged to
improvise, and that’s when he usually gets into trouble. His improvisations
always seem to be Guided by self-interest, for some reason. We’ve
discovered that it’s best to discourage these expeditions into free
decision-making. By definition, the emperor is all-wise anyway, so it’s
probably best to leave these things in his hands.’
‘A standard definition isn’t always very accurate, your Excellency.
‘All-wise’ means different things when it’s applied to different people. We
have one ourselves. We like to say that the Archprelate is guided by the
voice’ of God. There have been a number of Archprelates in the past who
didn’t listen very well, though.’
‘We’ve noticed the same sort of thing, your Grace. The definition ‘all
wise’ does seem to have a wide range of meaning. To be honest with you, my
friend, we’ve had some frightfully stupid emperors from time to time. We’re
rather fortunate just now though. Emperor Sarabian is moderately
accomplished.’
‘What’s he like?’ Emban asked intently. ‘He’s an institution,
unfortunately. He’s as much at the mercy of custom and tradition as we are.
He’s obliged to speak in formulas, so it’s almost impossible to get to know
him.’ The ambassador smiled. ‘The visit of Queen Ehlana may just jerk him
into humanity. He’ll have to treat her as an equal – for political reasons
and he was raised to believe that he didn’t have any equals. I hope your
lovely blonde queen is gentle with him. I think I like him – or I would if
I could get past all the formalities – and it would just be too bad if she
happened to say something that stopped his heart.’
‘Ehlana knows exactly what she’s doing every minute of the day, your
Excellency,’ Emban assured him. ‘You and I are babies compared to her. You
don’t have to tell her I said that, Sparhawk.’
‘What’s my silence worth to you, your Grace?’ Sparhawk grinned. ,Emban
glowered at him for a moment. ‘What are we likely to encounter in Astel,
your Excellency?’
‘Tears, probably,’ Oscagne replied. ‘I beg your pardon?’
‘The Astels are an emotional people. They cry at the drop of a
handkerchief. Their culture is much like that of the kingdom of Pelosia.
They’re tediously devout and invincibly backward. It’s been demonstrated to
them over and over again that serfdom is an archaic, inefficient
institution, but they maintain it anyway – largely at the connivance of the
serfs themselves. Astellian nobles don’t exert themselves in any way, so
they have no concept of the extent of human endurance. Their serfs take
advantage of that outrageously. Astellian serfs have been known to collapse
from sheer exhaustion at the very mention of such unpleasant words as
‘reaping’ or ‘digging’ . The weepy nobles are tender-hearted, so the serfs
get away with it almost every time. Western Astel’s a silly place filled
with silly people. That changes as one moves east.’
‘One would hope so. I’m not certain just how much silliness I can -‘ It
was that same flicker of darkness at the very edge of Sparhawk’s vision,
and it was accompanied by that same chill. Patriarch Emban broke off
turning his head quickly to try to see it more clearly. ‘What? – ?’
‘it’ll pass,’ Sparhawk told him tersely. ‘try to concentrate on it, your
Grace, and you as well, if you don’t mind, your Excellency.’ They were’
seeing the shadow for the first time, and their initial reactions might be
useful. Sparhawk watched them closely as they tried to turn their heads to
look directly at the annoying darkmess just beyond the range of sight. Then
the shadow was gone. ‘All right,’ Sparhawk said crisply, ‘Exactly what did
you see?’
‘I couldn’t see anything,’ Kalten told him. ‘It was like having someone
trying to sneak up behind me.’ Although Kalten had seen the cloud several
times, this was the first time he had encountered the shadow. ‘What was it,
Sir Sparhawk?’ Ambassador Oscagne asked. ‘I’ll explain in a moment, your
Excellency. Please try to remember exactly what you saw and felt.’
‘It was something dark,’ Oscagne replied, ‘very dark. It seemed to be
quite substantial, but somehow it was able to move just enough to stay
where I couldn’t quite see it. No matter how quickly I turned my head or