muted grey. ‘Who was he?’ Ehlana’s eyes were like flint. ‘It’s not really
important, your Majesty,’ Alcan replied, looking slightly embarrassed.
‘Yes, Alcan,’ Ehlana disagreed, ‘it is.’
‘It was Count Osril, your Majesty. ‘I’ve heard of him.’ Ehlana’s tone was
frosty. ‘So have I.’ Melidere’s tone was just as cold. ‘I gather that the
Count’s reputation is unsavoury?’ Sephrenia asked. ‘He’s what’s’ referred
to as a rake, Lady Sephrenia,’ Melidere replied. ‘He wallows in debauchery
of the worst kind. He boasts that he’s saving God all the inconvenience of
condemning him, since he was born to go to hell anyway.’
‘My parents were country people,’ Alcan continued, ‘so they didn’t know
about the count’s reputation. They thought that placing me in service to
him would give me the opportunity of a lifetime. It’s the only real chance
a peasant has for advancement. I was fourteen and very innocent. The count
seemed friendly at first, and I considered myself lucky. Then he came home
drunk one night, and I discovered why he’d been so nice to me. I hadn’t
received the kind of training Mirtai had, so there was nothing I could do.
I cried afterward, of course, but all he did was laugh at my tears.
Fortunately, nothing came of it. Count Osril customarily turned pregnant
maids out with nothing but the clothes on their backs. After a few times,
he grew tired of the game. He paid me my salary and gave me a good
recommendation. I was fortunate enough to find employment at the palace.’
She smiled a tight, hurt little smile. ‘Since there were no after-effects,
I suppose it doesn’t really matter all that much. ‘
‘It does to me,’ Mirtai said bleakly. ‘You have my word that he won’t
survive my return to Cimmura by more than a week.’
‘if you’re going to take that long, you’ll miss your chance, Mirtai,’
Kalten told her almost casually. ‘Count Osril won’t see the sunset of the
day when I get back to Cimmura, I promise you.’
‘He won’t fight you, Kalten,’ Sparhawk told his friend. ‘He won’t have any
choice,’ Kalten replied. ‘I know any number of insults that no man can
swallow – and if they don’t work, I’ll start slicing pieces off him. If you
cut off a man’s ears and nose, he almost has to reach For his sword probably
because he doesn’t know what you plan to cut off next.’
‘You’ll get arrested.’
‘That’s no problem, Sparhawk,’ Ehlana said, grimly. ‘I’ll pardon him.’
‘You don’t have to do that, Sir Kalten,’ Alcan murmured, her eyes downcast.
‘Yes,’ Kalten replied in a stony voice, ‘as a matter of fact, I do. I’ll
bring you one of his ears after I’ve finished with him – just to prove that
I’ve kept my promise.’ Sparhawk fully expected the gentle girl to react
with violent revulsion to her protector’s brutal offer. She did not,
however. She smiled warmly at Sparhawk’s friend. ‘That would be very nice,
sir Kalten,’ she said. ‘Go ahead, Sephrenia,’ Sparhawk said to his tutor.
‘Roll your eyes and sigh. I might even agree with you this time.’
‘Why should I do that, Sparhawk?’ she asked. ‘I think Sir Kalten’s come up
with a very appropriate course of action.’
‘You’re a savage, little mother,’ he accused. ‘So?’
Later that afternoon, Sparhawk and Kalten had joined the other knights in
the gleaming great hall of the counterfeit Elene castle. The knights had
put aside their fOrmal armour and now wore doublets and hose. ‘It wouldn’t
take very much,’ Sir Bevier was saying. ‘The walls are really very sturdy,
and the fosse is already in place. The drawbridge is functional, though the
capstans that raise it need some grease. All we really need to finish it
off are sharpened stakes in the fosse.’
‘And a few barrels of pitch?’ Ulath suggested. ‘I know how much you
Arcians enjoy pouring boiling pitch on people.’
‘Gentlemen,’ Vanion said disapprovingly, ‘if you start reinforcing the
defences of this place, our hosts may take it the wrong way.’ He thought
about it for a moment. ‘It might not hurt to quietly lay in a goodly supply
of stakes, though,’ he added, ‘and maybe a number of barrels of lamp-oil.
It’s not quite as good as pitch, but it won’t attract so much attention
when we bring it inside. I think we might also want to start unobtrusively
bringing in provisions. There are quite a lot of us, so concealing the fact
that we’re filling storerooms shouldn’t be too hard. Let’s keep it all
fairly low-key, though.’
‘What are you contemplating, Vanion?’ Emban asked. ‘just a few simple
precautions, your Grace. Things are unstable here in Tamuli, and we have no
way of knowing what might happen. Since we’ve got a perfectly good castle,
we might just as well give it a few finishing touches – just in case.’
‘is it just my imagination, or does it seem to anybody else that this is a
very, very long summer,’ Tynian asked suddenly. Sparhawk became very alert.
Someone had been bound to notice that eventually, and if they really
pursued the matter and started counting days, they’d be certain to uncover
the fact that someone had been tampering with time. ‘It’s a different part
of the world, Tynian,’ he said easily. ‘The climate’s bound to be
different.’
‘Summer is summer, Sparhawk, and it’s not supposed to last forever.’
‘you can never tell about climate,’ Ulath disagreed, ‘particularly along a
sea-coast. There’s a warm current that runs up the west coast of Thalesia.
It can be the dead of winter’ in Yosut on the east coast, and only
mid-autumn in Horset.’ Good old Ulath, Sparhawk thought with some relief.
‘It still seems a little strange to me,’ Tynian said dubiously. ‘Lots of
things seem strange to you, my friend,’ Ulath smiled. ‘You’ve turned down
any number of invitations I’ve sent you to go Ogre-hunting with me.’
‘Why kill them if you’re not going to eat them?’ Tynian shrugged. ‘You
didn’t eat any of those Zemochs you killed.’
‘I didn’t have a good recipe for cooking them.’ They all laughed and let
the subject drop, and Sparhawk breathed a bit easier. Talen came into the
hall then. As usual, he had almost routinely shaken off the agents of the
prime minister that morning and gone out into the city. ‘Surprise,
surprise,’ he said dryly. ‘Krager’s finally made it to Matherion. I was
starting to worry about him.’ that does it!’ Sparhawk burst out, slamming
his fist down on the arm of his chair. ‘That man’s starting to make me very
tired.’
‘We didn’t really have the time to chase him down before, my Lord,’ Khalad
pointed out. ‘Maybe we should have taken the time. I was sure of that when
we saw him back in Sarsos. We’re settled in now, though, so let’s devote a
little time and energy to rooting him out. Draw some pictures of him,
Talen. Spread them around and promise a reward.’
‘I know how to go about it, Sparhawk.’
‘Do it then. I want to put my hands on that drunken little weasel. There’s
all kinds of information inside that sodden skin of his, and I’m going to
wring him out until I’ve got the very last drop of it.’
‘Testy, isn’t he?’ Tynian said mildly to Kalten. ‘He’s been having a bad
day,’ Kalten shrugged. ‘He discovered a streak of brutality in his
women-folk, and it upset him.’
‘Oh?’
‘There’s a nobleman in Cimura who needs killing. When I get home, I’m
going to slice off his ears before I butcher him. The ladies all thought it
was a wonderful idea. Their approval shattered a number of Sparhawk’s
illusions.’
‘What’s the fellow done?’
‘It’s a private matter.’
‘Oh. Well, at least Sephrenia agreed with him.’
‘No, as a matter of fact, she was even more bloodthirsty than the rest.
She went so far as to offer some suggestions later on that even made Mirtai
turn pale.’
‘The fellow really must have done something awful.’
‘He did indeed, my friend, and I’m going to give him hours and hours to
regret it.’ Kalten’s blue eyes were like ice, and his nostrils were white
and pinched with suppressed fury. ‘I didn’t do it, Kalten,’ Tynian told
him, ‘so don’t start looking at me like that.’
‘Sorry,’ Kalten apologised. ‘Just thinking about it makes my blood boil.’
‘Don’t think about it then.’
Their accents were still rough, Sephrenia had seen to that, but their
understanding of the Tamul language was very nearly perfect. ‘Are we
ready?’ Sparhawk asked his tutor one evening. Unless you plan to make
speeches, Prince Sparhawk,’ Emperor Sarabian, who was paying them another
of those whirlwind visits, said. ‘Your accent is really vile, you know.’
i’m going out there to listen, your Majesty,’ Sparhawk told him, ‘not to
talk. Sephrenia and Zalasta are hiding our proficiency behind the accents.’
‘I wish you’d told me you could do this, Zalasta,’ Sarabian said just a bit