“Elisha,” the Lady continued in a honeyed tone—then, switching back to acid sharpness and looking at her Chief Maid, she said, “Sarah, what are all these women doing here? Don’t they have rooms of their own?”
Women who still dallied in the suite’s common room—several of the lower-ranking stored their garments here in chests and clothes presses—scurried for their sleeping quarters while Sarah hectored them, arms akimbo.
“I need you to carry a message for me, Leesh,” explained Lady Miriam softly. “To one of our guests. You—you do know, don’t you, boy, which suite was cleared for use by our guests?”
“Yes, My Lady,” I said, keeping my face blank. “The end suite of the East Wing, where the King slept last year. But I thought—”
“Don’t think,” said Sarah, rapping me with the brush which she carried on all but formal occasions. “And don’t interrupt milady.”
“Yes, My Lady,” I said, bowing and rising.
“I don’t want you to go there, boy,” said the Lady with an edge of irritation. “If Sergeant Grant has any questions, I want you to point the rooms out to him—from the courtyard.”
She paused and touched her full lips with her tongue while her fingers played with the fan. “Yes,” she said at last, then continued, “I want you to tell Sergeant Grant oh-four hundred and to answer any questions he may have.”
Lady Miriam looked up again, and though her voice remained mild, her eyes were hard as knife points. “Oh. And Leesh? This is business which the Baron does not wish to be known. Speak to Sergeant Grant in private. And never speak to anyone else about it—even to the Baron if he tries to trick you into an admission.”
“Yes, My Lady,” I said bowing.
I understood what the Baron would do to a page who brought him the news—and how he would send a message back to his wife, to the king’s daughter whom he dared not impale in person.
Sarah’s shrieked order carried me past the guard at the women’s apartment, while Lady Miriam’s signet was my pass into the courtyard after normal hours. The soldier there on guard was muzzy with drink. I might have been able to slip unnoticed by the hall alcove in which he sheltered.
I skipped across the gravel-in-clay surface of the courtyard, afraid to pause to touch the tanks again when I knew Lady Miriam would be peering from her window. Perhaps on the way back . . . but no, she would be as intent on hearing how the message was received as she was anxious to know that it had been delivered. I would ignore the tanks—
“Freeze, buddy!” snarled someone from the turret of the tank I had just run past.
I stumbled with shock and my will to obey. Catching my balance, I turned slowly—to the triple muzzles of the weapon mounted on the cupola, not a pistol as Lord Curran had pointed. The man who spoke wore a shielded helmet, but there would not have been enough light to recognize him anyway.
“Please, My Lord,” I said, “I have a message for Sergeant-Commander Grant?”
“From who?” the mercenary demanded. I knew now that Lieutenant Kiley had been serious about protecting from intrusion the quarters allotted to his men.
“My Lord, I . . .” I said and found no way to proceed.
“Yeah, Via,” the tank lord agreed in a relaxed tone. “None a’ my affair.” He touched the side of his helmet and spoke softly.
The gatehouse door opened with a spill of light and the tall, broad-shouldered silhouette of Sergeant Grant. Like the mercenary on guard in the tank, he wore a communications helmet.
Grant slipped his face shield down, and for a moment my own exposed skin tingled—or my mind thought it perceived a tingle—as the tank lord’s equipment scanned me.
“C’mon, then,” he grunted, gesturing me toward the recessed angle of the building and the gate leaves. “We’ll step around the corner and talk.”
There was a trill of feminine laughter from the upper story of the gatehouse: a servant named Maria, whose hoots of joy were unmistakable. Lieutenant Kiley leaned his head and torso from the window above us and shouted to Grant, his voice and his anger recognizable even though the words themselves were not.