Which not only made their awkward bastard legitimate after the fact, but—hardly a coincidence—enabled Sharbonow to pass off his own treasonous history as being that of Gellert’s agent on Preble. The fact that the latter claim was pure gibberish didn’t seem to bother anyone either. Not in the northern provinces, at least. And after watching several dozen former pirates bobbing facedown in the harbor waters of Chalice, scavengers and sharks drawn by the blood tearing at their corpses, no Islander in his right mind was going to question much of anything said by Enry Sharbonow.
Albrecht and his faction, from behind the safety of Vanbert’s great walls, pointed to all these claims as further proof of Demansk’s treachery and duplicity. All of the members of the Confederate aristocracy who were siding with him—which was most of them, at least of the “First Twelve”—were in full agreement. So, of course, was the great mob of the capital’s underclass. Who were being showered with favors and festivals by Albrecht, and being disciplined where necessary by Albrecht’s street gangs.
Demansk was not really concerned about Vanbert itself, for the moment. He had a different answer to the capital’s opinion than printing presses. His son Trae, taking the name from Gellert himself, called them “bombards”—and they fired not broadsheets, but 64-pound balls.
The printing presses would still have their place in the coming civil war, though, and a great one. Because what Demansk was concerned about, deeply and immediately, were the eastern provinces. They held the balance of power now. Demansk had the north and the islands. Albrecht had the capital and the center. The south and the west had dissolved into such chaos that they were irrelevant. That left the east—the source, now as for centuries, of most of the Confederacy’s military strength.
But he and his escort had reached the docks now, and Demansk broke off his ruminations on strategy and tactics. All of those figured in his decision to come down to meet the ship now being moored to the pier, to be sure. But, mostly, he’d come down because he wanted to see his daughter.
* * *
“Well, she looks healthy, that’s for sure,” commented Nappur as he watched the pretty, buxom girl mincing her way down the gangplank with a babe in her arms. His tone was full of approval. Easterners, like Southrons, preferred their women with some heft to them. “I thought she’d look a bit older, though.”
Demansk chuckled. “That’s Ilset Yunkers, Forent. Jessep’s wife. Helga—”
A second woman appeared and began striding down the gangplank. Tall, broad-shouldered, her legs—far too much of them displayed in a tunic which suited a warrior, not a lady—well-shaped but definitely on the muscular side. Demansk sighed. The fact that she bore a sword—and a real one, requiring a baldric—didn’t help matters in the least.
The giant Forent’s eyes were almost bulging. “Is that—” he choked.
“Indeed, so.”
Enry Sharbonow was standing to Demansk’s left. His own eyes weren’t bulging, no. But they were squinted. “Got our work cut out for us,” Demansk heard him mutter.
A young man started down the gangplank. No taller than Helga; a bit more broad-shouldered, perhaps; and reedy-looking rather than muscular. He was carrying no weapon of any sort. He did, at least, have a gorgeous head of corn-gold hair.
Demansk sighed. He’d never seen Gellert before, but he’d had him described. He almost winced, waiting for Sharbonow’s—inevitable—next words.
“Let me see if I understand the story right. Best I do, since I’m the one who’s been spreading it. He is supposed to have rescued her?”
“He’s said to be quite an accomplished slinger,” grumbled Demansk. “Just lie, dammit.”
“Oh, certainly, certainly. No problem, Triumvir. But . . .” Even Enry seemed at a loss, for a moment. “Emeralds don’t get smitten by women to begin with, much less . . .”
Demansk ignored the rest. Helga had spotted him and was racing up. In bounding leaps, like an athlete of the Five Year Games, each great stride bringing yet another mutter of despair from Sharbonow.
When she seized her father in a hug and began jiggling him up and down in glee and pleasure—his feet were off the ground, most of the time—Sharbonow’s muttering became nonstop.