This story is a work of fiction. It contains references to violent behavior between adults, references to sexual behaviour between adult males, and expressions of physical affection between consenting adults. If you find this type of story offensive, or if you are underage and it is illegal for you to read it, please exit now. All characters are fictional and in no way related to any persons living or deceased. Any such similarity is purely coincidental.
This work is copyrighted by the author and may not be reproduced in any form without the specific written consent of the author. It is assigned to the Nifty Archives under the provisions of their submission guidelines but it may not be copied or archived on any other site without the direct consent of the author.
I can be contacted at Bookwyrm6@yahoo.com
Copyright 2003 Kristopher R. Gibbons All rights reserved by the author.
21 Hoist With His Own Petar
Hamlet: Let it work;
For 'tis the sport to have the enginer
Hoist with his own petar, and't shall go hard
But I will delve one yard below their mines
And blow them at the moon. O, 'tis most sweet
When in one line two crafts directly meet.
Hamlet, Act 3, Scene 4, Lines 206ff.
"Your Majesty jests," came the taunt from the floor. "Let no one claim His August Majesty has no levity, no sense of the supercilious or ridiculous. Its quite evident from this perspective."
"We did not give you leave to speak. We do not now. Your moment has passed, Nisakh. And see what you have made of it?"
"Let me be so bold as to assume that, as Your Majesty addresses me, Your Majesty expects a reply. Your Illustrious and Most Luminous Majesty must realise that I was merely the mark - the main and example of my betters."
Evendal grinned, utterly without mirth. "We know full well how you embodied the vices of your masters, Nisakh. That does not excuse you or diminish your responsibility for what you have chosen to do. Silence for now. But have no doubt, We will hear your specious arguments anon."
"Aldul,"
"Hail to your lordship."
"Do you know how Drusillikh is faring?"
"Well, but worried."
"As am I. Though nothing of my mystery is certain, I think that now, if aught assailed Kri-estaul, I would know of it straightly."
"That is good to know... but do not rely upon it."
"I agree. Good Aldul, I would impose on your charity yet more. You may not have made the acquaintance of this pestilence in human guise before me."
"He looks indeed, a sad bit of flotsam, my lord."
"This blight hights as Nisakh, a selfless imitator of the Beast. Lacking the imagination for compassion, and taking Abduram as his mold and pattern, this apprentice strove to fashion a masterwork on the body of the six-year old Kri-estaul. After having failed with his own sister."
"You are most keen, Your Majesty." Nisakh piped up.
"And you are counterfeit, a poor reproduction of a horrid abomination: A single reed with only one note to play, 'Haaa' 'I shall teach you to be good'. 'Haa,' and 'I shall teach you to be good,' ever and again."
Aldul looked troubled, uneasy. "My lord, this seems... petty."
Evendal held his breath, closed his glowing eyes, and let it out in a gust. "You are right, Aldul. It is simply rage. A pointless, oversetting and bitter rage. All I can do is kill him. This creature who can only pretend at most emotions. Joy, pleasure, anger and sorrow; all known to him only second-hand."
The Kwo-edan looked down at Nisakh with greater interest. "I had heard of such, from my mentor in the Paramenate Temple back home. But I had never met one such as that, to the best of my knowledge."
The King made a face like he wanted to spit. "Having watched Abduram at play, Nisakh would pretend at his master's rage, and 'escalate' his master's ordeals and tortures. He mistook the rush of excitement that they gave him for emotion. The despair and mortal agonies he caused make him feel more alive, and what he felt he interpreted as pleasure, and so equated as 'good'. He is minimally aware of his lacks, which causes some anxiety. How he responds to that emotion, he himself may not even know! He is not without an urge for self-preservation, which is why I charge you to expect argument from him that will be unique to his apperception." As he spoke, Evendal schooled his face to impassivity.
"And how may I be of service?" His friend's seeming indifferent demeanor motivated Aldul to step up to Evendal's side.
Evendal stared a long time at the man kneeling on the floor. "We shall not let him go to the fires without unveiling something further of his infamies. And would ask you to note any revelations. Also, Kri-estaul..." Evendal swallowed abruptly and took a breath to speak again. No words emerged.
"Not now, Evendal." Aldul whispered. "Not yet."
The son of Menam forced a deeper breath. "You are right. This is not the time. Would you assist Guard Kinmeln into the next apartment? Henhyroc, if you could arrange a companion for him?" Evendal indicated the wounded Guard in the chair, being held in place by Henhyroc. Together, Aldul and the Guardswoman cradle-lifted Kinmeln out the door. As Henhyroc left, another Guard scurried in, to stand attentively behind the King. After a moment, oddly silent for a room that held six people, Evendal heard Henhyroc's crisp voice from the hallway; and after that, Aldul returned.
"Henhyroc has called for someone else to assist Kinmeln, and chose to watch over him until that attendant arrives. We arranged Kinmeln onto a bed, on his stomach."
"See what happens when you are not around, my friend?" Evendal responded, with a weak, troubled grin.
Aldul quirked a quick grin in return, then wiped down the chair Kinmeln had been in and moved it closer to Evendal's chair. Evendal's chair faced the doorway; Aldul set his chair to Evendal's left, so that he could keep an eye on both the beds and his lord. He then picked up his scribal tools and sat down. Evendal looked over to the large bed, and the yet sleeping marvel it held. 'Sleep awhile more,' he willed silently.
Falrija returned, with others in tow. "Your Majesty, may I present Steward Hwil-marsidyan, and Guard Darhelmir and Ddronhelim."
"You may. Health and peace to you, gentlefolk."
"Your Majesty is gracious beyond expectation." Answered the woman not in Guard livery.
"That remains to be seen." Evendal returned. "You are preeminent in your station?"
"Master Steward, and your humble servant."
"When We returned, We dealt with no 'steward' at all in choosing Our residence. None appeared. Since then We have, unintentionally, diminished the list of residents considerably. And yet no one has approached Us with the personal effects or those articles of value which We are certain these late occupants harboured."
"Perhaps the staff felt it unfit for your royal notice?"
The King frowned. "Master Fillowyn likewise has been undisturbed. No. Someone has made themselves a gift of matters that are Ours. Learn who, and find the hoard or hoards. Specifically. That of the Most Unwise Counselor, the Beast's, the Militia General's. Also, learn what was done nine years ago with those effects that were Our dear neglected father's."
The woman's eyelids stretched with each name given and the heat from her anxiety radiated throughout the room. "Your Majesty's faith in my abilities, while gratifying... may prove... I fear the heights you goad me to."
Evendal's face flushed and he snorted in irritation. The hand Aldul set on his arm calmed Evendal long enough for sense to restore his good humour. "Look full upon Us, Hwil-marsidyan."
The woman obeyed.
"Ah, did you think, because We arranged no fetes, that you had fewer obligations? We shall grant no quarter to your natural laziness, your sloth in forethought or in performance. Forgive Us or not, Mistress Hwil-marsidyan. Your equivocation grates. Yes, We have set you a most difficult task. Understand, We expect your best efforts. What you cannot accomplish will be sought through other means, without any penalty or punition to you. But We distinguish between what you cannot do and what you will not do."
"If you have staff you never trusted, but daren't dismiss, let Us know and We will try their natures. Our home needs be as safe as We can make it, Hwil-marsidyan. But no menial may work harder than you, so you may not delegate all responsibility to others! And We will accept your oath, if you wish to maintain yourself in your present office."
"Now, tell Us of Uhult-helt."
"Twelve viankis a day. Started two years before Mausna in his current vocation."
"How does he serve?"
"Not quietly," the woman replied. "One would think he alone keeps the Palace from falling into unqualified anarchy. Uhult-helt is one of two, with an assistant, who organise and store the missives submitted to the archive and library." Hwil-marsidyan said nothing more, having exhausted her knowledge of that subject: Three fragments of fact and one piece of gossip.
The ruler of Osedys and the Thronelands seeing Hwil-marsidyan's calm, almost vacuous countenance, very much feared that the pillaging done for the effects, the spoils, of the dead had likewise been done in the Royal Archives. "Guard Darhelmir and Guard Ddronhelim." The two youths thus named approached and bowed. "If you would, go to the Records Hall. If this Uhult-helt is there, detain him and bring him here. If he is not, look through the writs compiled for those most recent, those that are Our decisions." The twin Guard bowed and left.
"If Uhult-helt served as archivist, what did Siarwak work at?"
The Master Steward's response came out tentative. "I believe she is the assistant, Your Majesty."
"We understood she served under the Palace Reeve?"(68)
Hwil-marsidyan's mouth scrunched in a moue. "I loathe that title." And Evendal saw what damage sloth was capable of. This woman did not monitor her underlings, did a minimum amount of work with the least effort possible, she had no knowledge of her subordinates aside from what she had to pay them and since when. She doubtless would not be able to tell whether a given worker had gotten out of bed on a given day. Lord Evendal ald'Menam had a choice word to share with Chancellor Fillowyn aghd' Efferdiy.
"And where is Siarwak? Do you know?" Evendal asked.
"I have received no word from her or Uhult-helt, so I presume she is working amongst the records."
Henhyroc returned and stood at alert just inside and beside the doorway.
"Not a canny answer, Hwil-marsidyan. The woman has been dead for almost three days." The King stared hard at the woman. "We have changed Our mind about the task We assigned you. You would only foul it up by pursuing it with half a heart and no thought whatsoever. No. You will stay here, attending Us in this room until We give you leave. You have a lesson or two to learn, and We are the only praecentor above your station willing to take on the task." Evendal could sense the pattern his own day had taken, and he did not like it's predictability.
"Your Majesty!..." Hwil-marsidyan sought to protest, but could think of no rejoinder.
"Enough!" Evendal insisted. He pointed forward and to his left, to a corner of the door-bearing wall. "Stand there, for now. And observe." Swift and sudden, the King stomped on Nisakh's just as suddenly outstretched hand. He bent down and pried a hard and sharp nugget of rusted iron from the prisoner's grasp.
"Well, little serpent, you yet have a fang?" he asked, leaning back into his chair. Nisakh cradled his bruised fist against his chest and made no reply.
Falrija cursed. "Your Majesty, my apologies. We thought him disarmed."
"We are surprised that you would so assume." Evendal did not feel charitable as yet. He examined the bit of metal in his hand. "A bit of detritus left behind by the Stoneworkers' under-grounds cleanup, no doubt(69). Apologies would not have served, had he thought to grab Kri-estaul instead of attacking Us. You abide as Guard of the Royal Person because of intelligence and attention to instinct and detail, not because We simply enjoy your company - even if We do. Are matters between you and Bruddbana still unsettling you?"
"No, Your Majesty. I have no such excuse."
"Then join with Hwil-marsidyan, and attend Us for a time. No," Evendal objected, when Falrija thought to remove Nisakh from under foot. "Leave him where he is. We are safest when We can see him."
"Nisakh!" The former Guard looked up, again into Evendal m'Alismogh's glowing gaze.
Think back to the places,
the times of my choice,
Spurn the gild you tender,
Unveil your own voice.
Be honest to the last,
Don't pretend to feel.
Accept Ir's debasement,
The turn of Her wheel.
"Nisakh, have you other students under your 'training'?"
"Two I had hopes for, but have not been able to wean from their guardian."
"Name them!"
"Niar-lles and Nehaleidda, son and daughter of Niem Dir."
Evendal looked first to Aldul, marking assiduously on his table, then to Ierwbae, who had straightened up from leaning over Metthendoenn when Nisakh began his answers. The Guard nodded to Evendal in acknowledgment, again bent over Metthendoenn to whisper and kiss in parting, and then walked up and bowed to his lord.
"You and one other, if you would, escort her here."
Falrija spoke up. "She presently abides in her Court-tide dwelling on Gentry Row." She referred to a borough that had, over the centuries since the extermination of the Nikraan, developed near the Palace grounds; between the Palace and the Guild residences.
This news puzzled Evendal. Those housings were not intended for extended stays, at least by tradition. As a cautious afterthought, the King added. "Be polite but unrelenting. Accept no delay or excuse."
Ierwbae bowed again. "As you desire, my gracious lord." And Evendal almost cried, struck by surprise at the blatant gratitude in the Guard's tone and gaze.
After Ierwbae had left, Evendal m'Alismogh resumed his questioning. "Nisakh, who is their 'guardian'?"
"An unyielding hypocrite called Frichestah. Mar-telohema's minion." Guard Falrija frowned at this, but said nothing.
"Niem Dir yet lives, how came they to require a guardian?"
Nisakh shrugged. "Not by any craft of mine. The fault no doubt lies with Niem Dir's intransigence in the face of the Lord Protector's arguments."
"Who sponsored the guardian?"
"Not knowing, I cannot say. But not Lord Abduram."
"Polgern?"
"That is what those who knew about it assumed."
"Why do We feel that you are making a weighty song-cycle out of a simple ballad. If that is the kind of answer you give, We must wait." Evendal glanced around behind his chair. "Well met, Mulienhas."
"How does my lord?"
"Exhausted, harried, but well. You?"
"Every day I breathe is a fine day." She hesitated, then added. "And when I can show my thanks for your grace to me, by serving you directly, I account myself most fortunate."
Evendal heard the truth in the sound of her voice, and did not know how to answer. When the silence continued, he heard a whisper in his ear. "So. Even you have difficulty with expressions of gratitude."
"Even I, Uaestrho." He murmured back.
A quarter of a bell passed before Darhelmir and Ddronhelim returned. They were, by bone structure and general features, clearly identical twins. But time and history had forged small differences. One looked to be thinner than the other, near to gaunt, and pale. The other, more oval-faced with health, sported a scar-caused break in his right brow. Grim-faced they bowed before their lord. "Your Majesty," the thinner man reported. "The tally is incomplete. But we felt you needed to know what we have learned so far."
"Proceed. But first, which one of you is which?"
The gaunt one bowed. "I am called Darhelmir, Your Majesty."
The scarred youth bowed. "And I hight Ddronhelim, Your Majesty." He unrolled a bit of foolscap. "The warrant for the return of the enslaved, those that... Robiliam listed, never made it out of the Palace, Lord Evendal. No record of copies sent to anyone. Your judgement providing the land, formerly the Kernost-desmesne, to the Cinqet has disappeared. The remuneration and compensations you provided for both Pohul-halik and Melianth became, on the written acknowledgment of receipt and on the stored copy of the withdrawal-request, one tenth of what is listed as actually removed from your personal thesaurus. Likewise, your benefices to the Ship-wrights and the Eikhonists have been tampered with, so that we do not know what the original amount was, just that the numbers have been patently altered."
"Monies." Evendal nodded. "And land."
"So far," Darhelmir temporised. "Your edicts and declarations require deeper scrutiny. We fear that your arrangement with the guilds, for harbouring the survivors of the duumvirate, has also vanished."
"We needs find Mar-telohema, Uhult-helt, and this Frichestah."
Darhelmir and Ddronhelim traded glances. "Lord, we know of Mar-telohema, she is an adjudicator near the Maritime annex. Considered harsh but honest. We found no sign of Uhult-helt."
Falrija spoke out. "Lord, Frichestah is the name of an attendant in Niem Dir's entourage."
Evendal looked down at a still obeisant Nisakh, who shrugged his shoulders. "Niem Dir?"
"I only met him in Mar-telohema's company." The ex-Guard acknowledged.
"Whose were you, Nisakh? We cannot imagine you a compatriot of Robiliam, and yet you attended the Beast without peril."
"You ask a question, lord, I never asked myself. None could match the Most Terrible One for swift action, ferocity or daring. While the cunning and ruthlessness calculation of the Most Wise and his unshakeable, imperturbable calm, was irresistible."
"So each perceived you as their creature."
"I relied on them both." And Evendal knew he meant that literally; that Nisakh relied on both rulers as guides for behaviour.
"Nisakh... Where did you meet Frichestah?"
"Mar-telohema's residence."
"Be more specific."
"In truth, all I recall is the smell of old fish. And that she did not seem to like me much, not as much as Frichestah did." Frustrated, Evendal knew that Nisakh spoke true.
He turned to the two Guard. "Do either of you know where Mar-telohema resides?"
Off to Evendal's right a voice weakly called out. "Papa!"
Faster than his next breath Evendal stood beside the larger bed, almost knocking over the chair in his path, to gaze down on a panicky Kri-estaul. "Here, my son. Right here." He glanced over at Mulienhas, indicated Nisakh and then placed his hand over his mouth as though stifling a yawn. Mulienhas nodded, carefully drew her sword, pointed the tip at Nisakh's collarbone, and with a finger on her lips, demanded silence.
"I'm thirsty... and I need to piss."
Aldul stood and, skirting around Mulienhas and Nisakh, joined the King and Prince. "Your Highness,"
"Unk'Aldu," Kri-estaul could not complete the name.
"If it is well with you, allow me to help."
"Hurry, I have to piss really soon."
Aldul moved to the table against the windowed wall, grabbed an oddly shaped ewer, with a wide flattened base, a long narrow neck and a wide mouth without the standard downward-curving corona. He then returned to the bed and paused to sweep the room with a scowling gaze. Falrija, the twin Guard and Hielbrae realised their forwardness and pointedly turned their attentions elsewhere. Mulienhas kept her attention on Nisakh, whose gaze was fixed on the blade at his throat.
Diverted by the sound of water on metal, still startling for all its being expected, Hielbrae looked down on her Prince. The moss wrapped over the child's leg stumps was now black, and one or two tendrils of dark red spotted the linen. Hielbrae jerked her eyes up to the Prince's pillow. Kri-estaul squinted with pain rather than relief, a tensing that had not evidenced until he had begun to urinate. When Hielbrae's gaze trailed down to the Prince's genitals, she understood and her feelings drove the breath from her. Kri-estaul's scrotal sac was ballooned to over four times its natural size; the pain he felt was from the ewer having to press against the sac so that its lip could safely encompass the spray-pattern of a penis that now looked dwarfed.
Hielbrae looked up and shared an anguished gaze with Evendal, who mimicked Mulienhas' earlier gesture, putting a finger to his lips.
"Your Highness," Aldul whispered, after emptying the ewer in the jakes.
"Yes, Unk' Aldu?"
"Your ballsac hurts, doesn't it?"
Kri-estaul did not answer right away. "Yes."
"I need to make a small cushion, to place under it. It will get better, its just been abused for so long."
Kri-estaul began to weep. "Its 'cause... bad."
Evendal, eyes wide and incandescent with fury, quickly turned to fall upon Nisakh. Quicker yet, Aldul grabbed the King by his arm, staring him down. "Don't..." the Kwo-edan hissed, then mouthed the words soundlessly. "Don't leave him!"
"No, Kri-estaul." Evendal gasped, turning back and pulling his mind from the roil of rage it had been swimming in. The shine from his eyes did not abate. "No. All that you have endured, all the pain and the fears and the dark, are because of Nisakh. He put his feeling anything above everyone else's lives. That he felt something, by hurting you, even if he did not know what it was he felt. That mattered more to him than other people, their lives, their hearts or sanity. All the terrible lies and pain are because he wanted to... not feel numb inside. Nobody and nothing mattered more than that. He simply used you, my lovely, sweet, wonderful boy! You were never evil. Never." He wiped the tears from his son's face.
"Now let me lift your head and shoulders a bit, and Hielbrae will give you some water." And a tearful Hielbrae suited action to word.
"Did I do something wrong?"
"No, sweetling." Hielbrae answered. "I just... I wish you were well already."
"Oh." Kri-estaul fought to stay alert, in vain. "Papa?"
"I will be right here, beloved boy. I am not going anywhere."
"Good." The Prince breathed.
Aldul looked across the bed. "Let me do what I can." He waved back to the chair Evendal had vacated. "You do what you can. I will only be a moment."
The King turned around, only to confront an aggrieved Metthendoenn.
"I know," Evendal responded. "Leave it in my hands." And the young Guard nodded, acquiescing.
Evendal grabbed the chair he had nearly tripped over and set it in front of the seat he himself employed, with the condemned on his knees and centered between. Darhelmir and Ddronhelim still between Nisakh and the doorway, answered their king's earlier query.
"No, Your Majesty. Only that it is between the northern docks and the Cinqet."
"Nisakh, look at Us." The man turned his face up, but focused on the royal ear. "At Our face, Nisakh!"
The ex-Guard obeyed and, in the reflective glow off Evendal me'Loema, revealed a rat-like peevish expression. "What else have you played at? Press-ganger?" Evendal m'Alismogh, Left Hand of the Unalterable frowned. "Assassin of the gentry?"
Nisakh said nothing. Kri-estaul dozed on the larger of the two beds extended out from the wall at Evendal's right, while Aldul quietly tended him and Hielbrae kept her vigil. Metthendoenn, in the other bed, moved in and out of consciousness. Hwil-marsidyan sulked in the corner front-left of her king and nursed her petulance in silence, watched over by Falrija who pledged to herself not to allow appearances to lull her again. Mulienhas stood alert, sword still drawn.
The criminal's continued silence informed m'Alismogh. "Panderer and Slavemonger? You are like Robiliam, after all." The King leaned back and waited a moment as Aldul moved from around the large bed, picked up his tools, and settled himself.
"Well, Aldul?"
"He is as fine as anyone could be, after such a cutting. In fact he is more responsive than I expected." Evendal did not change expression, so Aldul clarified. "He is doing better than he has a right to."
When Evendal made no sign of acknowledgement, Aldul had a sudden realisation: The King struggled with the relief he felt. The King had had a father who, to his reckoning, was but recently murdered. He had a mother but newly reacquainted, who lay in the Temple fighting ill-health and frailty. Evendal dared not allow himself to truly believe in Kri-estaul healing. The perception followed that this very doubt and anxiety was what kept the King of the Thronelands functioning in this hour. Aldul also mused over an apparent irrelevancy. His friend's eye colour and mysterious glow no longer hid Evendal's humanity from him; Aldul could see in his friend's face the pain Evendal was using to continue in his offices. Even as the Kwo-edan now saw a wordless plea for forbearance directed at himself.
The Kwo-edan priest nodded.
Evendal quickly turned away. "So, slaver, tell Us of your victims."
"Lord, I protest your comparison! I am no more like Robiliam than you are like your son! Robiliam provided the basic product. He sought servants with a haphazard indifference to their suitability, constitution and stamina." Nisakh snorted his opinion of that. "As a result, of course, he got less per servant, and had to cull and supply more to see any profit." He shook his head in disgust. "Too much effort! I, however, show more delicacy, more skill; suiting the servant to the needs of the market."
"We are not interested in your cleverness, Nisakh. Only in the names of your associates, your clients, and your victims and their whereabouts."
"For that you must ask the lovely behind me. She searched me much more thoroughly and enjoyably than your pet Cinqet-beggar did."
Evendal glanced up at Falrija, who moved from the corner and handed him what at first looked like a small pipe. Curled tight and bound with thread, Evendal held a collection of a dozen papers that opened out to no bigger than his palm's length from king-finger to wrist. In cramped cipher each proved a transfer-of-title, with the name of the buyer, the slave, the seller, the price, and the date as calculated from the beginning of the interregnum.
"Do We want to know where he hid these?"
Falrija grimaced. "No, my lord."
"We do want to know why you waited to provide them." Evendal insisted. It made no sense to him. Falrija presented herself as unshakably confident, unerringly competent, and consistently thorough; the calm discerner in her partnership with her husband.
Falrija dropped to one knee. "I cannot explain. My sense and training have abandoned me today. I have no excuse, only apologies."
A thickness in her voice, an odd timbre wafting like a prolonged grace note, sent a shiver up Evendal m'Alismogh's spine. And when a breathless Abduram barreled through the door, Evendal blurted out the explanation.
"Your pregnant!"
Aldul, Hielbrae, Darhelmir and Ddronhelim all smiled their congratulations, Darhelmir's and Ddronhelim's delight tempered by doubt. Mulienhas grinned and bowed, saluting Falrija with a swirl of her blade.
Bruddbana stopped. "Pregnant. Falrija?"
Falrija set one hand on the floor to steady herself. "I... was not certain. Just a feeling of impatience. Everything seemed to make me irritable lately, and not so hungry. But no queasiness! Mother got nauseous at first, but I haven't."
But Evendal nodded, confirming his own perception. "Falrija, as Anlota could tell you, every woman is different in her reaction to nascency. Your attention and intent have been divided. Diverted."
We wish you only health and sweetness,
All good that a heart may hold,
Then once again in equal measure,
For the treasure you enfold.
"Pregnant?" Bruddbana repeated, stunned.
Evendal smiled. "Yes, Commander. Guard Falrija, Guard-Commander Bruddbana. It seems to Us that you have not had the chance to sup since early in the day. We feel that the two of you should rectify that oversight. See to a replacement and then accept Our leave to relax for a bell or two." Evendal handed the papers to Aldul.
The Guardwoman protested. "But Your Majesty, I had thought to witness..."
Evendal overrode her concern. "You cannot doubt his fate. It will look no different than any other death by violence. Go for now. You truly have better things to do. We did not intend to surprise you, but the realisation was a surprise to Us."
Bruddbana stammered to his wife. "You wait for me here. I'll see to our relief. Wait right here. With your leave, Your Majesty?" Evendal waved at him. The big man headed back out the door, hesitated, then returned to soundly and passionately kiss his wife. When satisfied that he had expressed himself clearly enough for the moment, Bruddbana ran out of the room.
After a short pause, Evendal spoke up again. "You understand that We shall be changing your assigned duties, as a result."
This shocked Falrija awake. "For what? I cannot be far along, as yet."
"You have seen today one reason. You cannot be divided in your concerns; and your body and mind, despite your will, always prevails. But more importantly, We would be remiss in Our pledge to cherish you, and serve you. You are Our sword, but We are your shield. We will not remove you from duty, but We will be careful of how you serve for this interim."
Falrija did not hide her feelings at this ramification, the dismay plain on her face.
The King would not be moved. "On this there can be no argument, rage at Us as you wish. Go. Discuss this in private if you wish, but do not turn your good tidings into bad temper."
Ierwbae strode into the room and stepped immediately to the King's left. "Your Majesty, may I present Niem Dir, Warden of the Eastern Dark."
With a nod and a quick gesture, Evendal ald'Menam directed Ddronhelim and Darhelmir to his right and away from the door. Next through the entry swayed a figure in gray and leaf-green. The visitant stopped and bent her knee in a reverence just inside the door, shadowed by five attendants who echoed her movements. When she stood within fifteen feet, she curtseyed again but did not rise. Again her attendants mirrored her rigid adherence to courtly etiquette. She gazed up nearsightedly at Evendal and then knelt with head bowed.
The King stood upon the Niem Dir's entrance. He felt strange, suddenly vulnerable, young and uncertain. A shiver ran through his frame even as, seeing her, he comprehended what this woman had been to him.
Mulienhas used her sword to prod Nisakh off to the King's left and toward Hwil-marsidyan as Evendal ald'Menam took a step toward the obeisant form.
A flush-faced Bruddbana appeared at the door, where Falrija had waited with her hand on her sword. "Your Majesty, I present Dilyn and Rhoswyl alth'Rostwylyn." The two Guard, a man and a woman in Guard livery, bowed low and then moved to their left, to stand beside Metthendoenn and await orders.
The King nodded his acceptance, then waved the hesitant husband and wife away in order to turn his full attention back to the supplicant before him.
"We expected better of you." Lord Evendal ald'Menam sniped.
The kneeling figure hunched her shoulders, shifting her wavy cloud-gray hair.
"Your father and foremothers neither knelt nor bowed their heads before Our lineage. Ever."
After a moment's silence, a whisper threaded into every ear. "Our predecessors had no cause for shame."
"What shame? Did a Guard bring you before Us in irons? Did We harbour you below-ground? Or wrestle you out of your camp?"
The woman shook her head.
"Then face Us as who you are."
After the woman stood, Aldul's eyebrows rose up his forehead. The suppliant's face shone porcelain-smooth and pale, her eyes blacker than onyx, her lips full and ample. And a thick ring of discoloured scar tissue ran like a ribbon across her neck. Aldul glanced at his friend, who had paled. Not for Aldul to know that the King had almost expected to see a bubbling froth of blood, where now was shiny scar-tissue. In a disquieting, almost defiant gesture, the woman displayed her clenched teeth.
"Talk. Talk to me, Niem Dir." Evendal bade, and reached out to take her hand.
The middle-aged woman lifted her clasped hands toward the standing royal. "My life is your's. My son and daughter are your's. My lands are your's." The woman might have been reading from a book, for the lack of expression her face displayed.
Evendal quickly retracted his hand and sought his chair, shocked at her maneuver. "We do not recall asking for any of them. This audience is ended."
This earned a startled Aldul's attention. "Evendal..."
Niem Dir bared her teeth again. "Your Majesty! Your indulgence, please. What have I...?"
"We asked Niem Dir to talk with Us. We did not ask the Warden of the Eastern Dark to pledge homage."
The Kwo-edan realised that when this woman showed her teeth, it was the nearest to a smile as she could manage. He also suspected, though he did not know how he knew, that her dignity alone sustained her through this meeting. While having always accounted himself as the least imaginative of men, a strong feeling of uneasiness moved Aldul to survey the room. "Evendal..." he whispered in warning.
Evendal stood to move closer to Aldul's side. "What? What am I not seeing here?"
Aldul whispered the first thought in his head. "Can you not see she is hurting? Terrified?"
The King bit the inside of his lip, and worried at it. He stood again and approached the woman and her entourage. Again, Niem Dir knelt, head bowed appropriately. The King put his hand in the woman's field of vision for her to grasp and raised her back up to stand. Then, refusing to relinquish her hand, Evendal escorted Niem Dir to the chair he had allocated and seated her facing him. The Warden's attendants remained kneeling so that they flanked Niem Dir.
Two males and three females knelt on the chill stone. Situated directly behind Niem Dir's chair waited one of the two men. Long of torso and of face, the man kept his head up, almost farcically stiff, and took in his surroundings with quick furtive glimpses while pretending to stare straight ahead. Again and again the fellow made a visual circuit of the King, Nisakh, and the few portables in the room, with occasional puzzled glances at the stone-walled jakes closet. The other male was more of a boy, clearly underage, gazing all around with wide-eyed uncertainty, so that Aldul wondered how much he really saw for his nerves. The Kwo-edan remarked the resemblance between one of the maids-in-attendance and the young boy.
Contrary to court manners, Evendal sat down next but made no introductions. "Do not be so hasty, Warden, so quick to relinquish your rights. We are not in the Council Chamber, that you should give such a pledge. Indeed, forgive the setting of this meeting, but Our son's health demands Our attendance. Are you familiar with his travail?"
"Word had reached me of your adoption. The brother to the Quillmaster, found in the chambers beneath the Palace, or so I understand. I trust that he has brought you joy."
The King nodded. "He has both broken and restored Our heart, and claimed it as his. Much as you yourself nearly did, over nine years ago."
Aldul's head shot up in amazement. Niem Dir forced another baring of her teeth. "I had hoped. I had hoped you might remember me fondly. I am relying on my memory of you in coming to you thusly."
"You were, and remain, unforgettable. A landmark of kindness and strength in an otherwise arid and terrible time in Our life." Evendal changed the direction of their converse. "The fellow to your right is Our son's former persecutor, recently recaptured, called Nisakh." Looking for it, Evendal caught the expression of surprise on the face of the middle attendant in Niem Dir's entourage.
"March-lord of the Eastern Dark, are We to presume by your gesture just now that you place yourself, provisionally, under Our authority?" Evendal ald'Menam passed Niem Dir only an insouciant glance, instead distractedly focusing on the area just behind her attendants. Ierwbae straightened.
"Precisely so." The woman's muscles relaxed a trifle at being understood. "Certainly for as long as I may enjoy the light of Your Presence, and the grace of this audience that you requested so... persuasively." Niem Dir demurred.
"Let it be as you say. The situation, then, is it so much like our last night together near Mausna?"
"As a mother I must think constantly of my own, needy, children."
Evendal leaned back, grim-faced, with the glow of his eyes waxing yet again. "We believe We understand." He nodded his head, but kept his gaze on Ierwbae.
To an attentive Aldul, it sounded as though two different conversations had begun simultaneously.
As the young Guard left his position and approached, the King grinned mirthlessly and asked. "Dearest lady, please introduce me to the tall man behind you. He seems most eager in his attentions."
Niem Dir froze in her chair and her throat convulsed as her muscles locked. "This. This is Frichestah agdh Efryho, a young man who has served in my presence for a number of years. Clever, capable, and determined." Her voice came out even softer than its injury-caused rasp.
Ierwbae stepped around the other attendants like a dancer in a pas de quatre. By the time Niem Dir turned her body enough to look behind, Ierwbae had his blade dimpling Frichestah's side. The Warden's other attendants stirred and, while not given leave to stand, yet tried to put more space between themselves and the swordsman.
"Wherefore do you treat me so, Your Majesty?" Frichestah asked.
Niem Dir half-turned, but Evendal m'Alismogh ald'Menam grabbed one of her hands with one of his own and gazed hard at the assistant. He asked the question foremost in his mind. "Niem Dir, where is your family?"
She said nothing. Pointedly. And as pointedly stared at Frichestah.
"We recall you engendered and cherished three children before Mausna. We were told that you bore yet one more child by your late husband. Were We misinformed?"
"You were not misinformed, Your Majesty. A son conceived even as the campaign was, that survived my injuring. Your Majesty, I would beg you to employ the utmost care in matters involving my kin... and my train."
As though she had not spoken, Evendal continued. "We were also told that this Frichestah acted as the guardian for your two children. Again, 'two children,' Niem?"
"Your Majesty, please? Do not tread so precipitously."
The King shook his head regretfully. "We remember you, Niem Dir. Bold when the only life in jeopardy is your own. Reckless in the protection of others. Once the only defense of a Royal Heir in turmoil, under surprise attack."
The circumstances were so different. Evendal was reminded, indeed shocked yet again into accepting, the passage of nine years where his gut insisted not even a season had passed. The circumstances were different from his newly unveiled memory. The woman had more to lose than merely her life and had been trying desperately in the last bell to make that clear to him. It was time to calm her nerves.
He turned to his right. "Niem Dir, Warden of the Eastern Dark, We present Our dearest friend and advisor, Aldul of Kwo-eda, emissary to Us from the Paramenate and Archate Temples. Aldul of Kwo-eda, We present Niem Dir, Warden of the Eastern Dark and the first defender of Our Person."
"The 'first defender'?" Aldul made the comment a question.
"Yes. Her father may have told the late Majesty where he could put his muster, but Niem Dir accompanied us to Mausna and nearly lost her life in Our defense."
"Your Majesty, please..." Niem Dir pleaded.
Evendal felt no compassion for her modesty. "Is this not true? You had no reason to protect me, and plenty of reason to simply let me die and be freed of your charge. Especially when you half-believed the Militia Commander's bad report of me." Evendal had not let go of Niem Dir's arm, and now he grasped her other hand. "We called you 'defender of Our Person' when it would be more honest to say We imperiled your person. And..." The King swallowed hard. "And both then and now, that is how We see it."
"You had a fit in the midst of battle." The woman downplayed matters. Evendal noted that she breathed a bit easier, and more deeply.
Evendal snorted, releasing Niem Dir's right hand. "That is too mild a word for the... collection of brainstorms We endured. Niem Dir guarded Us after we left Kwo-eda. At Our father's command. The night before we were to reach the battlelines, someone thought to attack the Heir of the Thronelands in his tent. This stalwart lady placed herself in peril protecting Us, when We were in no condition to defend Ourselves."
"Do you see, Aldul?" Evendal whispered. "The ones imperiled this time are her heirs. The Warden thought to thwart the blackmailers and yet keep their hopes fresh, and her children alive, by but temporarily surrendering her birthright... to Us."
"I do not understand, Your Majesty. Lady, why toy with dastards if they endanger your children? Your Majesty is here for her, and has been for more than a fortnight."
"Not just children, Aldul. Heirs. Heirs with or without Our approbation. Think about that distinction. Her persecutors, likewise, do not understand. Niem Dir's family has never been Our vassal; until this hour. The Eastern Dark is unique amongst the annexes and authorities Osedys encompasses."
"Niem Dir, Aldul can attest to what We say here. What you helped Us to survive... What so incapacitated Us en route to Mausna, was the birthpangs of a dread gifting. One still unfolding and growing. One aspect of it is an ear for truth." Evendal paused, and then asked. "Niem Dir, who does Frichestah serve?"
"Himself." The woman answered without hesitation.
"Who else?"
"I had thought that he served Polgern. But it seems I was wrong."
"You do not doubt Our assertion? You do not dither over your answers."
The woman sat with every appearance of a calm restored, as though she had not just pleaded with the King to ignore the blatant mischief rampant in the largest annex in the kingdom. As though her family simply waited in the next room. She knew from her experiences with Menam that the royal temper had limits and one did not try to kerb the will or the wit of the Gracious Majesty of the Thronelands; it did not meander to no purpose.
"Ten years may have passed, yet I well recall that fateful campaign, Your Majesty. I still see the same earnest, honest and grave young man I first met then. I know to credit whatever you are certain enough to say."
"Tell Us what controls the actions of your son, Niem Dir? Your adult son?" Evendal thought to address the most potentially painful matters altogether. His discomfort in confronting Niem Dir over a dishonourable family member caused Evendal's words to come out fast and clipped, so that he sounded hard and angry.
"I cannot."
"What do you know of Dhu-etslef's comings and goings? We have delayed meeting with you over him for three days now, knowing that you would pursue this matter yourself, that you would search out the truth of things."
The woman bowed her head. "Your kindness is appreciated, Your Majesty." That she did not confirm Evendal's assumption, nor answered his query, deeply troubled the King. But Evendal m'Alismogh frowned from a different cause. Her single statement had the ring of both truth and fervor. "What do you know, suspect, and want?"
Shame and frustration moved the woman to borrow Evendal's terse manner. "I... know nothing useful. I suspect that your foster-mother threatened my son in some way. And I want him freed." Niem Dir sat utterly still for the space of three breaths, then rubbed the tip of her nose repeatedly.
And Evendal knew two out of her three declarations for lies. And, taking him at his word, she expected him to know her lies for such. Seeming distracted, Evendal m'Alismogh kept his gaze fixed on Niem Dir, who stared at Frichestah.
"We will ignore your last two lies, dear friend," the King murmured. The Warden blinked her surprise at Evendal's apparent acuity and bluntness. "But you must treat with Us as the protector We can be."
"Niem Dir. Your family has been the shield at Our father's back since We knew language. You tempered his rash judgments, quietly compensated the grieving when he erred, as did your father before you. Your annex was, by all accounts, a sanctuary during the first five years of the interregnum. You kicked Us in the ass when We needed toughening, you turned from jailer to support in the short time we were forced together. We know you to be a strong, steady, dependable woman. Talk to Us. You are obviously under duress. Tell Us its nature."
First, Niem Dir spent moments forcing calm, disciplining her breathing back to regular rhythm. "After I had my throat ripped up, I was taken to Kwo-eda for healing. As many were. Months later, long after the tumult and the confusion that followed the battles, I was permitted to travel back home. I found Pol... the Wise Counselor and the Beast in full control. My. My father and husband had died in the inundation. My mother had had 'an unfortunate accident' while traveling home from Council. The Beast and Pol... the Wise..."
"Oh, just say his name!" Evendal snapped.
Niem Dir forced herself away from the hysterical laugh that pounded in her chest. "The Beast and Polgern, in a rare moment of communion, had a welcome prepared for my return."
Evendal began to see the direction of this narrative. "We see. You have two sons and a daughter, are We right?"
"No, Your Majesty. Dhu-etslef is no longer kin. However, for a time, I had two sons and two daughters by my late husband." She paused to draw in a ragged breath. "Those vermin plotted for the long-term. Unknown to nearly everyone in Court, I have lived the last seven years at home with only a single family member."
"Your children were held elsewhere in order that the duumvirate might control you."
Two dots of colour glowed on Niem Dir's cheekbones. "Yes."
"What happened?"
"With myself healing in Kwo-eda, the co-rulers could send Guard to arrest my kin without any great outcry made. Initially, all my children stood fast against the schemes and lures the duumvirate offered. The murder of my mother, their grandmother, was obvious and rage united them. But Polgern held informal 'chats' with Dhu-etslef, my husband's eldest son. He felt, feels, that the Seat should have been his. That I could not begin to govern his inheritance wisely. He feels..." She shrugged. "Baseless bitterness and injured pride."
"But it was not his inheritance." Evendal interrupted. "The Eastern Dark is a feudum maternum, it has never gone to the male line when there was a female surviving who could inherit."
Niem Dir nodded. "Thus speaks the voice of reason and tradition. Dhu-etslef did not like that sound and heeded only the voice of ambition and fancy. When I arrived home, I quickly learned the lay of the land. And so I was able to protect myself from numerous attempts on my life."
She snorted in disgust. "You would not know, but I came home to a ready-made reputation as a hero of the cataclysm. Polgern needed a few living heroes to accent the dead ones he created. But he did not count on my opposition to his other efforts. So, for the first four years he or Abduram tried to kill me with accidents. One time they even tried a farcical 'bandit attack'!"
"There have been no rogues or banditry in the Thronelands in over ten generations!" Evendal protested, with a laugh of surprise.
"Who was going to say so, when the most ruthless man in the kingdom and the most brutal man in the kingdom agreed it was bandits?" Niem Dir asked rhetorically.
"Every two months I would get a visit from one of my children for about a day. A different child each time, so I would know that they all were still alive. In the fifth year, one month I received a visit from Dhu-etslef, and he stayed more than a day."
Niem Dir's eyes were tear-filled and hard as granite. "Would you believe I was actually grateful to those weasels? I held Dhu-etslef in my arms and cried. I also... Thunders! I also told him about the people I permitted to hide in our lands. If the greedy idiot had waited another day or two, I would have shown him where they were camped! But he was gone from his room the morning after I told him about the fugitives. Then two days later, he came back as head of a procession. Escorting a bier. With Eirahe. They had all but buried her in cosmetics, to make her look whole. But when I cleaned her up and out... They had pulled her fingernails out, had teased her with a garrote. They had raped her vaginally and anally. She had died from loss of blood, for there were many small knife wounds with bruising and her pallour was extreme. And my son..."
Niem Dir halted, her gaze directed down and to the left, at something only she saw. She pounded on her own knee to express the grief and frustration her face could show only through tears.
"And my eldest son sat on his horse, looking sad and somber, and explained to me why my daughter Eirahe died. That it was my fault, my responsibility, because of my treason. How the threat held over my family continued simply because I remained head-of-household, and so that was my fault as well."
The black-haired woman shook her head, as if in wonder. "He thought to break me, foolish boy. I told him that he had too many witnesses to his chaperoning Eirahe too many places. Too many witnesses to his accusations and ambitions just then. If he could not protect one young girl, he could hardly manage a manour and land. He laughed. That was when I saw it."
"Saw what?" Aldul ignored the convention of addressing only the Majesty of the Thronelands.
"Blood. One moment his hands were clean and manicured like some Craft-hall courtier! The next moment blood dripped from them, and I knew."
"Right then and there, in front of Polgern's lackeys and the household servants, I called on the ground and the sky, on fire, water, air, earth and heart, to seal our land and hearth against him. I named him Kinslayer and declared him nameless, kinless and heartless henceforth."
"He laughed yet again. Until he fell off his horse in a faint. And where the dirt and plants touched his skin, where his clothes didn't protect him, his skin reddened and pealed and burned. Then it spread across parts of his body." Aldul merely raised an eyebrow. Niem Dir continued on. "I never saw anything like it. But it was a sight that has supported me ever since. I think enough people confirmed all of this to Polgern, and that it worried him enough, that he did not press his advantage. All I know is, he could have asked me to do any number of dishonours and, with the threat to my two remaining children, I would have obeyed. But he never did what I expected. And Dhu-etslef has mercifully stayed clear of me."
"But likewise. But, likewise he didn't dare release my children. After the Beast died, when you gave Polgern over to the Cinqet and cleared out the under-grounds, I waited. I expected any moment to hear how you had found them alive and in need of healing. Or dead and given to the fires."
Evendal knew what to say next. "And then Frichestah came calling, with some token from your children's persons?"
Niem Dir shook her head. "No. With a moon-pale and starved-looking Nehaleidda, my surviving daughter."
"And what did they want?"
"You. Dead. Or so he told me later. But they did not seriously think anyone could accomplish that. So they thought to provide themselves with all the trappings of the lords."
Were Niem Dir not sitting before him so grave and intense, Evendal would have laughed. All the turmoil and misfortune, and all over wealth! "So they wanted land, and servants, and the documentation. And the land they could get was your's. Or so they thought."
"They want as much of my fee as they can claim, in exchange for my heirs."
Evendal nodded his understanding. "And you knew that if they got what they wanted, they would slay all of you. But since that land is now Ours..."
Niem Dir smiled grimly, a light of grim humour in her eyes that had not been evident before. "And while you have, in a summary statement during a Court Critical, granted most manourlords the right to their lands, I have yet to publicly request Your Majesty gift these cretins with my stewardship, or disinherit my children from their traditional right to a royal audience. Not being a manourlord, I have never offered my homage, nor refused to offer. Until you rushed matters today. Since you have accepted or denied all such pledges only in private audience, they feared what I might reveal to you in a private conference."
The glow to her countenance died. "Now, with you forcing such a conclave and detaining Frichestah... Must I mourn my children's death?"
"Fear not, dearest lady. Frichestah," Again, Evendal stared the long-faced man down. "Do you know who We are?"
The young man looked upon Evendal directly; his body shuddered. As if against his will, he slowly sank into a genuflection; his head bowed and muscles slack in submission. "I stole from you. I damaged your property."
"Yes. What is, for the length of this audience, Our property. What did you steal?" Evendal noted Niem's avid expression, watching this exchange.
"The Court copy of the grant to the Eastern Dark." Frichestah's gaze remained fixed, absorbing the glare of Evendal's face.
"What did you hope to do with the Court documents involving the Eastern Dark?" No one else noticed the King's correction, but some of the tension in Niem Dir's frame dissipated.
"Mar-telohema insisted we needed them." Evendal noted the widening of Niem Dir's eyes; that was a name she had clearly not expected. "We got tired of waiting for you to call Niem Dir to task for not pledging to you. Once you realised it was missing you would need to summon her, to give her oath. She would, instead, express a desire to retire from Court life and claim that her heirs, having abandoned her, did not deserve the land. Then request that it be granted to us."
The King recalled what he had said earlier regarding monies and land, and thought how lazy or naive these extortionists were. "The lady had withstood the cunning and cruelty of the Beast and Polgern, a sudden desire to retire from public life would not be believable." he protested.
Niem Dir explained that. "Frichestah had a long monologue all prepared, Your Majesty. 'After the grief of all my un-mourned losses and the cruelties inflicted on me, I no longer feel any desire to continue making myself a target for further misfortune or malice'... and several folios of yet more drivel along the same vein."
The King held up a hand. While Niem Dir had been talking, what had filled Evendal's mind had been a list repeating itself over and over. "Plundering Our archives, detaining Our subjects, plotting murder and theft of lands and heritage. They have made too free with Our rule!" He stood, stepped up to Frichestah, and bore into the slack face with his eyes. From Evendal m'Alismogh's mouth flew a siren-sound, a wordless claxon of two notes coincident. Quavering at first, the sounds gained stability, then gained rhythm as an intentional tremulo emerged. Feeling the assault, Aldul and Niem Dir pressed their hands over their ears, in vain, until m'Alismogh broke off to sing.
My claim has primacy,
My rights defined.
You trespass grievously,
Your lives are mine.
Your eyes are mine.
Your hearts are mine.
And until I say so,
'Tis I you shall echo.
Aldul, after cautiously removing his hands from his ears, asked. "What. What claim has primacy, Lord Evendal? What did you just do?"
"Patience, Aldul." Evendal turned back and sat again. Both Frichestah and Nisakh remained in place, but sank to the floor collapsing on to their sides and curling up. "What else have you taken?" The Songmaster ignored Nisakh.
The young man replied in a whisper of a voice, the skin along the right side of his face rubbing against the hard flooring. "From you?" Niem Dir noticed how Frichestah's eyes remained open, but focused on nothing. Her gut clenched in confusion and continued anxiety.
"Not simply from Us. What have you stolen?"
"Silver anklets with ruby and orichalcum insets from Manourlady Tiel-rien's Court residence last year. The lives of Littelna-has, Aldark-roen, Mur-golas and Hasel-kri-en. Also some dozen or more dung-eaters that Mar-telohema needed quit of."
Evendal m'Alismogh gripped the back of a bench in dismay. "Why? Who were they? First tell Us of the ones you named."
"Mur-golas, so that he would not tell Niem Dir that I kept Polgern's advisors informed of her activities. Aldark-roen and Littelna-has, because they sought out other judges, when Mar-telohema ruled to keep a percentage of their widows' pension."
"And Hasel-kri-en?"
"Because Mar-telohema asked me to."
Though vacuous impassivity was a product of the glamour, Evendal felt certain that Frichestah's lack of expression would have been there regardless. "What else have you stolen?"
"Eight horses over seven years from Niem Dir's stable. Nath-Dhur's old signet and seal."
"You stole my father's signet-ring and seal?" Niem Dir blurted out, aghast. Her surprise puzzled Evendal.
Frichestah said nothing, and showed no reaction except to breathe and blink as needed.
Evendal explained. "My lady, at the moment no one else exists for him, for them, except for Ourselves."
"What just happened? I heard no threat of torture or coercion, so how did you get him to speak so candidly?"
Evendal hesitated. "The neuralgia and paroxysms that so beset Us during the Mausna debacle proved the birthing pains for a... responsibility, a strange covenant with the five elements. We can, among other capabilities, coerce truth from anyone."
"How is it with him?" she asked, horrified.
Ierwbae, standing uncertain beside the huddled figure, raised an eyebrow, awaiting a command.
"He and Nisakh are blind, for they cannot see aught without Our leave. They breathe, and their hearts beat, by Our grace alone. Until We command otherwise. The same is true, in this moment, for Telohema as well." He waited, not looking at anyone where he had acted so forthright but a moment past.
Niem Dir, unlike Frichestah, was not blind, and His Majesty's evident vulnerability elicited the same reaction from her that it had on the eve of Mausna. She strove to lighten the moment, to divert the younger man. Being, herself, a woman both intense and austere, her effort proved clumsy. "It is strange to think of you as a father..., Your Majesty."
And the King of Osedys showed the same unthinking gravity and tactlessness he had lived by back then. He gripped Niem Dir's hands and vowed. "We hope, and are confident, that We can restore to you the liberty to be 'mother' again. And, however you wish it, allow you some measure of justice."
Niem Dir almost smiled in her worry, perceiving the gratitude behind the King's words even as she heard the uncertainty in them. What sounded to her anxious ears like equivocation had been meant as reassurance.
"You knew about Frichestah before he revealed his culpability, didn't you?"
Niem Dir accepted the change in subject almost gratefully. "I knew he was Polgern's ear. I did not know he had killed. I only suspected he had taken the silver and perhaps sold a horse of mine - but I had no witness or proof. Then three sennights past, he brought Nehaleidda to my place on Gentry Row, and allowed me less than a quarter bell with her." The lady struggled to maintain clarity against her disfigurement and her emotion. She glanced uncomfortably at the youth on the floor.
"If I tried to delay either of them, I endangered the life of my son and of Nehaleidda. He led her away without request or demand. And I was kept waiting to hear. To hear anything! Finally, two sennights past he approached me, swaggering like a spavined plow-horse. Polgern had left the detention of my family to another, he insisted, and he and this other had found themselves in agreement... Where are my children, Evendal? Where?"
"Bear yet Our slow march toward your need, good Niem Dir. It serves a purpose."
The woman paused in thought, calmed herself, then waved a hand. "Though no courtly scribe remarks it, I am your humble, hopeful, servant."
"We would rather you were, again, Our proud friend." Evendal smiled, turning his lambent gaze on the supplicant.
The Lady of the Eastern Dark demurred. "I could only hope that I remained a pleasant memory for you, as you have been one of mine. But I dared not presume, Your Majesty."
"Then you have greatly changed."
Niem Dir eschewed the offered levity. "I have been through a season I would not wish on anyone, excepting Polgern and Dhu-etslef."
"We accept that We could never really understand the nature or depth of your turmoils, dear lady." Evendal intoned without a trace of flippancy. "Forgive Us, please, that We was not here even to comfort you." He turned back to the barely breathing duo waiting between the Guard. "Frichestah, you have not told Us all you have stolen. Have you?"
"No. I have not."
The King's eyes flared without warning, a pulse of light. "You will!" Evendal exclaimed. "Also where it is. Now."
"Three crossbows from Niem Dir's armory. Several pounds of potatoes, eight goats, twelve hens and two cockerels. Two of Niem Dir's three surviving children. Niar-lles and Nehaleidda. All at the manour."
"The manour?" Niem Dir exclaimed. "They are not!"
But Evendal understood. "So you have already set up a steading in the Eastern Dark?"
"Yes."
"Southward?"
"Yes."
"Has Mar-telohema a bench? Or is he a peregrine adjudicator?"
Niem Dir answered. "No Your Majesty. And Mar-telohema is a woman, having over forty-five years. I was most surprised to hear that name from this churl's lips. She has a place near the docks, where plaints, complaints, and pleas are delivered for her consideration. A public-house, three warehouses east of Dove-tail Pier."
Evendal sensed a story or two in the wry tone of her reply, but felt no patience to hear any of them. "Ddronhelim. Cordon any work-house, warehouse or residence adjacent, until it can be sifted through, by literate Guard. Assign a half dozen Guard to detain her clerks, all guests and associates, and any portable property. Isolate the ones who are... obedient but unresponsive. Those will be the ones most directly involved." The Guardsman bowed, glanced uneasily at Frichestah, and strode out.
Mulienhas protested. "As a Maritime Saemend, Mar-telohema could refuse..."
"We are the Port-greve of Osedys. She has no choice. But Ddronhelim will not have to deal with Saemend Telohema. We saw with Telohema's eyes for an instant as We sang, and she was not near the sea or in a squalid port public-house. She awaits..."
Mulienhas finished the thought. "In a grange in the southernmost extension of the Eastern Dark."
Evendal nodded. "At the moment Dilyn and Rhoswyl alth'Rostwylyn, plus one other, can serve Our needs well enough. You, take as many of your cohort as are available, along with this jellyfish," He indicated Frichestah. "And seize whoever you find."
"Bind him."
Mulienhas signaled Ierwbae to her side to ward a still unresponsive Nisakh, and then obeyed. Yet even as she hauled Frichestah to a sitting position, then tied his wrists behind his back to a cord looped about his neck, the Guardwoman protested. "But lord, he is blind. How will he be any aid?"
Evendal waited until Mulienhas had also wrapped a short cord around Frichestah's waist and tied it through a preset loop in the cord about the wrists.
"Frichestah, do you know where the lodge housing Nehaleidda is?" Evendal asked more for Mulienhas sake, already assured of the answer.
"Yes, Your Majesty."
"You can see, until We say otherwise." And Mulienhas had the unnerving opportunity to watch Frichestah's pupils shrink in reaction to the light around them. "You will walk with this Guard, assisting and protecting her to her destinations and back, informing her of whatever she enquires, with honest answers. Serving her as she asks or demands. In what, for her and her well-being, is a timely manner. This is Our will. That grange stands on what is, currently, Our property. Do you understand?"
"Yes, Your Majesty."
"And you understand that in the instant you act in disobedience to Our instructions, you die?"
"Yes, Your Majesty."
"Go."
(68) See ch.14 (69) See ch.16