“I know I wouldn’t want to be in his boots. I don’t know about the Lady Yasmid but that King Without a Throne ain’t a very nice guy.”
“He needs delivering, Bee.”
The drover casually thanked them for sharing their fire. Carrie thanked him for having provided tea. Babeltausque donned his “handling a Greyfells in a fury” bland face. He felt the killer calculate his chances and dislike them-even unaware that he had fallen in with sorcerers.
Babeltausque was not that sure of the easterners himself. He chose to assume that Tang Shan and Lein She were at least his equals.
He said, “Sit down. You won’t be leaving us.”
Carrie added, “We know who you are. Don’t make it hard on…”
Babeltausque snickered.
“Bee Boss, you aren’t twelve.”
The killer was not amused. He fixed on Lein She now. Lein She had donned his mask. He was just a Candidate. His mask was simple but it was what it was. The killer knew what it meant. This would be an excellent time for that devil who saved him from the hunger in that desert tower to pop up again, to keep the scheme he wanted played out from aborting.
“Sit,” Babeltausque said again, gesturing.
The man understood. He sat. His options were few.
Carrie asked, “What’s the plan?”
“Hunh?” He did not have one.
“Be a lot of money on those donkeys.”
“Temptation, you’re saying.”
“Big time, Bee. Big time.”
“Carrie, this will sound bad. It might not even make you happy.”
“Surprise me, love.”
“The last temptation I gave in to was you. I’m not interested in anything else anymore. I’m especially not interested in grabbing some money and trying to outrun a lot of people who want to take it away.”
Carrie giggled and pretended to tickle his chest. “You lie like a dog, Bee. You’d be all over Haida Heltkler if you ever got the chance.”
His heartbeat increased. She would feel it. But it was not the pounding that would proclaim him a liar. “I don’t think so. I’m happy with what I have. Really. You and my job as the Queen’s wizard. That’s all I want. It’s all I need.”
“Wow. All righty, then. Know something, Bee? I can live with that.”
Tang Shan said something the sorcerer had no need to follow closely. He wanted the love stuff shelved. He was hungry. It was cold out. It was time to move on. The boys from the Tower were up and bouncing, getting their blood flowing. They could stay warm by jogging.
Babeltausque looked down. His belly was a specter of its former glory but it had not gone away completely. He would do no jogging anywhere.
Lein She understood prisoners management. He lashed the killer’s right hand to a donkey pack, added a cantrip that would keep the knot from untying till he told it to let go. Then the cold march began.
Chapter Thirty-One:
Year 1019 AFE:
Knots at the End of the Rope
Nathan Wolf leaned into the Queen’s sitting chamber. His breath misted. “The sorcerer just turned up, Majesty.”
Inger pulled her hands back from the brazier that was the best even Kavelin’s Queen could afford. “Babeltausque?” Unable to believe. “Yes, ma’am.”
Ma’am? Nathan must be thoroughly rattled.
“But… How…?”
“Ask him yourself. I came as soon as I heard. It’s him and his girlfriend, some Shinsaners and a couple of others, plus about twenty donkeys and horses. They strolled in a couple minutes ago with their butts frozen off.”
“But… How…?” Oh. Yes. Ask Babeltausque. “All right. Let me grab another wrap and some gloves.”
She strode so briskly that Nathan had trouble keeping up. Everyone in the castle was headed in the same direction. Inger almost trampled Dr. Wachtel and Toby.
Josiah was there already, with blankets and hot tea. The constant babble eased briefly on the Queen’s arrival, then redoubled. Even the easterners seemed compelled to talk to her.
She watched a desert man be led away, his hands bound behind him. The sorcerer’s sex toy quieted the foreigners while her lover explained to his sovereign.
She, of course, heard only, “The entire treasury of Royalist Hammad al Nakir,” and nothing about the Star Rider or deadly attacks.
“No. He cached some a few places before he banged into us. You should probably get that gleam out of your eye.”
Greyfells blood would tell. The moment she knew there was money to be had she thought that anyone who knew of its provenance ought to be silenced.
Babeltausque told her, “These people are Tervola. They’re alert. They won’t cooperate. And neither will I.”
“Excuse me?”
“I won’t be used as a black sorcerer anymore. Majesty. I’ll be the royal wizard, but not the kind that does dirty deeds. I have responsibilities, now.” He looked at his baby whore. She looked back with adoration that Inger feared was real.
“Good heavens,” the Queen said. “Good heavens.”
Kristen, with Fulk and Bragi swirling around her, asked Carrie, “Are you all right with that?”
“Bee growing a set and wanting to be a decent guy? Yeah. I’m loving it.” Not a hint of acknowledgement of Kristen’s status.
“That, too. But I meant…” She looked at the girl’s waist and nodded.
“Oh. Sure. Yes. It happened…”
Inger grasped the truth as Carrie realized that her lover’s transformation had happened because he had figured it out, too.
The Queen shook her head, surprised by her own good feelings.
Josiah had men unloading donkeys already. Those poor animals were bedraggled. “Nathan, appropriate enough to buy firewood for us, the staff, and the stable, then get some decent food in here. Decent. Don’t go crazy. Then you and Josiah join me to go over our books.”
She owed a lot of money. Good people and bad, no one who had seen the El Murid Wars would have trouble rationalizing confiscation of wealth from the desert. Most of that would have gotten there as plunder, anyway.
“Babeltausque, I could bear your children myself. Conning you into signing up with me was the smartest thing I ever did.”
The sorcerer had trouble understanding when people were joking, especially when they were droll or sarcastic but kept a straight face. He coped by remaining unresponsive till he gathered cues enough to guess what was going on.
Carrie said, “I bet he’d jump at that. But I’m selfish. I won’t share.”
Inger was stunned. Did the girl think she was amongst her own street people? She managed, “I’m heartbroken. Who is that forlorn cripple?” The woman did not look like much but seemed important even so.
Babeltausque said, “I’m not sure, Majesty. Something supernatural. She came out of the otherworld used by Shinsan’s portals. She took control of a boy who tried to follow us and transformed his body into that. The bad foot was the last part out. Maybe the boy wasn’t big enough to let her make a complete new body. Don’t offend her. She might look lost but still be a goddess or devil.”
He knew more than he was saying. He believed what he did say. Complying with his suggestions would be sensible.
“Doctor Wachtel, take charge of the young lady. Help her if you can.” She had forked branches for crutches. Lein She had made those for her.
Wachtel approached her, made himself understood by grunts and signs. Too, she understood a few Wesson words and phrases-which astonished everyone.
Inger said, “Toby, take our other guests to the empty quarters. Garyline, help him. Miss Depar, you seem able to communicate with them. Go with Garyline and Toby. Kristen, contribute wherever you can.”
That earned her a grim look-followed by a curt nod. Things did have to be done.
Inger added, “The lifeguard that got left might be helpful, too. Where is he? You’d think he’d want to see this.”
Kristen said, “You asked him to stick to his quarters.”
Of course. It was honorable behavior to the point of obnoxiousness. Centurion of the First. Something like that. She was ashamed. She could not recall the man’s name.