"It wasn't for show. They weren't just here to kill. They were looking for something."
Varthlokkur's expression grew strained. He said nothing.
"There wasn't anything here. Not even much money."
"There was," Varthlokkur interjected. "Or should have been. Looks like the secret was kept better than I expected."
"Uhn? Going to start the mystery-mouthing already?" Bragi had always thought that wizards spoke in riddles so they couldn't be accused of error later.
"No. This is the story. Turran, Valther, and their brother
Brock served the Monitor of Escalon during his war with Shinsan. In the final extremity the Monitor, using Turran, smuggled a powerful token, the Tear of Mimizan, to the west. Turran sent it to Elana by trade post. She had it for almost fifteen years. I thought you knew."
Ragnarson sat on the edge of his bed. He was confused. "She kept a lot of secrets."
"Maybe one of the living can tell us something," Varthlokkur observed, searching faces with dreadful eyes.
"I saw it once," Preshka volunteered. "When we were on the Auszura Littoral, when I was wounded and we were hiding. It was like a ruby teardrop, so by so, that she kept in a little teak casket."
"Teak?" Bragi asked. "She didn't have any teak casket, Rolf. Wait. She had one made out of ebony. Runed with silver. It just laid around for years. I never looked inside. I don't even know if it was locked. It was always around, but I never paid any attention. I thought she kept jewelry in it."
"That's it," Preshka said. "Ebony is what I meant. The jewel, though.... It was spooky. Alive. Burning inside."
"That's it," said Varthlokkur. "One of its most interesting properties is its ability to escape notice. And memory. It's incredibly elusive."
"Hell, it ought to be around somewhere," Ragnarson said. "Seems like I saw it the other day. Either in that wardrobe there, or in the clothes chest. She never acted like it was anything important."
"A good method of concealment," Varthlokkur observed. "I don't think it's here. I don't feel it."
Ragnarson grumbled, "Michael, Jarl, look for it." He buried his head in his hands. Too much was happening. He was being hit from every direction, with worries enough for three men.
He had a premonition. He wasn't going to get time to lie back and absorb his grief, to settle his thoughts and redefine his goals.
The search revealed nothing. Yet the assassin in the park had carried nothing. And Ragnar had said the man hadn't gotten into the master bedroom. "Jarl, where's Ragnar?"
"Mist took him to her place."
"Send somebody. It's time he saw what grown-up life can be like." He might not be alive much longer. There would be more assassins. Ragnar would have to be his sword from beyond the grave.
"Jarl," he said when Ahring returned, "bring some more men over here tomorrow. Find this amulet or talisman or whatever. Valther. Do you think Mist would mind taking care of my kids for a while? I'll be damned busy till this blows away." "With Nepanthe's help she can handle it."
Ragnarson eyed him. The strain remained. Valther must have known.... But that was spilled ale.
What would he have had Valther do? Rat on Turran?
Who else had known? Who had cooperated? Haaken? Haaken had been in the house.... No. He knew his brother. Haaken would have cut throats had he known.
He was starting to dwell on the event. He had to get involved in the mystery.
Varthlokkur beckoned him to an empty corner. "I appeared at an emotional moment," the sorcerer whispered. "But this wasn't what brought me. That hasn't yet happened. And it might, if we're swift, be averted."
"Eh? What else can happen? What else can they do to me?"
"Not to you. To Kavelin. These things aren't personal. Though you could suffer from this too."
"I don't understand."
"Your other woman."
Ragnarson's stomach tightened. "Fiana? Uh, the Queen?"
"The child is what caught my attention."
"But it's not due...."
"It's coming. In two or three days. The divinations, though obscure, are clear on one point. This child, touched by the old evil in Fiana's womb, can shake the roots of the earth-if it lives. It may not. There're forces at work...."
"Forces. I'd rid the world of your kind if I could...."
"That would leave you a dull world, sir. But the matter at hand is your Queen. And child."
"Gods, I'm tired. Tired of everything. Ten years ago, when we had the land grant in Itaskia, I griped about life getting dull. I'd give anything to be back there now. My wife would be alive. So would my kids...."
"You're wrong. I know."
Ragnarson met his gaze. And yes, Varthlokkur knew. He had lived with the same despair for an age.
"Karak Strabger.... Baxendala. That's almost fifty miles. Can we make it?"
"I don't know. Fast horses...."
"We'll rob the post riders." One of Ragnarson's innovations, which Derel had proposed, was a fast postal system which permitted rapid warning in case of trouble. Its way stations were the major inns of the countryside. Each was given a subsidy to maintain post riders' horses.
The system was more expensive than the traditional, which amounted to giving mail to a traveler bound in the right direction, to pass hand to hand to others till it reached its destination. The new system was more reliable. Ragnarson hoped, someday, to convince the mercantile class to rely on it exclusively, making his system a money-earner for the Crown.
"Jarl. Have some horses saddled and brought round front. Make it... three. Myself, the wizard, and Ragnar. Haaken's in charge till I get back. His word to be law. Understand?"
Ahring nodded.
"Valther?"
"I've got it." He eyed Bragi, expression unreadable.
Bragi realized that his going to the Queen would support the rumors. But he didn't comment. His associates could decide for themselves if they should keep their mouths shut.
He studied faces. His gaze settled on Michael Trebilcock. The pallid youth still held his aim on Varthlokkur. A machine, that man.
"Excuse me," Ragnarson told the wizard. "Michael, come with me a minute."
He took Michael downstairs, outside, round to the garden. Dawn had begun painting the horizon toward the Kapenrungs. Somewhere there Fiana lay in pain, this child of theirs struggling to rip itself from her womb before its time.
"Michael."
"Sir?"
"I don't know you very well yet. You're still a stranger, even after several years."
"Sir?"
"I've got a feeling about you. I like you. I trust you. But am I right?"
The garden was peaceful. From the rear Ragnarson's house looked as innocent of terror as were its neighbors.
"I'm not sure I follow you, sir."
"I don't know who you are, Michael. I don't know what. You stay locked up inside. I only know what Gjerdrum says. You don't give away a thing about yourself. You're an enigma.
Which is your right. But you've become part of the gang. I hardly noticed you doing it. You're unobtrusive.
"You hear things. You see things. You know everybody. I've got a feeling you've got the kind of mind that leaps to conclusions past missing data, and you're usually right. Am I wrong?"
Trebilcock shook his head. In the dawnlight he appeared spectral, like a mummy returned to life.
"The question, again. Can you be trusted?" Bragi waited half a minute. Trebilcock didn't respond. "Are you really with me? Or will I have to kill you someday?"
Trebilcock didn't react in the slightest. Again Ragnarson had the feeling that fear, to this young man, was meaningless.