“Then it has to be Vergerin.”
“If we can find him.”
“ORDER! ORDER!” and Paulin banged his gavel forcefully until silence prevailed. “There! Now, we can think again. First, we must remove Chalkin.”
“What good does that do if we’ve no-one to put in authority in a Hold that will be totally demoralized to find itself leaderless?” S’nan asked, so incensed that he was speaking faster than anyone had ever heard him talk.
“Ah, but we put in a new Holder so quickly no-one will have time to become demoralized,” Tashvi said.
“I suspect that we will,” Paulin said. “Vergerin is not in his known holding, and indeed the place looks to have been deserted for some length of time.”
S’nan was aghast. “Chalkin has removed him?”
“Probably to that cold storage he’s said to have in his lower levels,” M’shall said grimly.
“Master Domaize insisted that we learn the rudiments of architectural draughting,” the young portraitist said.
“There’s another level,” Issony put in, tapping the right-hand corner of the paper. “You were lucky not to visit it.” He gave a snort. “Chalkin calls it his cold storage.” The teacher glanced around the table. “A lot of small cubicles, some horizontal, some vertical, and none of them long enough or wide enough for the poor blighters shoved in ’em.”
“You can’t be serious?” S’nan’s eyes protruded in dismay
“Never more,” Issony said. “One of the kitchen girls spilled a tub of sweetener and she was immured for a week. She died of the damp cold of the place.”
“Then,” as Iantine’s pencil slowed, “There’re steps down from his rooms here. They come out in the kitchen. He’s always complaining that delicacies disappear from storage, but I know for a fact he’s the one snitching.” Issony grinned. “I was trying to get some food one night and he nearly caught me at it.”
“There’s an upper level over this section,” Iantine said his pencil poised. “But the door was padlocked.”
“Supposedly due to subsidence,” said Issony with a bit of a snort.
“But there wasn’t as much dust in the hall as usual in his back corridors. I think it could be an access to the panel heights.”
“We’ll have a dragon up there, too,” Paulin said. He wasn’t the only one to stand behind the artist to watch him work.
“Quite a warren. Glad you looked about you when you were there, Iantine.” He patted the young man’s shoulder in approval. “So how many… ah… discreet exits are there?”
“I know of nine, besides the front one and the kitchen door,” Issony said as he pointed out the locations.
Paulin rubbed his hands together and, waving everyone to resume their seats at the table, stood for a long moment looking at the floor plan.
“So, let us not waste time and let us agree on the… ah… strategy here and now. Irene, I appreciate your willingness to be bait, but let us use surprise instead. Issony, Iantine, when would the Hold be at its most vulnerable?”
The two men exchanged glances. Issony shrugged. “Early morning, about four-five o’clock. Even the watchwher’s getting tired. Most of the guards would be asleep.” He glanced towards Iantine who nodded.
“So, we will need dragon riders.”
“Let’s stick to those of us in this room if we can,” M’shall suggested.
“It’s totally improper to hound a man in his own Hold,” began S’nan, starting to rise from his seat.
G’don of High Reaches, seated just beyond him, pulled his arm to reseat him.
“Give over, S’nan,” he said wearily.
“You’re excused from the force, S’nan,” Paulin told him, equally exasperated.
“But… but…” Even his Weyrmate shushed him.
“There’re more than enough of us quite willing,” said Shanna of Igen with a withering glance at the dismayed Fort Weyrleader.
“Good. Then we’ll cover all the exits.”
“There’s one window in the kitchen that they always forget to lock,” Iantine said, “and I don’t think they ever feed the watchwher enough. He’s all bones. Something juicy might occupy him. And I think the window’s beyond his chain’s reach.”
“Good points, Iantine,” said Paulin. “Through the window, then, and we’ll infiltrate immediately up to Chalkin’s private quarters through the back stairs.”
“The hidden door’s the panel next to the spice cupboard.”
“If you take me along, I can find it in a jiffy,” Issony suggested, his eyes bright with anticipation.
“If you’re willing…” Paulin said.
“I am, too,” Iantine added.
“I rather thought you might be,” said Paulin, and then rapidly issued the details of the plan.
With the exception of S’nan, all the Weyrleaders were involved and even young Gallian was persuaded to come.
“I might as well be hanged for the sheep as the lamb,” he said with a fatalistic shrug.
“You’ll not suffer from this day’s work, Gallian,” Bastom assured him. It’s a unanimous decision and our presence there will make that plain to Chalkin. He has no allies among us,” the Tillek Lord said, with a reproving glance at S’nan who sat with face set in such a mournful expression that Bastom was nearly sorry for the punctilious Weyrleader.
“So we are agreed, Lords, Ladies and Leaders?” Paulin said when he was sure everyone had grasped their roles in the deposition. “Then let us refresh ourselves and rest until it’s time to depart.”
Bitra Hold and Telgar Weyr
Except for the fact that the watchwher did not succumb to the choice bits of meat brought to lure it from its duty and M’shall had to have Craigath speak sharply to it, entry was obtained.
Whoever should have heard the watchwher’s one bellow did not.
Issony had no trouble entering by the unlocked window and opening the kitchen door to that contingent. Those who were assigned to watch the various other exits from the Hold were by then in place. Iantine sped through the kitchen and up into the main reception rooms where he opened the front entrance and the rest of the group entered.
Meanwhile, Issony had found the hidden door in the kitchen. Although the stairway was lit by dying glows, there was enough illumination for Paulin and the arresting Lords, Ladies and Leaders.
Paulin opened the access door at the top and entered Chalkin’s private apartments first. Behind him came eight Lords and Ladies Holder and M’shall, who insisted on representing the Weyrs. To their surprise, the room was brightly lit, glows shining from wall sconces so that the sleeping figures in the massive fur-covered bed were quite visible. All three of them… Chalkin’s portly frame bulked the largest under the sleeping furs, though his head was covered by a fold of the fine white bedsheet.
One of the girls woke first. She opened her mouth to scream, but did not when she saw Paulin’s abrupt gesture for silence. Instead, she slithered across the mattress, sheet held up to her chin, to the edge of the bed and grabbed a discarded dress from the pile on the floor.
Paulin indicated that she could clothe herself. As smoothly as she moved, or perhaps because she had the sheet up to her chin and let in cold air, the other girl was awakened. She did scream.
“As loud as a green in season,” M’shall said later chuckling at the memory. At that, Chalkin didn’t rouse.
His guards had been alerted though and charged into the room, to be flabbergasted by the sight of so many armed folk in Chalkin’s most private apartment.
“Chalkin has been impeached for failure to prepare this Hold for Threadfall, for abuse of his privilege as Lord Holder and for denying his holders their Charter-given rights,” Paulin said in a loud voice, sword drawn. “Unless you wish to join him in his exile, put up your weapons.”