‘Oh good heavens, no.’
‘There’s a first time for everything.’
‘Well, I’m a careful fellow,’ he said, with a level of refinement that didn’t suit the rest of his image. ‘You see, I only used minute amounts of silver to burn away his eyeballs. Any more would have gone into his brain.’ Maxid gestured at his own head to illustrate his point. ‘It just isn’t any good. As I say so often, this is a job for only the highly skilled.’
‘He’s free to go now,’ I said. ‘We can release him at the temple gates, but for Polla’s sake, at least give him a stick to help him, and see that he’s well looked after. Cornellus was ultimately a respectable man with a powerful family, and we should treat him with all the dignity we can. We don’t want to get a reputation for tormenting people needlessly.’
Maxid nodded glumly. ‘Ah. I don’t suppose you could do that instead? He might not wake for another hour or more, and I’d dearly like to ride back now while the sun’s still high.’
‘All right, I’ll wait.’
‘You’re a good fellow.’
‘What job have you got lined up next?’
‘None at the moment,’ Maxid said, packing some vicious-looking tools into a leather bag. ‘I’ve a little free time. Our agents are doing good business and my skills are in high demand these days. So for now I’m going back to Venyn City and I intend to purchase some lithe young studs to bed for the next day or two, before another request comes in.’
I smiled. ‘Buying love won’t make you happy.’
‘Who said anything about love?’ Maxid replied with a small smile.
‘Well, as long as it keeps you off the streets. Oh, that reminds me, this is for you.’ I reached into my pocket, pulled out a purse of money and threw it over to him. ‘Make sure you don’t catch any diseases.’
Maxid caught the purse in one muscled hand and peered inside, scrutinizing the contents. ‘Well, farewell, Drakenfeld!’ He picked up his belongings from the corner of the room and lumbered straight past me.
I glanced once again at the still form of Cornellus, feeling regret at what had transpired. The law could be brutal at times – but, as I told myself so often, Vispasia would be a far darker place if there was no law.
Leana was sitting in the late afternoon sunlight, her dark brown skin glimmering in the heat. The stone seats were almost too hot to sit on, but I managed to perch alongside her. Dressed in tight-fitting clothing the colour of the local stone, and with a sword sheathed at her waist, she was watching children from the local village as they ran around a fountain, each of them waving a small wooden doll above their heads. She explained that the children were playing a game based on the birth of Procetes. Little plumes of dust rose up from the street as they dashed about with abandon, while elderly beggars watched from afar and pulled themselves deeper into the sanctuary of the shade.
‘The heat, it never slows down children,’ Leana commented. ‘If the dolls were carved from bone, it would remind me of a game I played when I was as old as they are. Here . . .’ Shading her eyes with one hand, she handed me a tube containing a rolled-up letter. ‘A messenger gave me this.’
I eyed the tube in my hands. Letters were always something to be cautious about: they were usually requests for me to travel somewhere else, demands for more paperwork, news of a trivial dealing in a provincial town that needed addressing, or complaints from some nobody about the way they had been treated. But I noted the seal of the Sun Chamber in the wax, and opened the letter immediately.
Reading it, I felt a numbness hammering me. Hands shaking – just for a moment – I absorbed the information, even though none of it seemed to register at first.
Lucan Drakenfeld,
It is with regret that we must report your esteemed father, Calludian Drakenfeld, died during the night from heart failure. Your presence is requested immediately in the city of Tryum in Detrata, where you will deal with his remaining affairs and liaise with the pontiff at the Temple of Polla.
You are currently relieved of all present duties in Venyn City and a replacement will be allocated shortly.
Regards
Sheriff Balus,
Senior Administrator for Vispasian Royal Union East.
‘What is it?’ Leana asked.
Words felt trapped in my throat. ‘My father has died.’
Rarely did I see emotion in Leana’s face, let alone sympathy, but there it was – I hoped it wouldn’t last too long.
‘How did he pass?’ she asked.
‘Something to do with his heart, so it says.’ I held the letter in the air before returning my hands to my lap. ‘A natural death.’
‘Your loss is great, Lucan. I am… so sorry. I will make a sacrifice to Gudan tonight to see that the spirits comfort him.’
Not now, I wanted to say, please none of this spirit nonsense now – but I didn’t. Instead I rested my head back against the stone wall and stared up into the blinding sun.
Deep into the night, when Leana was asleep in her bed at the far end of our tavern room, after I had made my prayers to Polla and noted down the events of the day, I opened the letter and read it again by candlelight, contemplating the words, hoping they would gain more clarity.
My father, one of the greatest Sun Chamber officials who had ever lived, was already a fading memory. Greatness can be a matter of perception, however. Though he paid for an excellent and privileged life for myself and my brother, Marius, he never quite knew what to do with us after our mother died. Various people cared for us while he was busy with work. Names and faces came and went with the seasons. When he spent time with us we were beaten no more than the average child of Tryum. My brother, who was a year younger than me, took things to heart. I could never identify with his utter loathing of our father. Ultimately I felt I had more right to hate our father, after what he did to me at the time.
Despite any negative feelings, I always respected him. My only true treasured memory of him was when I was only seven or eight summers old, sitting in our garden while my father explained to me the importance of his badge of office – the one I also wear. I asked him what the Sun Chamber was and I still remember, for the first time, a softening in his voice and posture, a quiet pride that began to show. He became a different man.
The Vispasian Royal Union, he explained, was made up of the eight nations of this continent. Each royal head, with the help of elected representatives, enacted the principles of the founding treaties of the continent, the most fundamental of which was that there would be no war between nations. We prospered. There was peace and security. He looked me in the eye and said that he helped to enforce the essential laws that maintained a bond. ‘We are peacemakers,’ he said, ‘not warmongers. The world is better for it. There is no more important job.’
It was inevitable that I would follow that path, and his affection grew for me after I made that decision.
However, I spent my later life in his shadow. My conversations with older officials throughout the Vispasian Royal Union would often involve them referring to him and his famous cases with affection. My world was often comprised of being the son of Calludian rather than a man in my own right, and perhaps that reputation would never fully go away. Death rarely seemed to end the business of the living. But this man – who I had both feared and admired, who had given me life and then dictated its path without realizing – was no more.
I was no longer Son of Calludian. I was Lucan Jupus Drakenfeld, second generation officer of the Sun Chamber. A free man.
I watched the flame of the candle for some time, contemplating all these matters, trying to recover my memories of the buildings and people that defined my time in Tryum; moments of my childhood returned to my mind, the walls that bore my graffiti, the games we played in the street.