"Just as we are careful not to let ours escape to theirs," he corroborated. "Still. Elves?"
She shook her head. "Elves take their revenge in a leisurely fashion, and an artistic one. This is both too sordid and too hasty for Elves to be involved."
"Haspur aren't mages, nor Mintaks, nor Deliambrens," he said, thinking out loud. "It could be someone from a very obscure race—but then, I'd have known about him; he'd stand out in those neighborhoods like a white crow. What about Gypsies? I've heard some of them are mages."
Again, she hesitated. "There are bad Gypsies—but the Gypsies are very careful about policing their own people. If this is a Gypsy, he has somehow eluded hunters from among his own kind, and that is so difficult that I find it as unlikely as it being an Elf. I have information sources among them, and I have heard nothing of—"
She stopped in midsentence, suddenly struck by something. Her cousin's letter—
Tal waited, watching her expectantly.
"I was about to say that I have heard nothing of this," she said very slowly, "but I have hadsome distressing information from my sources. The victims—have they by any chance been Free Bards or Gypsies?"
Again, she got a startled look from him. "I can only speak for the cases in Haldene; I didn't get much detail on the ones in the other towns and villages, and frankly, I didn't spend much time investigating when I learned that the murders were going in the direction that I had feared. No Free Bards, and only one Gypsy," he told her, licking his lips. "But—perhaps this will seem mad to you, which is why I hesitated to mention it—every one of the dead women was either a musician of sorts, or posing as one."
Ardis pursed her lips. "So. There is a link between the victims, even when they seem disparate in everything but their poverty."
I don't like this. I don't like this at all.Ardis was not aware that she was frowning until she caught a brief glimpse of worry on Tal's face. She forced her expression into something smoother.
"I believe you, Tal Rufen," she said at last. "Anyone planning to hoodwink me would have concocted something less bizarre and more plausible."
The constable's visible relief conjured at least a tiny smile onto her face. "So you'll vouch for me if I have trouble getting information?" he asked hopefully.
"I'll do more than that." She pulled the bell-cord that summoned Kayne from the next room. When the novice arrived, eyes brimming with suppressed curiosity, Ardis motioned for her to sit down as well.
"Tal, this is Novice Kayne, my personal secretary. I suspect you will be working at least peripherally together." They eyed one another warily; a grayhound and a mastiff trying to decide if they were going to be friends or not. She hid her amusement. "Kayne, I am making Tal one of the Abbey Guards, and my personal retainer." She smiled a bit wider as they both turned startled eyes on her. "Please get him the appropriate uniforms and see that he has housing with the others. A room to himself, if you please, and a key to the garden doors; his hours are likely to be irregular. He is going to be a Special Inquisitor, so draw up the papers for him. No one else is to know of that rank for the moment except you and the Guard-Captain, however. To the rest, he is simply to be my Personal Guard."
Kayne's eyes danced with excitement; this was obviously the sort of secret she had hoped to be privy to when Ardis appointed her to her post. "Yes, High Bishop. At once. Guard Rufen, have you any belongings you wish me to send to your quarters?"
"I have a pack-mule in your courtyard, and a riding-mule," Tal said dazedly. "I left them tied to the post there."
"I'll see that they are taken care of." She rose quickly to her feet, and looked briefly to Ardis for further instructions.
"You can come back for him here," Ardis said. "Oh—and draw out his first quarter's pay, would you?"
"Of course, High Bishop." The young woman left in a swirl of rust-colored robes and anticipation.
Ardis settled back in her chair, secretly a little pleased to have so startled the stone-faced constable. "There are times when it is very useful to have no one to answer to but one's own self. So, Guard Rufen, you are now a Special Inquisitor. That means that no one can hinder you in whatever you wish to ask or wherever you wish to go. That which is told to you is under the same veil of secrecy as the Confessional; you may tell it to no one except your direct superior, which is myself, since you are the only Inquisitor the Kingsford Abbey now boasts. Within reason, and Kayne will tell you when you have transgressed those bounds, you may requisition anything you need from the Abbey resources. That includes bribe-money—"
She laughed at his shocked expression. "Oh, come now, Inquisitor Rufen—do you take me for a cloistered unworldly? You will have to bribe people; often only money will loosen the tongue when not even threat of eternal damnation will have an effect. Simply tell Kayne what it is for, and keep strict accounts."
"Yes, High Bishop," he said faintly.
"Come to Kayne for whatever you need," she continued. "Report to me once a day if you have anything new to report, to Kayne if you have nothing. Take your meals in the Abbey or in the city, as you prefer, but meals in the city will have to come under your own expenses. Wear your uniform as you deem advisable;always within the Abbey, but outside of the Abbey, you may choose to wear civilian clothing. As a Special Inquisitor, your duty is to investigate whatI deem necessary, not religious irregularities. Those are for the General Inquisitors, of which this Abbey has none. The city constables will not interfere with you when you show them your papers—but in any event, once they know you by sight, they won't bother you. I'll tell Fenris only that you are conducting an investigation for me. Only Duke Arden's men might continue to impede you, and they won't after I send my cousin a little note. The people who will know your true rank will be myself, Captain Fenris, Captain Othorp, Duke Arden, and Novice Kayne. Any questions?"
Tal Rufen still looked as if he had fallen from a great height onto his head. "Ah—just one," he said, finally. "Why?"
As an answer, she tossed him her cousin's letter—for those who did not know Talaysen—or Gwydain, the name he had been born with—the contents were innocuous enough.
Tal read it through quickly; that answered one of her questions: he was obviously not only able to read, but fairly literate.Which means he may well be an amateur scholar of history. I shall have to be sure to let him make free with the Abbey library. He got to the last paragraph, and she watched him as he read it through twice.
He looked up at her. "This Talaysen—this is—?"
"Free Bard Talaysen, Master Wren, Laurel Bard, and advisor to the King of Birnam."
"And the leader of the Free Bards, as well as a person respected and admired among the Gypsies. I see." He handed the letter back to her. "I think we can probably assume that most, if not all, of the murders he speaks of bear the same signature as the ones I told you about."
"I would say so." She put the letter away in her desk. "You also asked for a mage; I can offer you two. The first is a fellow Justiciar who also has some other abilities—he can touch minds, and sometimes read the past from objects. His name is Arran, and he just happens to be another cousin of mine."