That was dangerous for any wife of a High Holder, given that High Holders still retained the right of low justice on their own lands-and low justice could include what amounted to perpetual incarceration and other cruelties, even for a High Holder’s wife.
Before long, the coach stopped before the building that served Seliora’s family as factory, factorage, and dwelling. Located at the intersection of Nordroad and Hagahl Lane, the yellow-brick walls rose three stories, set off by gray granite cornerstones. The wooden loading docks at the south end of the building were stained with a brown oil and well-kept, and the loading yard itself was stone-paved. The entrance on the south side of Hagahl Lane, on the north end, was the private family entrance, with a square-pillared covered porch that shielded a stone archway.
Seliora leaned over and gave me a kiss before she left the coach, and I handed Diestrya down to her. “The newsheets are on the seat.”
She always left them there for me to read on the rest of the ride to Third District, and she always reminded me, a ritual that I found somehow reassuring. I followed her down and, holding my shields, walked her up the steps. She used her key to enter.
Then I walked back to the duty coach and climbed in. As Lebryn eased the coach away, I picked up the first of the newsheets-Tableta.
The lead headline stated “War Looms in Cloisera.” The story was about the increasing tension between Ferrum and Jariola. While the two had reached a truce after the undeclared “Winter War” of 756-757, when the troops of the Oligarch of Jariola had finally pushed the Ferrans back to the pre-war borders and regained control of their coal mines, no peace agreement or treaty had ever been signed. Both nations had armed forces poised along the border, and the two had never resumed diplomatic relations. According to the Tableta story, the Ferrans were deploying a new steam-powered land-cruiser, claiming that it could operate in the coldest of winters, unlike earlier models that had broken down in hilly lands of Jariola during the cold winter months.
The story in Veritum was similar, but the second newsheet had another story that I found intriguing, not to mention disturbing. The grain ware house of a wealthy freeholder near Extela had been torched right after harvest, and it was the latest in a series of grain ware houses that had burned across the southeast of Solidar. All the ware houses except one had belonged to freeholders, rather than High Holders.
Then there was a rather cryptic and short story that reported on an explosion of an undetermined nature outside the Place D’Opera on Samedi night after the premiere of The Trial of Lorien. The explosion had damaged a coach, killed several people, and injured a number of bystanders.
I frowned. No one had contacted me. But then, the Place D’Opera was in Second District.
Seliora had mentioned the opera because Iryela and Kandryl had wanted to see the premiere, but couldn’t because of a dinner at his father’s chateau. The dinner might even have been in celebration of Frydryk’s and Alynkya’s engagement. Or it might not have been, given the social obligations and intrigues that swirled around High Holders.
I’d wanted to see the opera for a different reason, although I was certainly not willing to pay the prices for the premiere. Lorien had been the son of Rex Defou, who’d been removed as ruler and rex of Solidar by Alastar, the first imager to be titled a Maitre D’Image-the most powerful of imagers, of whom there were none at present in the Collegium. Historians had always questioned whether Lorien was strong and temperate or weak-willed and subservient to the High Holders of the time. It would be interesting to see how the composer and the librettist had seen Lorien.
But…why weren’t there more details about the explosion in the newsheet?
For the moment, I couldn’t do anything about it, and I finished reading Veritum just before Lebryn eased the duty coach to a stop outside Civic Patrol headquarters.
I stepped out of the duty coach and adjusted the gray visored cap that imagers wore when on duty off Imagisle, a cap similar to those worn by the Civic Patrol, except that mine bore the four-pointed star that symbolized the Collegium. Although the headquarters of the Civic Patrol of L’Excelsis were slightly less than a mille from the south end of Imagisle, my circular trip via NordEste Design had taken four milles. Even had I gone directly from the Collegium, the trip would have been more than two milles because there wasn’t a bridge on the south end of the isle that held the Collegium. There really wasn’t much difference in distance between going to headquarters and going to my Third District station, although the station was almost two milles northwest of headquarters.
The Civic Patrol headquarters building was of undistinguished yellow brick, with brown wooden trim and doors. There were three doors spaced across the front. The left one led to the malefactor charging area, and the right door was permanently locked. The middle double doors were set in the square archway above two worn stone steps leading up from the sidewalk. I took them and stepped inside and past the table desk, with a graying patroller seated behind it.
“Good morning, Captain Rhennthyl.”
“Good morning, Cassan.”
I hurried up the time-worn dark oak steps to the second level and turned right, going past one door before stepping in through the open door to the conference room, with its long oval table of polished but battered oak and the straight-backed chairs arranged around it. Three wide windows, both closed, were centered on the outer wall. They offered a view of the various buildings on the north side of Fedre, but not so far enough to see those along the Boulevard D’Imagers. There were no pictures hung on the walls, and only three unlit oil lamps in sconces spaced along the inside wall.
I was the second to arrive. Bolyet, the captain of Fifth District, was already there. He’d replaced Telleryn a year before, when Telleryn had earned out his stipend and moved to Kherseilles with his wife.
“Good morning,” I said.
“It won’t be for long,” the balding captain replied. “Commander’s not happy. Something in Second District.”
“The explosion?”
He nodded, but before he could say more, Subunet, of First District, entered, trailed by Hostyn and Jacquet, who had dark circles under his eyes. Several moments later, Kharles followed.
Subcommander Cydarth walked in directly behind Kharles. He had black hair and a swarthy complexion. Part of his upper right ear was missing. “The commander will be right here.” His voice was so low it actually rumbled, and I recalled how I’d reacted when I’d first heard him speak years before. I’d read of voices that deep, but I’d never heard one until then.
We all remained standing for several moments, until Commander Artois entered and shut the door behind himself. Three or four digits shorter than I was, he was also wire-thin with short-cut brown hair shot with gray. His flat brown eyes never seemed to show emotion. He sat at the end of the table, with Cydarth taking the place at his right. The rest of us sat, those in the first three districts to his left, those in districts four through six on his right, if below the subcommander.
“Good morning, Captains.” Artois paused, then continued. “Some of you know we had a problem Samedi evening and yesterday. For those of you who don’t, I’ll summarize.” He tilted his head slightly, looking momentarily at Jacquet, before continuing. “Samedi evening there was a premiere of a new opera at the Place D’Opera. After the opera ended, an explosion destroyed a wealthy factor’s coach and killed him, his wife, his eldest daughter, and the coachman. The factor was Broussard D’Factorius of Piedryn. He was visiting a cousin here in L’Excelsis. A message was found pinned to his body after the explosion. The message claimed that the factor had been killed because of his mistreatment of workers on his lands. The signature, if one could call it that, was ‘Workers for Justice.’ Eight years ago, a High Holder was shot, not fatally, and he received a similar message. There’s no other record of such a group.”