Qasam, bowed. He was trembling now as well as sweating.
"From where I sit, it appears that your methods outside my borders have come within them. What act did the Rokats commit to rate your brother so messy an execution? And if you think to retaliate, you and your people are on the next ship out."
"No, your grace, please! We did nothing to cause this, nothing!"
"I find that hard to believe," drawled Erdogun.
Qasam threw him a frantic look, then dropped to his knees before the duke. "Please, you must help us! We have done nothing in Emelan, on my mother's honor I swear it! The Dihanur are animals, my poor brother is evidence of that—,"
"Now we come to it. Get up," the duke said crossly. "Don't grovel." He glanced at the baron, who tugged the bell pull.
Sandry put aside her embroidery and got a chair for Rokat. The man struggled to his feet and sagged into the chair, weeping. She watched him for a moment, then lifted his handkerchief from his fingers.
"As a rule, silk isn't practical for handkerchiefs," she told him. "It's expensive and it looks nice, but it doesn't soak up moisture very well." She gave hers to him, and laid the silk over the back of his chair to dry. Qasam rolled his eyes at her—they were bloodshot from weeping and fear—and buried his face in the new handkerchief.
A soft-footed maid brought glasses, a bottle of wine, and a bottle of pomegranate juice, Sandry poured wine for the men and gave out the glasses, then took some juice for herself. Mages soon learned that any drug or liquor had unusual effects on their power, some good, many bad. She didn't think Qasam Rokat would like it if all the threads in the room began to move.
His sips of wine seemed to quiet the merchant. "Thank you, your grace," he whispered.
"I do not require thanks. You suspect your rivals the Dihanur are involved?"
Qasam nodded. "I know it."
"Have you favored my lady provost with this information?»
Qasam shook his head.
"Why not?" asked, the duke.
Qasam did not look up. "My lady—she, she is not a woman of power, in the merchant's world, or, or under standing, or sympathy.”
"His grace knew that when he asked her to take the post," said Erdogun waspishly.
Sandry, back, at her embroidery, was fascinated. She had, to suppose that the baron and, the duke had done this many times, She knew her great-uncle; if the baron made tart observations in situations like this it was be cause the: duke wanted him to.
They stir the pot, and see what bubbles to the top, she thought.
"The provost thinks it is not a business matter, when murder is done with such violence," Qasam explained, staring at the glass in his hands. "She expects a slighted husband or lover, or a madman." He began to tremble again. "She does not understand the Dihanur. They are heartless, little better than animals—,"
"You said that," the baron interrupted. "Tell us some thing new."
Now Qasam did look up. His skin gleamed with sweat. "We are rivals. They have the frankincense trade and desire our monopoly on myrrh as well, the greedy pigs. And somehow they have learned, they found—," He drained his glass and set it down, shaking so hard that he nearly dropped it. "Today I received word they have gained the upper hand. In Bihan, in Janaal. My—my father is dead, my mother, their parents, my sisters, and their husbands…" He covered his face with his hands.
"You believe your brothers killing was part of this." Duke Vedris made it a statement, not a question.
Qasam lowered his hands. "They mean to wipe our house from the world. In Bihan, in Janaal, they have succeeded. Now they send their murderers here. My brother Jamar was the first—they will not stop until they have killed every Rokat in Emelan."
The duke got to his feet; the baron and Qasam did the same. Sandry began to rise, but the duke shook his head at her.
"They shall commit no mass slaughter here," Vedris told Qasam. "Tell all this to my lady provost and her harriers—they will find it useful. You may have obstructed their search by keeping information back, and think of the rest of your family in Emelan—they will need protection."
"Don't bunch up in one building," said Erdogun. "You don't want to make it easy for them."
Qasam nodded. He was spent with emotion; Sandry wondered if he'd slept at all last night.
"I am curious," the duke remarked, standing idly at rest. "Were you told how your brother was found?"
The merchant nodded, wiping his face again.
"Murderers rarely stop to arrange their work. The way they left things suggests" — Vedris paused, searching for the right word, while his eyes never left Qasam's drooping form—, "it suggests a message. Particularly the display of your brother's head. Am I correct? Was a message intended?"
"It refers to a thing that, that was done," whispered Qasam.. "My brother in Janaal is—was—intemperate. A Dihanur thrust ahead of our great-uncle as they went into the temple of Tirpu. The insult was avenged on Palaq Dihanur, their patriarch. Then my brother showed, all the city what became of those who did not treat the elders of Rokat House with the proper respect."
"He displayed the head—?” prodded the baron.
"On the city walls. Over the south gate, for all to see."
"And you wonder why they're angry," Baron Erdogun growled, disgusted.
Qasam shook his head and looked at the duke. "You will help? Please, I am not… My brothers, my uncles, my father, all have spilled blood to defend our house. I am only a bookkeeper, they do not even listen to me. Please say we are under your protection."
"Everyone in Emelan is under my protection," the duke said evenly. "Be sure you inform my lady provost that I suggested you explain these further details to her."
Qasam bowed, touching his forehead and chest. Sandry looked at her uncle reproachfully. Did he really mean to send this poor man back to the city without guards? Qasam would have his own guards, under the circumstances, but the presence of the Duke's Guard would show he was under her uncle's eye. The duke glanced at her. His mouth twitched.
"Erdo, go with Master Rokat. Detail a pair of guards to accompany him to my lady provost."
"I must stop at home." Qasam's face was suddenly brighter. "For papers…"
"Yes, very well," said the duke. "My guards will stay with you."
Erdoguns bow conveyed respect mingled with reproach that the duke would bother to give this man extra protection. "By your command, your grace," he said coolly, and ushered their guest out the door.
Alzena waited across the street from Qasam Rokat's home, her curved sword balanced on her knees. She was clad in the essence of nothingness, like her husband Nurhar, and the mage, who was tucked in a niche in a nearby wall. The nothingness was the mage's special power, the unmagic that got them past the cleverest guards and the most powerful spells. It cloaked her and Nurhar and even himself in sheer emptiness. Guards and magical protections felt nothing because nothing was there. She could not even see Nurhar or the mage as she peered through the tiny slit in the spells that enabled her to look at the real world. Late at night she sometimes wondered how it would feel, if that slit were to close. Would the nothingness eat her, as it seemed to have eaten the mage?
What ate him is dragonsalt, her practical self scolded. Keep your mind on the task!
Here came Rokat. She stirred. She had expected his own, guards, two in front and two behind. The surprise was that somehow he'd talked Duke Vedris out of a pair of soldiers. They will do him as much good as his own bodyguards, she thought, getting to her feet.
She couldn't see Nurhar, but she knew he had gone to work when the confusion balls burst. They had two for the bodyguards ahead of Rokat, and two for those body guards behind him. The guards reeled; their horses staggered as the enclosed drug went into sensitive noses. The balls were good for three minutes, and they hadn't brought extras to cover the duke's men. She would just have to be quick, quicker than the soldiers—but that was why the family had honored her with the task.