“A big hook needs good bait.”
“So what happens tomorrow?” Butcher said.
“Tomorrow you and I get busy.” Cavotti yawned ostentatiously and lay down-too weary to explain it all again to Butcher and too wary to talk in front of a woman he’d never met before. He turned away from her and pulled the cloth over himself.
“Busy doing what?” Giunietta’s whisper came from right behind his head. He had not heard her come to lie beside him. His heart skipped a beat.
“Sorry, can’t say.”
“A battle. Fighting, slaughter.” Seers could read emotions, not specific thoughts.
“I’m planning a killing ground.”
She snuggled against him. “Tell me.”
He had flogged men who breached security by discussing operations, but the seer already knew enough to betray him and in his present condition the bribe was irresistible.
“The baby ice devils in Celebre must be in a screaming panic. They will send word to Stralg that I’m sniffing around. Warbeasts cannot run all that way, so they will have to use chariots, and that means the message will go via the Vigaelian reserves camped near Umsina. The commander there is Hostleader Franin. He’s a greenhorn, too, because Stralg needs to keep all his experienced men active in the field. He will send the message on, of course. Stralg’s been burned often enough to suspect a trap, but I’m gambling that Franin will decide to move his camp closer to Celebre without waiting for orders. So two or three days from now an entire host, more than twenty sixties, will set off at the double.”
Her arm slid around him. “And?”
“And I’ll ambush them.” Unless Cavotti had totally lost his touch, Franin would bivouac the first night in the eminently suitable campsite at Black Lake, with his troops exhausted by a day’s forced march, ripe for slaughter.
“That’s wonderful!” Giunietta pulled the cloth off him and he realized that she had removed her wrap. Oh, yes!
He rolled over, face to face, and whispered, “Thanks.”
Seers must not be asked, because they knew what a man wanted as soon as he did, or sooner. This one was certainly not one of the chatty ones. Infected by his unspoken desire, she was just as urgent as he was, which was fine. She kissed his mouth fiercely. He cooperated with lips and hands, tongue. His body had already completed its own battleforming. The lady brazenly reached down to encourage it. Soon she rolled over and pulled him on top of her.
Apparently Butcher was still staring at the night and hadn’t noticed what was happening nearby. “Who’s going to be doge after Piero dies?”
The lovers paused. Cavotti felt her shaking with laughter in his arms.
He said, “Don’t know, don’t care. Chances are there won’t be anything left to be doge of.”
Butcher said, “Ah! Carry on then.”
He lay down and turned his back.
Part II
SALTAJA HRAGSDOR
awoke with a snarl. For a moment she was confused by chinks of daylight peering around shutters, by solid masonry walls and paneled ceiling. Then she remembered she was in Tryfors, lying under clean blankets on a level sleeping platform, not some lumpy riverbank. So why the oppressive mood? Ah, yes! She had been dreaming of Benard Celebre.
Benard Celebre? Jarred, she sat up and peered at her arm. Last night she had sought guidance from the Mother, offering blood. She had felt the power flow and the cut was already healed, so what sort of reward was a useless dream of Benard Celebre ambling along a Tryforian street like some amiable half-wit bear? She had not seen him on her way through Kosord in the summer, but she had no doubt that it was he that she had just dreamt, and here in Tryfors, too.
That was ridiculous! She had given Horold leave to kill him. Her brother was a pathetic relic of the fearsome warrior he had once been, but he should be able to dispose of one penniless hostage. And even if Ingeld had somehow smuggled her boy lover out of the city, the satrap’s Witnesses should have reported where Benard was and Horold’s Werists should have run him down within hours.
Saltaja yelled to waken Guitha, who was sleeping on a mat near the door.
Benard? Was this some doing of his sister? Was this the final proof that Fabia Celebre was indeed a Chosen?
Not for nothing was holy Xaran known as the Mother of Lies. She spoke to all Her children, but not always with a clear voice, lest they betray Her secrets to lesser gods, who were young and foolish. She was usually helpful to Her Chosen, although even they could never count on Her absolutely. If two came into conflict, She might aid both, or aid one and deceive the other. Or deceive both.
As she attended to her toilet, Saltaja continued to puzzle. Her problems never grew any less. Her brothers, especially Therek, had become dangerously irrational. She would have to waste several days here in Tryfors repairing him and might not extend his useful life by more than a year or two. On the way home she would have to stop off in Kosord to mend Horold also. At times she even wondered about Stralg himself. As a natural-born warrior, he had required far less Shaping than any of his brothers, but the steadily worsening news of the war made her wonder if he were decaying also. Then there was yesterday’s news about Kwirarl, the last of her sons dead, and these “New Dawn” rebel Werists massing at Nuthervale. With winter coming on, they were the most urgent problem. Last night she had dispatched warnings to both Horold and Eide, telling them to prepare for a spring campaign before the traitors grew any stronger.
Her life’s work was unraveling in front of her eyes.
“Brainless slut!” Saltaja swung a slap that almost knocked Guitha off her feet. “A clean shift, I said! From that box!”
Wailing, Guitha ran to obey. The girl was useless, incompetent even at helping her mistress dress now. She would have to be replaced soon, before she became incapable of even dressing herself. The Dominance Saltaja had used on her was quick Control, but it soon burned out the mind. It was not to be compared with the painstaking Shaping that Saltaja and Hrag together had used on his sons from their conception through to manhood.
She pushed dismal thoughts out of her mind and concentrated on dressing, in spite of Guitha’s bumbling. Tryfors Palace was surely the most dismal, bleakest royal residence on the entire Face, and in all the years since Stralg terminated the line of local kings and installed his brother as satrap, Therek had done nothing to improve it. No matter; it was a joy to pamper herself, to be rubbed with scented oil, try on fresh clothes specially made since she arrived yesterday, and to admire herself in a reasonably-sized silver mirror while Guitha wielded a hairbrush with the subtlety of a peasant flailing grain.
Saltaja’s hair was snowy white but had always been so. Her skin was unusually pale, even for a Vigaelian, and her eyes a startling dark blue-Hrag had claimed that he arranged that distinctive touch when she was an infant. Her face was too elongated to be beautiful, but beauty was much less useful than power. She could still pass for less than forty, although she was almost twice that.
“Now my wimple.” Living up to her reputation as Queen of Shadows, she always wore black, even to the cloth that concealed her hair and neck, the long cuffs draping her hands. Nothing but her face was ever visible to anyone except the many Guithas who had served her over the years-and certain highly privileged men, in the past. She must find a replacement Guitha here in Tryfors before she left. She always named her current maid Guitha, after the one who had been her first experiment in Dominance.
A new Guitha would have to wait. The first item of business today must be to confirm that the Celebre girl was a Chosen of Xaran. To give her a fair chance, though, she should be moved to some lower dungeon where she could draw power from the Mother. Then send in the brute Werist that Therek had promised. Back in Skjar, Saltaja would have arranged to have the rape done in a cell with a spyhole, so she could watch how it went, but Tryfors had no such convenience.