Again I tried to think of a way to intervene, something clever that would save Gribbins from the consequences of his own vainglorious folly. But I could not imagine anything that could stop the onrush of events, not unless I was willing to rush onto the bandits’ swords, run myself through, and hope my death provided enough entertainment to satiate Sir Basil and the other outlaws.
“I do not have the money,” Gribbins said. “Though if the ransom remained at thirty-five, I could raise it.”
Sir Basil snarled. “Do you bargain with us, sir?” He stepped to Gribbins’s chair, took his arm, and pulled him to his feet. He dragged Gribbins to the top of the stair, where he could view the bandits growling up at him, shaking weapons and fists. “Do you bargain with them?” he demanded.
Gribbins made an effort to control himself. “Sir,” he said, “I am heartily sorry if I impugned your—”
“Do you bargain with this?” Sir Basil asked.
I tried to turn away, but I was too late. The dirk was swift as a striking serpent, and flashed from beneath the outlaw’s cloak and into Gribbins’s side before I could so much as blink. And then, unable to turn away, I saw Gribbins’s look of shock, saw his knees begin to give way, and then saw Sir Basil withdraw the dagger and kick Gribbins down the stair, where the apothecary disappeared behind a wall of robbers.
The bandits bayed their approval, their weapons brandished overhead.
Sir Basil flicked the dirk several times to shake off the blood, then re-sheathed. His restless eyes prowled over the courtyard, then lighted on me. He made a gesture.
“You are next, Goodman. Come.”
I slowly walked through the mob of bandits, which parted only reluctantly. There I saw Gribbins dying at the bottom of the stair, his watery blue eyes blinking as they stared into onrushing darkness.
My stomach turned over. Many were the times in the last two weeks when I had cordially wished the apothecary dead, but now that it was happening, I found no pleasure in the sight.
To mount the stair, I would have to step over the dying man. I contemplated this action and found myself unable to do it, so I stepped to the side of the stair, reached up to the crumbling floor of the keep, and pulled myself up.
Sir Basil of the Heugh looked at me with mild surprise as I popped up in front of him, and stepped back to invite me to sit in the chair that Gribbins had just occupied. I seated myself cautiously, but Sir Basil threw himself carelessly into his own seat, the skirts of his overcoat flying. He crossed one booted foot over his knee, and looked at me with bright black eyes.
“You’re a lawyer, I see,” he said.
I was surprised to realize that my apprentice cap had stayed on my head through the whole adventure.
Sir Basil narrowed his eyes. “I don’t like lawyers,” he said.
“I don’t care for them myself,” I said. I had decided to agree with the outlaw whenever I could.
“My own advocate was no use at all,” said Sir Basil. “He thought I was guilty. He served me up to the jury like a mincemeat pie.”
Apparently, Sir Basil felt his fame was such that I would know this detail. I thought it impolitic to correct him.
I donned my learnèd-lawyer face. “The advocate must have been unfit.”
“I unfitted him,” said the outlaw. “I slit his nose and burnt his house.”
I nodded what I hoped Sir Basil would view as approval. “A resolute action, Sir Basil.”
“I failed to catch the judge,” the outlaw added, “but I robbed his wife.”
A flush burned in Sir Basil’s cheeks, and his black eyes flashed. The murder had stimulated him, and he shifted restlessly in his chair and spoke with restless, rapid animation.
“I was innocent of that theft,” he said. “I was a devoted priest of the goddess Sylvia, and ’tis true I had a key to the treasury under the podium of the temple. But it was another who opened the lock and took the money and the temple offerings!” He snarled. “I will admit to any deed I have committed—I will own to killing that blockhead a few moments ago—but I will not admit to a crime of which I am innocent!” He jabbed an angry finger onto the table. “They found not a single stolen article in my house—they had no evidence at all—and yet I was convicted!”
“It sounds like a monstrous injustice,” I said.
“I prayed to the goddess,” said the outlaw. “But she was as useless as my lawyer.” He snarled, and brandished a fist to the sky. “Damn all lawyers! Damn all gods! Damn the Pilgrim, and the King with him!”
I nodded, and began to think it a good idea to change the topic. “One item of your program is complete. King Stilwell is dead.”
Sir Basil raised an eyebrow. “So, that is why that imbecile called upon the Queen?”
“Yes. We have Queen Berlauda now.”
The outlaw made a noise of disgust. “She won’t last. Women can’t rule. Some ambitious knave will chuck her off her throne, or marry her and keep her so stuffed full of children she won’t think to say ‘boo’ to him.” He ran his fingers along his jawline, thoughtfully smoothing his beard. “And yet women are sentimental and foolish—would she be inclined to offer pardons, d’ye think?”
“Many pardons are issued after coronations.” I considered for a moment, then decided to seize the slight opportunity this seemed to open. I put on my respectful-apprentice face. “I could be your advocate in the capital, if you like.”
Sir Basil gaped at me, then laughed. “My advocate!” he scorned. “That is precisely what I need, another advocate! And further, one who reads his Mallio in the Rawlings translation, hah!” He pointed a finger at me. “Look you—how would you translate the following: ‘Quatenus permittit aurum prodit lex’?”
I was a little surprised to find myself at school again, but rose to the challenge. “ ‘Laws goeth where gold pleaseth.’ ” Though there was no way to translate “prodit” in all its subtlety, with its hint of betrayal, and of keeping the subject on a short leash, and bound by strict Necessity.
“Ay, plain but serviceable enough,” Sir Basil judged. “Yet Rawlings has it, ‘Howsoever gold and laws goeth ever in company.’ He understands not even that prodit, which is plain as—” He made a fist. “As the corruption of the common law by the judiciary!”
“I have the Delward translation at home,” I said. “But I preferred not to risk it on the journey.”
“That is the first wise thing you have said.” The outlaw laughed again, and shook his head. “My advocate!” His glittering black eyes regarded me for a long, unsettling moment. “So, you are not an ambassador, I take it?”
“I am a drudge,” I said, “a mere secretary. Nor am I an alderman, nor a magistrate. Nor will I call upon the Queen of Duisland when I am in the power of the King of the Toppings.”
The outlaw gave a thin smile. “Flattery may win the favor of royalty, but not Sir Basil of the Heugh. We have yet to determine your fine, Goodman . . .” He reached for a word and failed to find it. “Goodman,” he said, “I know not your name.”
“Quillifer, Sir Basil.”
“Is that a forename or a surname?”
“It is my only name,” said I. “It is one of the ways in which I am singular.”
The outlaw laughed. “And the gold chain?”
“A keepsake in memory of my father. He was an alderman, and was murdered with the rest of my family two weeks ago in an attack on Ethlebight by Aekoi corsairs.”
Sir Basil was not moved by this story, but entertained. “So, you plead that you are an orphan? A penniless orphan?”
“I was not penniless until this last hour, Sir Basil.”
“The fine for penniless orphans, Goodman Quillifer, is five royals.”