“I’ve picked up a bit about healing in my travels,” he said airily. “Unusual things. She thought I might be able to advise her. Who’s Sulien?”
“No one you’d know.”
“You mentioned a great-grandmother. Was that Sulien?”
His questions were like arrows, striking all around the target, perhaps deliberately. He was a clever man. Would he put the next one in the bull’s eye?
“Or was Zenda your great-grandmother? And Sulien the one before that?”
Her only refuge was silence. She felt too weak to spar with him, or evade his probing questions.
After a couple of minutes of silence, he said, “Hold your tongue all you like. I think I can answer for you.”
She started but did not speak.
“You keep having nightmares about murders,” said Holm, sipping his tea. “Hardly surprising since you saw your mother murdered for an ebony pearl ten years ago, when you were the tender age of eight.”
She opened her mouth to speak but he held up a callused, square hand. “There’s no point denying it.”
“I wasn’t going to.”
“Just as well. Since the scandalous revelations at the late Lord Ricinus’s Honouring, any denial on your part would only heighten my suspicions.”
Her attempt at an indifferent shrug sent pain spearing through her shoulder.
He continued. “Everyone with an interest in ebony pearls knows that four have been harvested, from four young Pale women. But no one knows who the other hosts were. They could have been any four out of a hundred thousand young women born in Cython over the past hundred years.”
“Or more,” said Tali desperately. “There are eighty-five thousand Pale, and if there were five generations, say, and half of them women — ”
The number reminded her of her unbreakable blood oath, and her impossible duty to save her people. Every new victory by Lyf brought the fatal day closer — the day when he would have to move against the Pale, the threat at the heart of his empire.
“Something the matter?” said Holm.
“No,” she lied.
“Good. The number of Pale isn’t relevant,” said Holm, “because there’s another possibility — equally plausible. That those women belonged to a single, extraordinary family.”
Her blood ran as cold as the ice the room was carved from. He knew! He knew everything.
“Your great-great-grandmother, Sulien; then your great-grandmother, Zenda. And your grandmother…” Holm looked at her expectantly.
Tali could not fight him any longer. There was no point. “Nusee,” she whispered.
“And finally your own mother, whose death you witnessed.”
“Iusia.”
“One thing puzzles me, though,” said Holm. “Who was Mimula?”
“Mimoy. She was my thrice-grandmother, Sulien’s mother. She had a gift of magery and she was a tough, cranky old cow.”
“You knew her? Your thrice-grandmother?”
“She lived to be a hundred and nineteen. Though not naturally, Mimoy said.”
“I wonder if she could have been the first intended victim, but she got away?”
“It never occurred to me… though she did have an old scar on the top of her head.”
She looked across from him, sick with dread. “Well, you know my secret, and what I’m worth. What are you going to do with it?”
“Why would I want to do anything with it?” Holm said mildly.
“Everyone wants something from me.”
“You should learn to trust more.”
“That’s not easy to do when you’re the one, and bear a pearl in your head that’s worth a province.”
“Makes no difference to me. I have all the possessions I want.”
“You just lost your beautiful boat because of me. With the pearl you could buy another one tomorrow.”
“My boat was precious because I built it with my own hands, and because of the memories — of the places we voyaged together over twenty years. Neither can be replaced with any amount of money.”
“All right. If you’re a patriot, the master pearl could win the war for whoever you give it to.”
“I am a patriot. Doesn’t mean I’ll do anything to save my country.”
“Why did you hunt me down to the docks, if not for the pearl?”
“I didn’t know you had it. Didn’t even suspect it.”
“Why did you risk your life helping me, then?”
“When I took you aboard, I didn’t expect to be risking my life. If not for the ice, we would have escaped north and no one would have known where we were.”
“You’re a liar!” she yelled. “You were stealing the chancellor’s most valuable prisoner, and in wartime that’s treason. You didn’t do that on a whim. What patriot would? What do you want?”
He buried his head in his hands.
“Well?” said Tali. “I’ve told you my deepest secrets. You could at least tell me something.”
After a long interval, he said, “You can call it atonement, if it helps.”
“It doesn’t. Why atonement? Whose?”
“Let’s just say that I did a terrible wrong once. Not deliberately, nor by accident, but through my own negligent arrogance. Others paid dearly for my wrong, and I took a vow, long ago, to try and make up for what I’d done.”
“Oh!” she said, and knew by the way he spoke that he was telling the truth. At least, a small part of the truth. Two deaths on my conscience, he had said the other day. “What wrong did you do?”
“I don’t see that it’s any of your business.” He rose, looking old and haggard, and went to the entrance. “The best thing you can do for your shoulder is to get a good night’s sleep.”
“I might say the same thing about your own ailment.”
“I dare say you’re right. But there’ll be no sleep tonight for me, so I might as well go fishing.”
He wrapped himself in his oilskins, put on fur-lined sea boots and stomped down to the water.
CHAPTER 33
“Do I have your blessing for this raid?” said Rix after outlining his plan to Swelt.
“If we don’t fight for our country, we’ll lose it.”
“It’s just the first stroke.” Rix rose and began to pace. “If it succeeds, people will flock here to join my army and I’ll plan a bigger strike.”
“You have bold plans,” said Swelt.
“We can’t save Hightspall by hiding and hoping Lyf will go away.”
“I agree. But when it does come to war, how are you going to pay the troops? Our treasury is almost empty.”
“Every able-bodied man has to do thirty days customary service. After that, I’ll pay them. I brought a small treasury of my own,” said Rix, and was pleased to note Swelt’s eyes widen. “Did you think I came empty-handed, like a beggar on the road?”
“Of course not,” Swelt said hastily. “And when it’s exhausted? Need I remind you how ruinously expensive war is?”
“I checked Father’s accounts for the Third Army. I know the cost of a soldier, and a war, to the penny. And since we’re on the topic, Astatin mentioned the ancient, secret treasures of Garramide.”
Swelt rolled his eyes. “Many have sought them, but nothing has been found.”
“Do you think there are treasures to be found?”
“Old manors are characterised by three things, Rixium. Ghosts, secrets and rumours of lost treasure. I put my faith in things I can count and measure.” He looked down at the ledgers and lists on the table.
“Then why was Garramide built so strong?” said Rix. “It’s the strongest fortress I’ve seen outside Caulderon.”
“They say it was to protect Grandys’ daughter — his only child, only relative. She was the only Herovian rescued from the wreck of the Third Fleet. Blood was everything to him.”
Swelt turned the pages of a ledger, then added, “What if the raid isn’t the success you expect?”
“It’ll still worry Lyf.”
“How so?”
With a flourish, Rix drew Maloch and held it high. “Grandys maimed Lyf with this sword, and I’ve fought Lyf with it, twice. And hurt him, too. More than anything in the world, he’s afraid of Maloch.”