"Like a market day, only better."
Gerek bounced. "Fairs are good," he declared.
The trader bowed again and produced from the pocket of a voluminous trouser leg a small crimson top which he presented with a flourish. "So we have your permission, Your Grace?"
"Yes." Gerek took the top quickly, before any of the adults standing around could decide he wasn't to have it. " 'Cause I am taking care of things till my papa comes back."
A slender man with short blond curls, who leaned negligently against one of the smaller wagons, smiled.
"… your due was accused by bards, was he, lady? We don't have much use for bards in Cemandia. Now you won't find finer pins than this anywhere…"
"… fine-looking young ram and I can give you a good price for him, too. Folk in Cemandia appreciate the work that's gone into breeding for him, let me tell you…"
"… save you an incredible amount of work, they will. I can't imagine no traders from Shkoder have brought them in. Well, never mind, I can beat their prices right out of the Circle…"
Olina walked slowly around the small fair, admiring the subtle—and occasionally less than subtle—working of Cemandian influence. She stopped for a moment to watch a fair young man keep half a dozen clubs in the air in a spinning cascade. His golden-blond curls gleamed in the afternoon sun and a breeze chased itself through the gilt. Below the pushed-up sleeves of his cotton shirt, the muscles of his forearms danced under the pale sheath of skin. As the small crowd gathered around him gazed open-mouthed at his skill, Olina dropped her eyes to the fit of his breeches.
"He's no more than a mountebank really." The portly trader stood suddenly by her side, wiping his jowls with a huge square of linen. "But we've found that a little free amusement makes people less willing to argue a price."
"He looks very…" Her brows dipped speculatively. "… coordinated."
"Yes. I suppose."
"When he's finished, could you tell him I'd like a private performance. Tonight. In the keep."
"He warned me that you'd eat me alive."
Olina laughed. "Maybe later." She stretched out her legs and crossed her feet at the ankles. "I like you with those short blond curls. It makes you look younger, more vulnerable."
Albek helped himself to a cup of beer. "Thank you." He wore a rough homespun vest over his wide-sleeved shirt and his manner echoed his clothing; his voice less polished, his speech less subtle. "Rumor says the king accused Pjerin of treason, sent a bard to condemn him, and a hundred guards to drag him away."
"There were twenty guards, but rumor got the essentials right. It was too much for poor old Bohdan. He's tottered off to his daughter's and taken to his bed."
"So the new due will need a new steward. Unless you intend to do the job yourself."
"Don't be ridiculous. I have someone suitably sympathetic to Cemandia in mind."
"You're certain Pjerin is dead?" Albek asked, leaning against the mantel.
"It probably happened some time ago, but you know what the roads are like at this time of the year. I'm expecting the official messengers to ride up any day now, covered in mud and glad to be done with it."
"I told you it would work."
"Yes, you did. Now, tell me why you've brought so many little friends with you across the border?"
"Two reasons." He turned a chair and sat straddling it, arms resting along the top of the back. "Albek always traveled alone so Simion does not. Albek was an aristocrat of traders, polished and urbane. These people are as far from that as I could stand traveling with. And…" He took a long pull on the cup and wiped his mouth on the back of his hand. "… as I had to check out the situation anyway, I thought I could use the opportunity to stir up a little sedition. Nothing overt, just a bit of Cemandia good, Shkoder bad."
Olina looked thoughtful. "So these traders work for you?"
"Not directly. But the Cemandian crown will be buying more fleece and timber than it really wants this year."
"The crown seems to be spending a lot of money on this considering the pass is open to them now."
Albek/Simion shrugged. "Wars are much more expensive and the longer they take to win, the more they cost. We have a saying in Cemandia that the word is not only mightier than the sword, but it's cheaper, too. By the time Her Majesty's army comes through that pass, I want the only resistance to come from parents who don't want their* children to join up."
"That might not be so difficult to accomplish." She told him how Gerek had unwittingly been adding to the Shkoder bad opinion. "By the time the child's finished, Pjerin will be a martyr to half of Ohrid."
"But Pjerin was anti-Cemandia."
"•Cemandia good, remember? We're looking for an emotional response." Olina slowly stood. "They were left so emotionally flayed by his betrayal that they're very open to suggestion and will only remember that Shkoder killed him."
"It sounds as though you've been busy."
"I may have dropped a word or two in the right ears."
He could feel her strength, the heat of her focus, from across the room. "And the other half?"
"Pjerin was going to sell them out. They hate him. If he was anti-Cemandia, they're for it."
"But he was going to sell them out to Cemandia."
"You're forgetting that in an emotional response rational thought has no place. If you can manage to invoke two or three conflicting emotional responses, rational thought has no chance. Those who aren't convinced to help the invasion will either be so confused that they won't hinder it or easy enough to remove." She reached up and pulled out the pins holding the weight of her hair. It cascaded down over her shoulders like a fall of night. "Come here."
He stood and wet lips gone suddenly dry. It was a long walk to her side and his past walked with him, murmuring in his ear, anxious for the release she could offer.
Strong fingers reached out and snaked through golden curls, pulling him forward over the last couple of feet. "It's time Cemandia showed me some return on my investment."
Later, much later, Olina took the edge of his ear in her teeth and murmured, "Many of them fear the bards, fear the Singing of the kigh."
He twisted under her grip, unable to remain still. "No one Sings the kigh in Cemandia."
"Yet another convincing reason to for them to switch allegiance." The nails of one hand scored the inside of his thigh. "Half of them already believe there are things that should not be allowed in the Circle. After all…" She smiled as he cried out. "… who knows what fell powers these bards can exert if they so desire."
"Annice, what are we doing here?"
"We're traders, remember?" She stepped over a small, foul-smelling pile she had no wish to investigate too closely and turned down a narrow street that led toward the center of town. "We're going to trade."
Pjerin grabbed her arm and pulled her to a stop. "We are not traders," he snarled after glancing around to make certain he wouldn't be overheard. "And we're going to Ohrid."
She glared at him until he removed his hand, then she asked, "If we aren't traders, what are we?"
"We're just telling people we're traders." His nostrils above the dark bristle of incipient mustache were pinched almost shut. The six days' travel up River Road, afraid to open his mouth for fear he'd be recognized and dragged back to Elbasan, had rubbed his nerves raw and he'd had as much as he was going to take. "I'm tired of pretending to be something I'm not."
"And you think I'm not tired of it?" she demanded incredulously. "The bards have a corner in every inn along River Road. I could've slept warm and dry and well fed inside. Instead, because we're traders, I slept under a cart and worked at not being seen by people who might know me. I had to constantly keep reinforcing our story. I couldn't relax. I couldn't sing. I couldn't play."