The Son of Heaven stirred a little in his chair; cramp, possibly. ‘Why do you think he seized power in the Mesoge?’
‘Lots of reasons, probably.’ Iseutz sighed and looked out of the window. ‘He saw a good opportunity and took it. The Mesoge was his home; no other way he could ever go back after what he’d done, except at the head of an army, so he took an army. And I expect if you asked him, he’d say he did it for the good of his people. Probably believes it, too, somewhere inside him. That’s another talent he’s got – he can believe almost anything if he has to.’
‘Why would he want to make war on the tribes? He helped them destroy Perimadeia.’
‘Ah.’ Iseutz nodded. ‘That’s a good one, but if you’d been paying attention you’d have figured it out for yourself. Betraying the City was one of the things he did that made Bardas hate him; so he reckons that if he fights the plainspeople and kills Temrai, that’ll make it up to Bardas. At the same time, it’ll please you people, and if he’s serious about being a king in the Mesoge, he’s going to need friends – like you, for instance. But the political stuff is only the trimmings. Bardas is the reason. Bardas motivates most of what Gorgas does, when he isn’t under orders from my mother.’
Colonel Abrain frowned. ‘Explain,’ he said.
‘The two people he hurt most,’ Iseutz replied. ‘Well, three, really: my mother, Bardas and me. In that order. So, he’s been trying to make it up to us ever since; he made it possible for my mother to play God Almighty in Scona, he’s going to kill Temrai for Bardas, and – well, he’ll get around to me later.’ She yawned and stretched like a cat. ‘Really, if you are a student of human nature, he’s a real collector’s item. He’s either an evil man who spends his life trying to do right by his own family, or a good man who did one very evil thing. Or both. Like I said, he feels the greatest obligation to my mother, because she was the one he hurt most (apart from the ones he killed, of course, but they’re dead, so he can’t help them). But Bardas is the one he really cares about.’
‘Even though Bardas killed his son?’
Iseutz shrugged. ‘Uncle Gorgas has an infinite capacity for forgiveness. Which argues against the evil-man hypothesis, just as the killing-and-betraying-cities thing argues against the basically-good theory. We’re a complicated lot, us Loredans. Almost but not quite more trouble than we’re worth.’
The Son of Heaven stood up, slowly because of his bad leg. ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘You’ve been most helpful.’
‘Oh, that’s all right.’ Iseutz stayed where she was. ‘But do me a favour, if you would. See if you can’t find some way of making life difficult for my mother – currency regulations, customs, import licences, something along those lines. She hates things like that.’
‘I’m sorry,’ the colonel said austerely. ‘The provincial office doesn’t work like that.’
‘Really? Forget it, then. Goodbye.’
When he’d gone, Iseutz sat on the floor, her back against the wall, her arms tight around her knees, thinking about the recurring dream she had in which the Patriarch Alexius told her that, if she wanted, he could take a sharp knife and cut off the Loredan half of her, leaving only the Hedin half behind. Invariably she woke up just before he started to cut. She’d never been able to work out whether it was a nightmare or not.
‘Who was that?’
She looked up. ‘The rat-catcher,’ she said. ‘I sent for him. Place is swarming with rats.’
Her mother sighed impatiently. ‘He was from the provincial office,’ she said. ‘What did he want?’
‘If you’re going to answer your own questions, what do you need me for?’
Niessa Loredan walked over to where her daughter was sitting and kicked her hard in the ribs, enough to wind her. ‘Who was he,’ she asked again, ‘and what did he want?’
Iseutz looked up. ‘He wanted to know if you like mushrooms,’ she said. ‘I said yes.’
Niessa kicked her again, rather harder, and pulled her foot away before Iseutz could grab hold of it. ‘I haven’t got time to bother with you now,’ she said. ‘I’ll send Morz up to take away your books and your lamp, and don’t think you’ll get anything to eat.’
‘Good. I’m sick of soup.’
Niessa bent down. ‘Iseutz,’ she said, ‘don’t be tiresome. What did he want?’
Iseutz sighed. ‘He wanted to know about Uncle Bardas and Uncle Gorgas. I told him – well, all the stuff I knew he knew already. That’s all I could tell him. I don’t know any more.’
‘Well.’ Niessa straightened up. ‘You told him what he wanted, then? We have to co-operate with these people; we depend on their goodwill.’
‘I told him everything I know.’
Niessa nodded. ‘And you weren’t rude or difficult? Well, of course you were. But you didn’t attack him or anything?’
‘Mother!’ Iseutz said angrily. ‘For pity’s sake. You make me sound like I’m mad or something. What do you think I did, chase him round the room on all fours trying to bite his ankles?’
Niessa walked to the door and opened it. ‘We have to co-operate,’ she said. ‘It hasn’t been easy since we moved here; I’ve had to work very hard. I won’t have you spoiling it for me. Understood?’
‘Perfectly.’
That sideways look again – fear, she’s worried. I love it when she’s worried. ‘Iseutz,’ Niessa said, ‘one day, everything I’ve worked for, everything I’ve built, will come to you. You’re my daughter, the only family I’ve got left. Why must you always be trying to spoil things for me?’
Iseutz laughed. ‘You’re going to die and leave me all your money? Fat chance. If I thought you were mortal, I’d have bitten your throat out in the night.’
Niessa closed her eyes, then opened them again. ‘You come out with things like that, and then you wonder why I keep you here. I know you don’t mean it, you’re just trying to shock me. You should have grown out of that when you were ten.’
CHAPTER FOUR
There wasn’t much wrong with Sammyra that an earthquake wouldn’t fix, except for the smell. The post coach had broken a wheel on its way down the mountains, which meant it was late getting in; the connecting coach to Ap’ Calick was long gone. There would be another one through in the late afternoon. Until then, Bardas was at liberty to wander about the town and absorb its unique ambience.
‘Thanks,’ he said. ‘Can’t I just sit here and wait?’
The posthouse keeper looked at him. ‘No,’ she said.
‘Oh.’ He looked up the street and down again. ‘Can I have a drink of water, please?’
‘There’s a well just down the road,’ the keeper replied. ‘There, on the left, by the burned-out mill.’
Bardas frowned. ‘No offence,’ he said, ‘but is the water here all right to drink?’
‘Well, we drink it.’
‘Thanks,’ Bardas said, ‘but I’ll see if I can find some milk or something.’
There were plenty of inns and taverns in Sammyra. There were the uptown inns, cut into the rock of Citadel Hill or amplified out of natural caves; most of them had signs by the door saying ‘No Drovers, Pedlars or Soldiers’, with a couple of large men leaning in the doorway to explain the message to any drovers, pedlars or soldiers who weren’t able to read. There were the middle-town taverns, an awning giving shade to a scattering of old men sitting on cushions on the ground, with a dark doorway behind. There were the downtown booze-wagons, drawn up in a circle on the edge of the horse-fair, with a hatch in the side into which money went and from which small earthenware jugs emerged. Bardas chose one of the middle-town awnings at random; it doubled as a knife-grinder’s booth and doctor’s surgery, and there was an old woman sitting at the back singing with her eyes shut, though Bardas didn’t know enough about Sammyran poetry and music to tell whether she was an attraction or a pest. The song was something to do with eagles, vultures and the return of spring, and a lot of it appeared to be mumbling. Bardas didn’t care for it very much. He sat down in the opposite corner; the old men stopped what they were doing, looked round to stare at him, then turned away. A very short, bald man with a long beard suddenly appeared behind his left shoulder and asked him what he wanted to drink.