She came to attention and started to salute, looked down at her bound hands, and shrugged.
"Ma'am, I'm Sergeant Rosita Gonzalez-"
"That's my lady d'Ath," the squire whose sword hovered near her back said.
"Gently, Rodard, gently," Tiphaine said, her voice empty of all emotion, like water running over smooth rocks. "She came to us."
"I'm looking for Grand Constable d'Ath," the prisoner said. "I've got messages from, ah, Princess Mathilda and-"
Tiphaine didn't sit bolt upright. Rodard didn't raise the sword or swear; he and his brother had been trained in her household for more than a decade, as pages and squires. Instead the Grand Constable untied the bundle of letters and looked at the seal on the first. It wasn't the usual shapeless blob of tallow, but a crimson disk from a stack of premade blanks, the type the Chancellor's office used. And the seal-ring was one she recognized, the Lidless Eye crossed by the baton of cadency.
"Seals can be duplicated, Sergeant," she said softly. "Or taken from prisoners."
The other woman looked at her warily; not afraid, exactly, but obviously conscious of the sword behind her, and of the pale gaze on her. A poet had once described Tiphaine d'Ath's eyes as the color of berg-ice floating down the Inland Passage on a sunless winter's day.
"The Princess said you'd say that. So she gave me a message that only you two would know, and nobody would think to ask her."
Torture out of her, Tiphaine thought, and was slightly surprised at the surge of anger she felt. Well, I did help bring the girl up from her cradle…
She nodded, and the prisoner approached. Rodard rested the needle point of his longsword over her kidneys, and Tiphaine leaned forward to hear the whisper:
"She said that you met Delia at the party, when she was serving at your feast when you took seizin"-the woman from Idaho mispronounced the feudal term-"of Ath, and Delia asked if you wanted to look at the embroidery on something."
Tiphaine's eyes narrowed a little, as close to a smile as she would get here-and-now. Mathilda had been there at that first feast at Castle d'Ath; it had been just after she rescued the girl from the Mackenzies, and was ennobled for it and given the fief. For that matter, Rudi Mackenzie had been there too, since she'd captured him in the same raid, and Sandra had wanted to get him out of Todenangst and from under Norman's eye. She hadn't thought Mathilda had known… but Delia had always gotten on well with the Princess, and had a perverse sense of humor.
"Right, you're from the Princess, Sergeant," she said. "What were the circumstances?"
The noncom gave her a brief precis; the noblewoman's eyebrows went up.
Lady Sandra is going to have kittens, she thought. Matti prisoner of the Cutters… and Odard's man working for, or with them. Which means Odard's mother still is… Hope the headsman sharpened his ax after the last one. Or it might be the rack and pincers…
"But there's more," Gonzalez said. "President Thurston… Martin Thurston is here. Four battalions of regular infantry and one regiment of cavalry-that's how I got here-and a lot of field artillery. And the Prophet Sethaz, he's got about the same of his goons, all cavalry. About a third of them the Sword, the household troops, the rest of them ranch-lander levies, but they look like they know what they're doing. They got a lot of experience in the Deseret War."
Now, that changes the equation completely, Tiphaine thought. Our preemptive strike just got preempted.
"And there was something going on at the Bossman's house last night," Gonzalez said. "Fighting, and then a fire. Then we were ordered out to beat the bushes all around the town, with the priority on anyone trying to break west. Meanwhile it looked like the whole force was getting ready to move in your direction. As soon as those Pendleton tontas got their thumbs out."
Ah, Tiphaine thought. Astrid's little black op didn't go as planned. But it didn't go entirely pear-shaped either, not if they're looking for fugitives rather than putting the heads on spears outside the gate.
"I can make it back if you let me go right now," Gonzalez said. "My squad are all in on it and they'll cover for me. Any longer and I've got to stay."
"Rodard, release her and give her back her weapons and her horse. Then get to Rancher Brown and tell him I need two hundred of his men, or as many more as he can get here within half an hour, ready for a running fight. Armand, send for Sir Ivo and Sir Ruffin, and then arm me. And call for couriers!"
She dipped her precious steel-nibbed pen into the ink bottle, and wrote:
To the Regent: I have confirmed the authenticity of the enclosed.
Then she threw that in a preaddressed courier bag and handed it to the first of the messengers, a slender whipcord man in leathers.
"Get this to the forward railway station for forwarding to Portland, maximum priority," she said, and was writing again before he'd left the tent.
By the time Sir Ivo arrived she'd sent six messages out, several clerks were writing out more, and the camp noise was beginning to swell as getting-up turned into frantic-scramble.
Ivo pulled up before the open flap and swung out of the saddle; he was wearing an old-style hauberk and conical helmet, and the loose mail and padding made him look even more troll-like than usual. Ruffin was on his heels, with his mail coif still hanging down behind and his squires scurrying behind him with visored sallet helmet and shield and lance. Ivo pushed his helm back by the nasal bar and looked at her as she stood to let the squire fasten the more elaborate modern gear on her, bending and twisting a little occasionally to make sure the adjustments were correct.
"This to First Armsman Barstow, over with the Mackenzies," Tiphaine went on to one of the clerks, who beckoned to a courier. "Ruffin, you're in charge here until I get back."
"Back?" he said.
"Something needs doing, and I don't have time to brief you. Ivo, get me two conroi of the Household men-at-arms." Those were at full strength; that was a hundred lances. "Full kit, now."
He left at the run. She went on: "Ruffin, the enemy's strength is much higher than we expected-Boise regulars and the Prophet's men are here, about two thousand of each."
He grunted as if someone had hit him in the stomach; that turned even odds into something like two-to-one against the allied force.
"We're going to have to fight to break contact, rock them back on their heels, then use the cavalry to hold them off while the infantry retreat. Get the heavy stuff moving out now. If it can't be on the rails or roads in an hour, burn it."
The last of the armor went on, the metal sabatons that strapped over her boots to protect her feet. She stepped over to the table and sketched with her finger on the map. "Put the Mackenzies here, and-"
Ruffin was nodding soberly as she concluded: "I should be back in about an hour. If I'm not, get this army out. Concentrate our troops at the Dalles, but alert the border forts as well."