As was the fashion, the stairs curved around to the right, so that an attacker fighting his way upward would have to expose his entire body to use his sword while a defender above him could strike with only his right arm and side exposed. He could hear the sergeant major beginning to breathe heavily behind him as they went upward and the two flanking men had to fall behind on the narrow stairway. He could easily sprint away from them here, he realized. But the question remained, where could he go? Once again, he decided to bide his time for a better opportunity. Once he tried to escape, he knew, any chance of pretending innocence was gone. He decided to wait until his chances of success were better. Here, in the heart of Orman's castle, with armed men behind him and nowhere to go but upward, those chances didn't look too bright.
They reached Orman's fourth-floor suite of rooms. Will hesitated at the door to the anteroom but the mace prodded him once more.
"Go on in," the sergeant major's grim voice ordered and, with no choice but to obey, Will did as he was told.
Xander was at his table in the anteroom. He looked up as they entered without knocking. If he was surprised to see the minstrel being escorted by three armed men, he gave no sign of it. He held up a hand, motioning them to stop, then slipped out from behind his paper-laden table and opened the door to the inner office. Will heard his quiet voice.
"The men have brought Barton, my lord," he said. There was an indistinct mumble from inside the room and he bowed his head quickly and emerged, motioning for the sergeant major and Will to enter as he opened the door wider.
The mace prodded Will in the back again. That little habit was starting to annoy him and he was tempted to take the weapon from the sergeant major and do a little prodding of his own. Truth be told, he was curious to know what Orman wanted from him, and as long as he didn't summon more guards, Will was confident he could escape any time he chose.
Orman was behind his own work table. Will noticed that the books on magic were still among his papers, one of them lying open at a page marked with a leather bookmark. Orman was wearing his usual dark robe and he seemed to be hunched over in the large wooden armchair. He moved awkwardly as he waved Xander out, almost as if he was in pain. His voice, when he spoke, confirmed the impression. He seemed to form his words with difficulty and his breathing was heavy and labored.
"Well done, sergeant major. Any trouble from him?"
"None, sir. Came right peaceably," the soldier announced. Orman nodded slowly.
"Good. Good," he muttered to himself. There was a pause as he breathed heavily, then he flicked the fingers of one hand at the sergeant major in a gesture of dismissal.
"Very well, sergeant major. You can leave us. Wait outside, please."
The old soldier hesitated. "Are you sure, my lord?" he asked uncertainly. "The prisoner may try to…" He stopped in mid-sentence. He wasn't sure what Will might do. In fact, he wasn't even sure that he was a prisoner. He had been ordered to take two men and go fetch him here right away and so he had assumed that there as trouble brewing. Now, as Orman dismissed him, he began to wonder if this was simply a social matter and he remembered with some concern the prodding he had been doing all the way up the stairs.
"It's all right. Go." Orman's voice was a low whisper but the note of annoyance was clear in it. He was definitely in pain, Will thought. He heard the soldier come to attention behind him, then his boots as he marched to the door. He paused there, still unsure of the situation.
"I'll wait outside then, my lord," he said, then added, "… with my men."
"Yes. Yes. Do that if you choose," Orman told him. The door closed as the sergeant major went out. Orman rose awkwardly, favoring his left side. Will could see now that his left arm was held to his side, almost as if he was suffering from broken ribs. He winced as he moved around the table and stood before Will, His breath came heavily, as if moving that short distance was an enormous effort for him. Will started toward him.
"Lord Orman, are you all right?" he said, but Orman held up a hand to stop him.
"No. As you can see, I'm not. But there's little you can do about it."
"Are you wounded?" Will asked. "I can send for your physician." But Orman was shaking his head, and a harsh laugh escaped his lips.
"I doubt that any healers in this castle could help with what I have," he said. "No. I need help of another kind." He paused, and his eyes burned into Will's as he added, "I need the help of a Ranger."
26
There was silence in the room. Will was speechless. It was the last thing he expected to hear from Orman. He recovered, knowing that his reaction was too late, but determined to try to bluff his way through anyway.
"A Ranger, Lord Orman?" he said. "I'm just a simple jongleur." He forced a self-deprecating smile and continued, "And, as you've pointed out several times, a pretty disappointing one."
Orman made a dismissive gesture and sank painfully onto one of the straight-backed chairs in front of his table.
"Don't bandy words with me. I don't have the strength. Look, I need help and I need it quickly. They've finally gotten to me, just as they got to my father. As you can see, I'm sick, and before too much longer I'll sink into a coma and then there's nothing to stop them."
"They?" Will asked. "Who are they?"
Orman groaned again, holding his side and stomach and bending over as a wave of pain hit him. Will could see sweat forming on man's face-he was obviously in a bad way. "Keren!" Orman gasped finally. "Who the hell do you think? He's the one behind my father's sickness. He's the one trying to take over the castle!"
"Keren?" Will repeated. "But…" He paused and Orman, stronger now that the tide of pain had receded a little, continued angrily.
"Oh, of course. He's taken you in, just like everybody else. I suppose you imagined I was behind the whole plot to get rid of my father?" He looked up at Will for confirmation. Seeing it in the young man's eyes, he nodded resignedly. "Most people do. It's so easy to think that way when a person is unpopular, isn't it?"
There was nothing for Will to say. It was precisely the way he had reacted, now that he thought about it. He disliked Orman and the dislike had led him to the conclusion that the temporary Lord of Macindaw was not to be trusted. By contrast, Sir Keren's open, friendly nature had led him to view the man as a potential ally. But still, there was only Orman's word to go on here. The sallow-faced man continued.
"Look, you may be many things, but I doubt you're really a jongleur." He held up a hand to stop Will's automatic protest. "You're talented enough, I suppose, although your music isn't to my liking. But you gave yourself away the other day when I interviewed you."
"Gave myself away?" Will's mind flashed back to the conversation he had with Orman just before Alyss's arrival.
"I asked about your mandola, remember? I asked if it was a Gilperon."
"Yes," Will said slowly. He wondered where this was going. He remembered a few moments of confusion when Orman had asked the question, moments where he tried to cover up the fact that he hadn't heard of the master luthier, Gilperon. "It was simply that his name escaped me at the time, Lord Orman," he said. "As I said to you, a country musician could never afford a real Gilperon instrument, so the name simply escaped me for a few seconds."
"There is no Gilperon. The name is Gilet," Orman said flatly. "Any true jongleur should have known that."