Blood in the Water (16 page)

“She needs her nap, my lady,” the nursemaid apologised. “We have had a long walk.”

“Walk,” Anilt agreed brightly, looking up at the woman.

“Of course.” Failla relinquished her daughter. Lessons in hiding humiliation learned in Carluse Castle proved useful in this household. “But join me when she’s rested. We’ll play with your ducks, shall we, chick?”

She smiled hopefully at Anilt and was rewarded with a giggle. “Ducks!”

It would take time. Drianon save them both, it wasn’t even twenty days since she’d reclaimed her child. But it was hard, and harder still not to resent Lathi’s hold on Anilt’s heart. And that was unforgivable, when all her cousin had done was help hide Failla’s pregnancy and save Anilt from life as a duke’s bastard, her only value as a game piece in Duchess Tadira’s petticoat diplomacy.

Before the nursemaid replied, a door across the panelled hall opened and three men emerged from the library.

“Upstairs, young lady.” The nursemaid took Anilt’s hand to hurry her.

“Madam Sibetha,” pleaded Gruit. “Indulge an old man after a long day’s business.”

Anilt was already twisting free of her nurse’s restraint. She ran towards Gruit, her arms upraised. Failla hid the pang that cost her. Anilt had known Gruit for ten days and adored him from the first.

“Here’s my favourite little chick.” Gruit swept her up with an ease that belied his wrinkles and snowy white hair. “Now, Anilt, say good day to these fine gentlemen.”

The three men laughed as she hid her face in the furred collar of his grass-green mantle.

“Good day to you, my little lady.” His midnight-blue gown as old-fashioned as Gruit’s, Baron Dacren bowed stiffly, leaning on his cane. His indulgent smile told Failla he was as fond a grandsire as any little girl could wish for.

Anilt looked around shyly. “Good day,” she said with endearing precision.

“Your great-niece will be a beauty to equal her mother.” Master Cardel, as yet showing only a touch of white at his chestnut temples, glanced across the hall to Failla. Pressing a hand to his red velvet paunch, he made her a polite half-bow.

“You are very gallant.” Failla made sure her smile was no more than common civility. That gleam in Cardel’s eye suggested he had more than compliments in mind. After all, she was supposedly the favoured niece of one wealthy merchant, and the widow of another, whom she’d honoured with a child thus proving her fertility.

Well, Failla had no intention of encouraging any man’s advances, save perhaps one, but he wasn’t here nor likely to be so any time soon. Did Tathrin think of her, she wondered?

“Ah, my friends, here’s your carriage,” Gruit said with honest regret.

They all heard the rattle of wheels and harness outside.

“We must bid you farewell, Mistress Failla,” Baron Dacren apologised. “It’s no weather to keep horses standing.”

“Assuredly not,” she agreed.

Courra hastily set Failla’s hat and shawl on a side table and hurried to open the door, revealing a warmly caped coachman.

“Good day.” Baron Dacren held out a wrinkled hand to Gruit. “Please congratulate your cook for serving such an elegant meal. And thank you for the food for thought.”

Failla saw a shrewd glint in the old man’s eye. What had they been saying in such privacy? Master Gruit had opened the library door himself, so they’d had no servant inside to fill their wine glasses, tend the hearth or overhear their conversation.

“A good deal to mull over.” Master Cardel offered the older man his arm and helped him down the steps. The coachman closed the door behind them.

Gruit looked from Failla to the nursemaid. “Let’s all take some cordial and wafers, shall we?”

“Cakes?” Anilt piped up hopefully.

“Just one,” Gruit warned. “Otherwise you won’t eat your supper and Madam Sibetha will scold me.”

“Don’t think I won’t,” the nursemaid agreed, amused. “Ring for me if she gets fractious.” She curtseyed impartially to Gruit and Failla. “Master. My lady.”

Still carrying Anilt, Gruit headed back into the library. “So tell me about your afternoon.”

Failla longed to hold her daughter herself. Anilt would surely come to love her better if they could spend more time together. But Master Gruit had established this household in the pattern he’d known back in Vanam, when his wife had still lived and his two daughters ran around in short skirts. As far as he was concerned, children always had nursemaids to relieve women of the burden of motherhood.

Hopefully his daughters would soon present him with a covey of grandchildren. It wasn’t that Failla begrudged the affection Master Gruit lavished on Anilt. She just wanted the chance to win her daughter’s love, to go to her when she woke in the night. She’d missed so much that even such trials appealed.

She closed the door to the hall. “Baroness Lynast invited Mistress Bohad, Lady Kishote and Lady Vapanet to view this particular dressmaker’s designs. It seems the woman is very particular whom she sews for. She would have been visiting at least one Lescari duchess if the situation there wasn’t so uncertain.”

“Who?” Gruit asked with interest.

“That she wouldn’t say, out of professional courtesy.” Failla didn’t hide her scepticism.

“Did you discuss more than the latest Toremal fashions?” Gruit set Anilt down on a cushioned settle.

“Thankfully, yes.” Failla sat down beside her daughter. The little girl folded her hands in her lap and contemplated the petticoats frothing around her knees. “Though the dressmaker did show us some beautiful gowns.”

“If it serves our purpose, buy some.” Gruit lowered himself into his preferred chair. “What do their ladyships make of recent events in Lescar?”

“They’re remarkably indifferent,” Failla said frankly. “If Duke Moncan and his heir are truly dead, then some other Sharlac lord will simply take his place. Trade along the Great West Road will go on as it always has. If Duke Garnot is unable to return to Carluse Castle for the moment, that’s of no great concern. He will soon secure whatever forces he needs to raise the siege.” She stroked Anilt’s hair as the little girl began playing with the fringe on the cushions.

“In the meantime, Baroness Lynast is delighted her husband will get such handsome prices for the meat and grain raised on their lands. Every other duke will be hiring more mercenaries, so their quartermasters will be busily buying provisions. She hasn’t the least interest in which mercenary companies these goods will be sold to or whoever might be leading this army attacking Carluse.” Failla raised her hand as Anilt twisted away, intent on her cushion.

“Lady Vapanet’s husband tells her the fighting will continue until the bad weather arrives. Then there’ll be money to be made feeding the armies in their winter camps. Once the battles resume, sometime around the turn of Aft-Winter to For-Spring, there’ll be the usual profits outfitting them. Caladhrians will prosper as they always have done, until this current conflict burns itself out, as such squabbles invariably do.”

Anilt looked up, startled by Failla’s tone. She tried to moderate her contempt but it wasn’t easy. At least her whore’s bargain with Duke Garnot had been a straightforward one. Rather than starve in the gutter with her aged mother, she had given her body in return for his favour, and she’d discreetly turned its tangible expressions such as gowns and gifts into coin. Her true self had remained untouched no matter how he used her, kind or cruel according to whim. These women seemed to have slavishly adopted all of their husbands’ greed and prejudices.

“All the while, as Lady Kishote agrees, their husbands can buy up ore and timber and whatever else the dukes will sell at prices born of their desperation for coin. Merchants like Mistress Bohad’s gracious husband will sell the peasants who’ve fled Lescar the cheapest possible goods for their last cut coppers. The ladies all look forward to buying splendid festival gowns next year,” she concluded waspishly.

Tathrin had told Failla how the Lescari habit of cutting up pennies was mocked in Ensaimin. How the other students had laughed at him when he’d first opened his purse. Now she realised she hadn’t truly appreciated his humiliation, not till she’d seen these fine ladies’ amusement.

Gruit’s snowy brows drew together in a frown. “They don’t scruple to say such things to you, when they know you’re Lescari born?”

“Of Lescari blood, not Lescari born,” Failla corrected him. “They’re careful to express their admiration for yourself and my supposed father, wise enough to leave the chaos of Lescar to those too stupid to haul themselves out of the mire.”

“What did you say to that?”

The opening door interrupted Gruit. Failla waited until the lackey had set down the tray of silver-mounted goblets and a jug of cloudy cordial. A prosaic horn beaker stood beside the crystal dish of cakes.

“Thank you, we’ll serve ourselves.” Gruit waved the youth away.

The lackey cleared his throat. “Madam Sibetha sent the little miss’s milk.”

“So I see.” Failla rose to fetch it, along with the linen napkin the nurse had thoughtfully provided.

“So,” Gruit continued as the door closed. “What did you say?”

“That Vanam’s wealthiest merchants see more profit to be made from peace.” Failla tucked the napkin into Anilt’s lace collar. “As do those with Lescari blood all across Ensaimin.”

“I take it you had to explain?” There was little humour in Gruit’s smile.

“Such a notion would hardly have occurred to them.” Failla held the beaker to Anilt’s lips.

“Cake?” the child asked hopefully.

“When you’ve had your milk.” Failla smiled as Anilt obediently drank. “Mistress Bohad thinks peace would only give Lescari smiths and potters the leisure to make goods for themselves rather than buying such things from her husband. Lady Kishote is none too keen on Lescari peasants spinning their own linen instead of selling their flax for a pittance and having to buy back finished cloth from her husband’s tenants.”

Gruit scowled more fiercely. “You pointed out that the Lescari in Ensaimin will put far more silver in Caladhrian coffers if they aren’t sending every coin they can spare to keep their kith and kin from beggary?”

Failla tipped the beaker for Anilt. “These ladies assume Ensaimin’s merchants will get first call on that coin. Only Baroness Lynast might consider peace worthwhile, if it means travel to Tormalin isn’t so disrupted by battles and bandits. She gets terribly seasick,” Failla explained sardonically. “Travelling downriver to Relshaz and taking a ship across to Solland is such a dreadful trial.”

“My heart bleeds.” Gruit heaved himself out of his chair and poured two glasses of cordial.

“At least they see no profit in Caladhrians getting involved in Lescar’s troubles.” Failla sighed. “It’s nothing to them who calls himself duke of wherever. Mercenaries can’t be trusted beyond a blind man’s bowshot, so only a fool would try to influence them. Until this storm blows over, their best course is to stay well clear. At least I could agree with that and hint they’d serve their husbands best by offering such advice behind their bed curtains.”

“Master Cardel and Baron Dacren should be saying the same around the merchants’ exchanges.” Gruit’s lip curled. “I explained just how badly Abray will suffer if Ensaimin’s merchants see Caladhrians hindering their efforts to bring peace to Lescar. We can always send our goods to Toremal via Hanchet and the Dalasor Road.”

“Did they believe you?” Failla found that hard to credit.

“Probably not, but who would have believed Lescar’s exiles would fund an army to bring down the dukes?” Gruit chuckled. “I pointed out how many Dalasorians are riding with Captain-General Evord. I may even have mentioned how eagerly the clans would welcome such new trading opportunities.” He shrugged. “Even if they think that’s the remotest roll of the runes, Caladhrians won’t want to take that chance.”

“Halcarion willing.” Failla still wasn’t convinced. “The important thing is that they stay out of this fight. Is there any sign of their parliament reconvening?”

“None,” Gruit said with relief. “Evord was quite right. The news of Sharlac’s fall had barely reached Abray by the start of festival. By the time the barons hereabouts had agreed on a message to send to Trebin, even their fastest courier couldn’t get their dispatch to the parliament before the turn of Aft-Autumn. All the barons who attended the parliament are still heading home along a score of different routes. Recalling them would take an age and a half and most of them would only start arguing about such an affront to their hallowed traditions. I don’t see them reassembling before the Winter Solstice parliament in Ferl.”

Failla hoped he was right. “So the fighting should be done before they can reach a decision.”

“If all goes to plan, and Evord’s schemes prosper.” Gruit brought her glass of cordial. “Let’s hope Lady Charoleia and Branca are having as much success keeping Tormalin’s princes from sticking their noses into Lescar’s affairs.”

“We’ll find it harder to stop interference once we have thrown down the dukes.” Sipping her drink, Failla didn’t dare contemplate any other outcome. “Did Baron Dacren ask what happens then?”

Perhaps they should follow Caladhria’s example and institute a parliament. Giving every landed lord a voice in lawmaking hereabouts meant the nobles were far too busy debating and divided into too many factions to ever resort to open warfare.