By Heresies Distressed (66 page)

“I don't care how capable Cayleb might be, My Prince,” Raimynd put in. “I have to agree with Earl Tartarian. I can't see how he could have done it, either.”

“It's almost enough to make you believe Clyntahn has a point about heretics and Shan-wei looking after her own, isn't it?” Hektor's chuckle contained no humor at all.

“I'm not prepared to go quite that far, My Prince,” Tartarian said. “I am ready to concede that he has Shan-wei's own
luck
, though.”

“I agree. At the moment, though,
how
he did it matters a lot less than the fact that he
did
do it. And the fact that we are now well and truly screwed.”

No one else spoke for several long moments. At last, Anvil Rock stirred in his chair.

“I'm afraid you're right, My Prince,” he said heavily. “With Koryn's field force gone, we aren't going to be able to put another one together for at least three or four months. And anything we could cobble together would be far less well-equipped—and trained—than the army we've just lost, even if we had the time . . . which we don't.

“According to our latest reports, Cayleb already has three strong columns moving out from the Dark Hills across Manchyr. What's left of Windshare's cavalry is trying to harass him, but not very successfully. They're managing to slow him down, but I still estimate that he'll be here, outside the capital, within a five-day. The garrison we have can hold the entrenchments for a time, at least, but we'd anticipated having Koryn's forces—especially his artillery and musketeers—available as well. If Cayleb wants to pay the price in lives, he can probably storm the works. If he's willing to settle for a siege, instead, we might hold out for several months. We've stockpiled sufficient food for the city's population and the garrison for that long, but to make it last that long, we'll have to institute rationing right now. And get as many unnecessary civilian mouths as possible out of the city as quickly as possible, too.”

“And his navy has Manchyr Bay completely sealed,” Tartarian added grimly. “Even if the Temple were in a position to send relief, I don't see any way that it could get past the Charisian Navy.”

“Neither one of you is telling me anything I didn't already know,” Hektor sighed. “I think we're going to have to play for time. We might be wrong—the Temple might actually have a relief fleet on its way, strong enough to do some good. I'm not saying I believe it does; I'm only saying it's possible. And that I will be
damned
if I surrender to Cayleb Ahrmahk after this long until I absolutely have to.”

The silence after his final sentence was finally said aloud was profound.

“My Prince,” Raimynd said finally, “I believe we could still get you out of the capital. As long as you're free to rally the nobles, it's possible that—”

“No, Lyndahr.” Hektor shook his head. “As Rysel's just pointed out, our entire stock of new weapons was captured with Koryn, for all intents and purposes. Putting troops armed with nothing but pikes and matchlocks into the field against him would be useless. And the casualties we'd take would probably be enough to turn the survivors permanently against my House, especially after people realized I'd known how bad they'd be all along. Nor do I propose to run around, like a rabbit or a hedge lizard looking for a hidey hole, while Cayleb beats the bushes for me. If I've lost, I'll take my chances on my feet, not cowering in a cupboard somewhere until they haul me out by the scruff of the neck!”

There was another moment of silence. This time, it was broken by Anvil Rock.

“I hate to say this, My Prince, but I believe you're probably right. Certainly, you're right about the uselessness of trying to fight them with old-fashioned weapons. And I'd have to say that, based on the way he's treated his prisoners, I don't think Cayleb is the sort of man to seek blind vengeance. I don't doubt he'd prefer to see you dead, especially after all of the, ah . . . animosity between your house and his and all the blood that's been shed. But if it's a choice between the pleasure of taking your head and finding the troops to control Corisande in the face of the backlash that might provoke from your subjects, I think he'll probably forego your execution.”

“That's what I think, too,” Hektor said. “And don't think for a moment that I don't find the fact that I'm forced to think that way . . . irritating.” The last word came out covered with fish hooks. “On the other hand, I'd just as soon keep as much maneuvering room as I can. And at least we've gotten Irys and Daivyn safely out of Corisande.”

His face tightened, the anxiety of a father who had sent two of his children into danger in an effort to protect them from still greater danger showing in his eyes, in the tightness of his lips. But then he shook himself.

“I'm not planning on sending him any surrender offers anytime soon,” he told the other three. “As I say, there's always a chance, after all, no matter how slim. And however ‘merciful' Cayleb may be feeling, I can always hope one of his own Temple Loyalists will get to him with a knife, one fine night.”

“Should I assume, Colonel,” Emperor Cayleb asked coldly, “that you have somehow failed to grasp my intentions in this matter?”

Colonel Bahrtol Rohzhyr had the appearance of a man who wished he could be anywhere else as he stood in Cayleb's command tent facing an irate emperor. The Commissary officer was effectively the chief quartermaster for Cayleb's army, and, by and large, he'd done an outstanding job so far, aided by the Charisian Navy's ability to move large quantities of supplies quickly by water. At the moment, however, he clearly didn't expect his past accomplishments to loom very large in Cayleb's thinking.

“No, Your Majesty,” he said.

“In that case, perhaps you could explain to me why my instructions haven't been carried out?”

Cayleb's voice was even colder, and Rohzhyr swallowed unobtrusively. Then he stiffened his shoulders and faced the emperor squarely.

“Your Majesty, they don't
believe
us.”

“
Who
doesn't believe us? Your assistant commissaries?”

“No, Your Majesty—the Corisandians. The
Corisandians
don't believe you're serious.”

Cayleb's eyebrows rose, and Merlin found himself hard-pressed not to chuckle as Rohzhyr faced his emperor with an expression which was part pleading, part confusion, and part outraged virtue.

Unlike most Safeholdian Commissary officers, Rohzhyr was actually honest. By tradition, most commissaries took a ten percent “bite” off the top of all funds which passed through their hands. In most kingdoms, that was considered one of the perquisites of their position; in Charis, that wasn't the case, and Rohzhyr had never shown any temptation to emulate his more sticky-fingered counterparts in other realms.

In addition to his honesty, he possessed the virtues of intelligence and energy, but he was an outstanding example of what had once been called a “bean counter” back on Old Earth. He was organized to the point of fanaticism, and he was one of the people who'd seized upon the introduction of the abacus and Arabic numerals with both hands. Outside the regulations and requirements of the Commissary, however, he had about as much imagination as a boot. And he was possessed of a strong sense that things should be done the way they'd always
been
done, only more efficiently.

Now Cayleb settled into the camp chair beside the table at the center of his tent, looking at Rohzhyr, and the Commissary officer clasped his hands nervously behind him.

“What do you mean, they don't think I'm serious?”

“Your Majesty, I've tried to explain it to them. They just don't believe it.”

Merlin wasn't really surprised to hear that.

Cayleb and his commanders were busily seizing every bag of rice, every basket of wheat, every reaper, and every horse, cow, draft dragon, chicken, and pig their foraging parties could locate. That didn't surprise the locals, however much they might have resented it. Stealing food and plundering farmers were what armies did, after all. Expecting them not to would have been about as reasonable as expecting a hurricane not to rain, although with this particular army there'd been remarkably little of the rape which often accompanied that plundering.

In this case, however, Cayleb wasn't collecting the food and other supplies for his own army's sustenance. He was collecting those items primarily to deprive Hektor of them, although he was also quite willing to use the confiscated food to feed the prisoners who'd once been Sir Koryn Gahrvai's army. That particular difference in approach had absolutely no significance for the unhappy original owners of the food, animals, and agricultural equipment involved. What
did
have a certain burning significance for them was that, contrary to the practice of virtually all other armies, the Marines were actually issuing receipts for the private property which had been seized. Receipts which would be redeemed in cold, hard cash at the end of the campaign. At which point Cayleb fully intended to tap the treasury currently in Hektor's possession in order to pay for them.

It was a novel notion, and one which had occurred to Cayleb entirely on his own. As he'd pointed out, one of the better ways to defeat the Group of Four's propaganda was to earn the trust of those people actually in contact with Charis by concrete deeds instead of printed broadsides.

“Let me get this straight,” he said now. “You're telling me the Corisandian farmers are refusing to accept the receipts our foragers are handing out?”

“More or less, Your Majesty.” Rohzhyr shrugged slightly. “Some of them take them, but they don't make much effort to keep track of them. And others, I'm afraid, are selling them to anyone ‘foolish enough' to offer them hard cash on the spot for them.”

“At what sort of exchange rate?” Cayleb asked, his eyes narrowing.

“Most of them are prepared to settle for a hundredth piece on the mark, Your Majesty,” Rohzhyr sighed, and Cayleb's jaw tightened ominously.

“And are these so-generous speculators Charisians?” he inquired icily.

“Some of them,” Rohzhyr admitted. “Possibly most of them. I really don't know. I only know the locals don't think our receipts are worth the paper they're written on. I wouldn't be a bit surprised if some of them are using them in their outhouses, Your Majesty.”

“I see.”

It was obvious to Merlin from Rohzhyr's expression and body language that he, personally, believed Cayleb's quest to actually reimburse the citizens of a land with which he was currently at war was quixotic, at best. In fact, the Commissary seemed to find the entire notion almost immoral. An unnatural act on a par with incest, perhaps. He wasn't about to come out and say it in Cayleb's presence, but it was pretty clearly his opinion that if the Corisandians chose not to accept or hang on to the receipts they'd been offered, that was their lookout, not his.

“Listen to me carefully, Colonel,” Cayleb said after a moment. “The policy of the Imperial Navy and the Imperial Marines is going to be that we pay civilian owners for what we seize from them.
Civilian owners
, Colonel. I'm not going to pay a pack of greedy Charisian speculators instead of the people whose property we actually took.”

“Your Majesty, I understand that, but—”

“I wasn't quite finished speaking, Colonel.”

Rohzhyr's mouth closed with an almost audible click, and Cayleb favored him with a frosty smile.

“I'm afraid your clerks are going to find their workload just got a bit heavier,” the emperor continued. “From this moment on, receipts for confiscated property are not transferable. They will be honored only when presented by the individual to whom they were initially issued or, in the event of his death, his legal heirs. Is that understood?”

“Yes, Your Majesty! But . . . how are we going to be able to prove the individual presenting the receipt is the one who actually received it in the first place? And what happens if someone
loses
a receipt?”

“That's why your clerks are going to be working a bit harder, Colonel. First, I want a duplicate copy of every receipt we issue, complete with date, time, and place, filed by every foraging party every day, in addition to the entries in your ledger books. And I want the recorded names of at least two witnesses to attest that the name of the individual to whom the receipt was issued is correct on the receipt. Those same two witnesses will be available to
identify
that individual before a disbursing officer, if that's necessary.”

Rohzhyr's face had grown steadily longer as he visualized the additional labor involved, but one look at the emperor's expression warned him against arguing. Cayleb let him marinate for several moments, then leaned back in his camp chair and cocked his head.

“Was there anything else we needed to discuss, Colonel?” he asked pleasantly.

Rohzhyr shook his head almost convulsively, and the emperor smiled.

“In that case, Colonel, I won't keep you any longer. I'm sure you have a great many things that need doing.”

“Are you sure this is a good idea, Sharleyan?”

Empress Sharleyan paused, her wineglass halfway to her lips, and her eyes narrowed as she cocked her head at the Duke of Halbrook Hollow.

Her relationship with her uncle hadn't so much improved over the past few months as settled into one of mutual exhaustion. He continued to make no pretense about his disapproval of her marriage and decision to embrace Charis' cause against the Temple as her own. Nor did either of them pretend any longer that Sharleyan hadn't brought him with her to Tellesberg specifically because of that disapproval. Despite her conversation with Archbishop Maikel, their estrangement caused her more pain than she could possibly have expressed, and she made a conscientious effort to at least maintain their familial relationship, since it was obvious their
political
relationship had been largely destroyed. She knew he still loved her, and they both pretended during their twice-a-five-day suppers together that politics didn't exist.