Lescari Revolution 03: Banners In The Wind (5 page)

Branca didn't doubt it, though she longed to ask Jettin how answering one wrong with another could conceivably be called justice. But Kerith was standing silent, dour faced, so she did the same, while the youth reiterated all those arguments that Reniack's writings had spread so effectively, even before the first mercenary in their rebellion's service had drawn a blade.

The dukes owed a duty to their vassal lords and to the commoners who in turn owed those vassals their fealty. That was what balanced Raeponin's scales. The dukes should defend the low-born, not abuse them. They should ensure all folk had shelter and food, not merely indulge their own appetites. In Raeponin's name, they should uphold justice for all, from highest to lowest, not grind the populace beneath their noble heels, leaving them no hope of redress.

The dukes owed the folk of Parnilesse all this and more in return for the loyalty they demanded. But they had broken that compact, for generations now. Duke Orlin, Lord Geferin and their kind had merely answered for their crimes and those of their forefathers. No god would deny it, not Raeponin or even Saedrin himself.

Branca could barely restrain herself. Didn't Jettin see the gulf between these weasel words and Reniack's self-indulgent revenge? Why was he mouthing this corrupt piety, when Reniack was just as ready to quote the arguments of the Rationalists when it suited him, denying the existence of any gods?

The boy had been a scholar. Logic was one of the most rigorous disciplines taught at Vanam's university, where Jettin's father had so proudly sent him. The spice merchant was one exile who had prospered splendidly, thanks to hard work and his determination to ignore the unthinking disdain that even the most well-disposed Vanamese reserved for Lescari blood.

If only he had taught his son such restraint. Branca had seen Jettin seethe, overhearing some contemptuous remark in a Vanam tavern. As often than not, he would challenge the thoughtless speaker to justify their words. He'd been caught up in more than one brawl as a consequence.

She and Kerith had thought nothing of it, simply glad to enlist Jettin's passion in the service of their unknown homeland. They were paying for that lack of insight now.

Harsh questions were on the tip of her tongue when she saw movement in the gloom at the end of the hall. Branca stiffened. Aremil? The shadowy figure was striding confidently forward but that meant nothing. Here in this imagined refuge, she had become used to seeing him freed from all the infirmities inflicted by his disastrous birth.

No. As the figure moved closer, she recognised that stocky build, the short beard jutting belligerently. Though it seemed Reniack had cropped his hair. Before, he had worn it long to cover his ragged ears, nailed to the pillory when Duke Orlin's men had finally caught him.

His writings, smuggled around markets and taverns, had long accused Orlin of poisoning his own father. According to Reniack, Lord Geferin had also been complicit in that murder, along with their sister Tadira, duchess to Duke Garnot, whose blood now stained Carluse Castle's cobbles.

Orlin's men had planned a lingering, painful death for Reniack, only for the rabble-rouser to rip himself free before fleeing into exile.

The simulacrum walked through a pillar as though it were not there. Branca saw no awareness in its eyes and guessed this was merely some reflection of Jettin's newfound devotion to Reniack's cause. She shivered uneasily and stole a glance at Kerith.

He stood, implacable, eyes hooded, beard and hair trimmed close as befitted a scholar, just like his long black tunic. There was no hint that he saw the phantasm, any more than he ever saw those reflections of Aremil's unconscious longing for the health and strength denied him. Branca had concluded she only saw such things thanks to the strengthening affection linking her to Aremil. But she shared no such fondness with Jettin, which made this somewhat unnerving.

'So the common folk of Parnilesse will see justice done for themselves,' the youthful adept concluded. 'You should make sure the other dukedoms soon enjoy the same liberties, most particularly Draximal and Marlier,' he added ominously. 'Prove you are dealing in good faith with all Lescari.'

'Is that a threat?' queried Kerith. 'If we don't murder Duke Secaris, Duke Ferdain and all their innocent children, you and Reniack's ruffians will do it for us?'

Jettin simply smiled. 'Then there's the settlement in Sharlac to be considered. Reniack asks that you present his compliments to Lady Derenna and suggests she curb her husband's ambitions.'

That was a perverse roll of the runes, Branca reflected. Lady Derenna had first met Reniack when they were both exiles in Vanam. Her noble husband, Lord Rousharn, had been unjustly imprisoned by the late and previously unlamented Duke Moncan of Sharlac. Derenna had travelled the length and breadth of that dukedom and beyond, making sure other nobles knew of Moncan's infamous conduct. Reniack had been only too glad to use his eloquence to help her.

When she had joined their conspiracy, Branca had served as Derenna's maid and her link to the others through Artifice. She knew Derenna's scholarly arguments had persuaded decisive numbers of landed lords to keep their swords sheathed and their horses stabled when the rebels sought to chastise their despotic overlords.

But with three of the six dukes now dead and anarchy threatening, Derenna had yielded to her husband's arguments. He insisted the old order be renewed. All that was necessary was a balance of rights and responsibilities as advocated by Rationalist philosophies.

Rationalism be cursed
, Branca thought briefly. Had Derenna ever thanked them for restoring her overbearing pedant of a husband to her meagre bosom?

Kerith didn't respond to Jettin's barely veiled threat. 'What of Triolle? Can Reniack shed any light on what's become of Duke Iruvain and his wife?'

Lord Rousharn had persuaded Duchess Aphanie, widow of the unlamented Moncan, to appeal to Emperor Tadriol of Tormalin for protection. His irate Imperial Majesty had also demanded the surrender of Aphanie's daughter, Litasse, along with her husband Iruvain.

Jettin shrugged. 'We've no news of them.'

Was that true? Try as she might, Branca couldn't read Jettin's thoughts. If it was, then no one knew where the duke and duchess of Triolle might be.

That didn't stop Rousharn insisting that Aremil and Tathrin's denials were a lie, and it seemed he had the Emperor's ear. Unless they could discover Litasse and Iruvain's fate, Branca wasn't at all sure the letter she carried would placate Tadriol, even though Charoleia, the rebellion's unrivalled mistress of intelligence, had risen from her sickbed to compose it.

'Are you sure?' Kerith persisted. 'We know they fled eastwards towards Parnilesse after the battle at Pannal--'

Jettin cut him off with an arrogant gesture. 'I told you I've no news, and I have better things to do than bandy words with you.'

With that he simply vanished. Kerith choked back an obscenity.

'I thought we didn't want to drive him away,' observed Branca.

'I think we have better things to do than bandy words with him.' Kerith scowled. 'Did you feel any hint of his deeper thoughts?'

Branca shook her head. 'Nor any clue as to how he's hiding himself so thoroughly.'

That was another savage irony. Confident in their knowledge, she and Kerith had agreed to use their Artifice in the rebels' service, keen to develop their understanding of these enchantments outside the sedate confines of Vanam's libraries and their cautious mentors. Now it seemed Jettin had outstripped them both, garnering knowledge he had no intention of sharing.

She braced herself. 'We should ask Mentor Tonin--'

'No.' Kerith's refusal was absolute. 'Not until we know more.'

'Mentor Tonin might know how we could learn more,' she retorted.

'By forcing Jettin to yield to us?' Kerith's face twisted with revulsion.

'That's not what I meant.' Branca knew better than to suggest that.

She had seen the guilt that gnawed at the scholar after his violent invasion of Failla's thoughts when they suspected the Carlusian girl had betrayed their conspiracy. None of them had imagined that cruelty would rebound so comprehensively on Kerith. He had endured every pain Failla had felt threefold.

Branca persisted. 'Mentor Tonin might have learned something new that could be of use.'

They knew their understanding of Artifice was incomplete. So much lore had been lost in the collapse of the Old Tormalin Empire. Scholars were only now piecing it back together, from fragments in dusty archives and, according to Mentor Tonin, with the testimony of some survivors from the Old Empire, rescued from enchanted, aetheric sleep.

Branca wasn't at all sure she believed any such thing but since encountering Sorgrad and Gren, she'd learned of the Mountain practitioners of Artifice, the mysterious
sheltya
. If Sorgrad and Gren's stories were to be believed, the scholars of the lowlands barely understood the most basic enchantments.

Most unnerving of all, even Gren, who feared nothing and no one as far as Branca could see, referred to the
sheltya
with cautious respect. Sorgrad had his own reasons for fleeing them. Apparently they decreed the few mageborn among their people be driven out into the uncaring wilds, to live or die as fate might decree. None escaped. S
heltya
always knew if they were being lied to.

That was an enchantment Branca would dearly love to master.

'I think,' Kerith began slowly, 'that Jettin has succumbed to the force of Reniack's personality all unawares. If only we can devise some way to shield him from that influence across the aether, perhaps he'll regain his senses.'

'Could we do that?' Branca had honed her skills at hiding her innermost thoughts this past half-year. Learning how hard that could be, in the throes of fear or emotion, had been shockingly unexpected. Using Artifice amid the challenges encircling them was so very different from calm academic studies in Vanam.

Perhaps Kerith was right. But she couldn't begin to imagine how they might wrap such a veil around Jettin without his consent.

Kerith turned away. 'How is Mistress Charoleia?'

Branca yielded to his determination to change the subject. 'Well enough, considering.'

Considering that Master Welgren, their apothecary in Carluse Castle, had shouted himself hoarse when she insisted on travelling with Branca. He had ruthlessly laid out all the consequences that might still arise from the tortures that Charoleia had endured.

'We're resting at the manor of a lordling who's long been a friend of hers.'

Even on her sickbed, the subtle enquiry agent's web of friends and debtors was proving of use, as it had done since the earliest days of their conspiracy.

Kerith frowned. 'You didn't make for Triolle?'

'She needs quiet and calm, and it's not as if we had any news for Tathrin.' Branca hoped Kerith didn't see her reluctance to visit the castle, to face all Tathrin's questions, his anxiety on Aremil's behalf. His friend must surely have let slip how she had withdrawn from him. 'We take passage on a sailing barge down the Dyal tomorrow,' she continued briskly. 'Then a seagoing ship will take us to Solland.'

Despite her injuries, Charoleia was insistent that only her charm and eloquence could rebuff those Tormalin princes intent on interfering in Lescari affairs. No one was prepared to argue that point.

But her suffering was something else none of them had foreseen. Neither Branca nor Charoleia should ever have come within any duke's henchman's brutal grasp. Her maid, loyal, gentle Trissa, shouldn't have been tortured to death. In her frantic efforts to save them, Branca should never have been forced to--

'Aremil?' Kerith turned.

Branca saw a high-backed chair had appeared in the midst of the hall. For the moment, it was empty.

'I must go.' She looked down at her skirt, to reassure herself it was still the demure brown of her travelling gown. Aremil's imagination was wont to clothe her in brocades and silks if she let him.

Not any more. She couldn't bear to share more than the remotest connection with him. He knew what she had done. She couldn't bear to feel the horror shading the pity in his thoughts. She certainly wouldn't stand for Kerith knowing her appalling secret, and she wasn't at all sure she could summon up the resolve to hide those dreadful memories from him. Not when her ties to Aremil left her so horribly vulnerable.

Summoning all her resolve, she thrust the enchantment away, fleeing to the sanctuary of the Carlusian manor's silent library.

She barely managed it in time. As she felt the firm leather chair beneath her and focused on the lamp she had lit against the afternoon's gloom, Aremil's hesitant voice echoed in her ears.

'
Kerith, forgive me, but I need you to send urgent word to Failla.'

Chapter Four

Failla

Ashgil Market Hall,

in the Lescari Dukedom of Carluse,

10th of For-Winter

As she passed from the fading sunlight into the shadowed arcades of the market hall, dizziness overwhelmed her. She hastily sat on the broad base of a stone pillar.