Petrodor: A Trial of Blood and Steel, Book 2 (49 page)

“Sasha would love this!” she said, gazing about. “When she was little she used to climb on the palace roof sometimes. She says she's still a good climber, I'm sure she'll get to use it in Petrodor. I think she could get from one side of this city to the other without touching the ground.”

That gave Jaryd an idea.

A tile gave way beneath Jaryd's boot, clattered down the roof and broke with a
crack
in the middle of the street below. Jaryd pressed himself flat atop the apex, repressing a curse between gritted teeth. Voices from the inn rose in drunken pleasure, and from the sound of boots thundering on the verandah, it seemed the dancing had taken to the streets. No one noticed a falling tile.

Jaryd continued carefully. There was less light than he'd hoped up on the rooftops and the overlapping shelves of loose tiles were treacherous.

He climbed a new slope, trod lightly across a terrace, past a table and chairs, beneath some washing, and up onto the tiles again. Ahead and below was the inn. It looked no different from the rest of the undulating rooftops, but Sofy and Teriyan had counted streets and strides, making certain he knew exactly where it was. Jaryd was now glad they had, despite his protestations at the time. He knew Algery well, but he'd never seen it from this perspective before, and certainly not at night. Now if he could just find the right room.

Sofy had helped there too. She had followed inn staff down to the river with their baskets of laundry, posing as a water carrier herself, and had simply started conversations. Before long, she'd known not only which inn and room lodged Master Wyndal Arastyn, but what he'd had for lunch, which serving girl's backside cousin Dylis Arastyn had pinched, and all about the appalling table manners of Lady Arastyn. Sofy had seemed quite cheerful in her espionage. Jaryd had suggested that perhaps treachery came to royals naturally. Sofy had laughed.

Jaryd skirted a courtyard, paused briefly beneath a window, then climbed across to the terrace he'd selected as his target. There was no table here, no chairs, no washing line. Thick curtains were pulled behind the diamond-shaped glass panels. He crept forward and put an ear to the glass, but he could hear nothing. He waited, listening to the music and laughter down on the street. Wyndal would almost certainly be downstairs with the other nobles, but he had to be sure. He waited.

Finally satisfied, Jaryd pulled his gloves from a jacket pocket. One he pulled onto his right hand, and into the other he inserted the hilt of his knife.
Thus muffled, he selected a glass pane near the door handle and broke it with a sharp blow. Pieces fell, and clattered, but would surely attract no more attention than the falling tile had. He reached his gloved hand in and pulled the door open enough to slip in and peer past the curtains. The room was bare and small, with a single lamp burning on a small table.

Jaryd eased the terrace door closed and pushed back the curtains. He would have to hide under the bed until Wyndal returned, in case servants came to attend to the lamp. But first, he pulled his sword and practised a few swings, testing his reach within the small room. Better to focus on that, than wonder at the reception Wyndal might grant him. Better to think on that, than any confrontation with family. With family came thoughts of his younger brother Tarryn. Wyndal was clearly not as angry at Tarryn's death as Jaryd was, or he'd have killed his host family by now…or died trying. Or escaped, to plot revenge in the wilds like Jaryd himself. Wyndal was still here. He'd always been a thinker, though. Jaryd lowered his blade with a last, grim look around. Perhaps he should not pass judgment too quickly. Perhaps Wyndal was plotting something.

The door opened. Jaryd stared, frozen in place—there was no time to slide beneath the bed, it happened too fast. Just as quickly, he found himself staring down the snubbed muzzle of a loaded crossbow, cocked and ready to fire. The crossbowman entered the room, muzzle aimed unwaveringly at Jaryd's chest. Behind him, in the doorway, stood another man. He was young, with blue eyes and shoulder length blond hair. He would have been very handsome indeed, were it not for the horrific sword scar that caved in his right cheekbone, and took a slice from the bridge of his nose.

“You,” Jaryd snarled.

Rhyst Angyvar smiled coldly. “You really
are
just as stupid as everyone always said, aren't you, Jaryd?”

It was a Varansday. Alexanda Rochel hated Varansdays. Varansday morning in particular, which required him to be out of bed at an ungodly hour, to dress up in his dukely best and walk the short distance across the house grounds to the Cochindel Temple for service. Worse, a light rain was falling and a chill wind blew from the north.

“Really, Alexanda,” said Varona at his elbow, “we needn't walk. We could have taken the carriage.”

“Nonsense,” snorted Alexanda, his polished boots scraping on the garden
path. “Ridiculous to mount up just to cross a stream. Hurry up, boy!” he growled at the servants behind them, struggling to keep umbrellas above the heads of their duke and duchess. “If I have to keep ducking your blasted contraption, I'll be sitting all service with a crook neck!”

Ahead of them walked a contingent of twelve Pazira Guard, dry enough beneath wide hats and coats over armour. Behind walked Bryanne, with several earls’ daughters huddling beneath their own umbrellas, and trying not to get grass stains on the hems of their good gowns. Behind them, three earls and their wives, including Varona's brother Redolcho. Trustworthy men, of families interwoven with the Rochels for many centuries, and a long history of friendly relations in trade, war and marriage. These, Alexanda invited for company at the house. The others, especially those from foreign provinces, he was becoming thoroughly sick of.

“The gardens do look lovely in the rain, Varona,” called Tiscea, Redolcho's wife.

“Oh, don't they just?” said Varona. The green lawns were lush and wet, and the green trees dripped, and the carefully rowed flower gardens seemed to drink in the moisture and glow with pleasure. “There is so much that is beautiful around Cochindel. So much that I have been unable to see.” With a sharp glance at her husband.

“Quit your griping, woman,” Alexanda retorted. “Isn't it just like a woman to admire the beautiful garden, and never a thought for the high walls and guards that protect it from ruin.”

“I'd swear you thought we were all about to be assassinated,” Varona replied, eyeing the armed escort to their front. At the rear of their little column, a similar number of armed men made a line. “Have your negotiations been going poorly, my love?” Alexanda grunted. “Perhaps your rough tongue could be moderated by a woman's softer tones?”

“I try to secure safety and prosperity for Pazira,” said Alexanda. “Not bargain a better price for a Xaldian carpet.”

“Really, Alexanda,” Varona sniffed. She withdrew her hand from the crook of his elbow. Alexanda reclaimed it and replaced it on his arm. He gave it a firm squeeze, whatever his gruff expression. Varona sighed. After twenty-six years of marriage, one learned to recognise an apology when offered, however fleeting it might appear to others. She gave him a thoughtful look. “You look so much nicer when you brush your hair properly. It no longer sticks out like a squirrel's tail.”

“Thank you, dearest,” said Alexanda. “How nice of you to notice.” Varona smiled, and gave his arm a squeeze.

The eastern gate was overgrown with ivy and manned by a small guardpost atop the wall. Several more guards withdrew metal braces from the wall and pushed the gate open with a heavy squeal. Alexanda wondered for the dozenth time if these walls were really fooling anyone. The Pazira House defences deterred petty criminals and unprofessional assassins, nothing more. Like everything in Petrodor, it was a game of appearances.

Some of the village folk waved and called greeting as the column walked by. Varona waved back, and nudged Alexanda on the arm. He waved too. The villagers seemed to like that and called traditional Varansday blessings in their broad eastern accents. Most were peasants, but there were some local smallholders too. Some dukes refused to allow nonnobility to hold title, but Alexanda did. If a common peasant could make enough coin to buy his own plot, then he was clearly a good farmer and should be rewarded. In the Bacosh, of course, such notions would cost a man his head.

“I'm so proud to be married to a duke who is so well loved,” Varona remarked with a smile as they passed.

“That there are so few who are is proof alone that the world is full of fools,” he replied. “These people are the source of all a ruler's wealth, and all his power too, if war should come. Treat them well, and they shall grant him the world. Treat them poorly, and nothing shall save him when the troubles come. It's the simplest equation in the world, yet so many lack the faculties to grasp it.”

“Oh, Alexanda, you
also
treat them well because you like to make people happy. Don't you?”

“A luxury,” said Alexanda dismissively.

“Alexanda Rochel, you can't fool me. You're not half as hardhearted as you like people to think you are.”

Alexanda spared his wife a small, wry smile. “If you say so, dearest.”

About the temple crowded most of Cochindel and the remainder of Alexanda's earls.

There on a white horse beside the temple steps sat Captain Faldini, with a metal breastplate over chain mail and a helm instead of a hat, with a lance pointed skyward from its rest upon one stirrup guard. He and ten more horsemen kept a clear space before the steps.

“
Must
he bring his horse to Varansday service?” Varona wondered. “What does he think to do, ride it down the aisle?”

“He does his job, dearest.”

“And makes a spectacular show-off in doing it.”

“That is the nature of the man,” Alexanda admitted.

The crowd parted as the column approached and earls doffed their hats to the duke and duchess. Captain Faldini dismounted.

“Your grace,” said Faldini with a bow. He had dark eyes and prominent cheekbones, features sharp and angular beneath his helm. Some ladies thought him dashing, as he no doubt intended. Alexanda knew that Varona found him, in her own words, creepy.

Many earls, and some of the duke's own family, disapproved of Faldini's promotion to Captain of the Pazira Guard. Alexanda's cousin Redal, for one, had been furious. Lieutenant Redal could have accepted being passed over for some high-born noble, but to be passed over for the second son of a Luchani wine maker was a personal insult, at least in Redal's eyes.

Alexanda cared not. Skill, in his eyes, came from passion. He admired men of passion, something he'd learned from his father, and his grandfather before him. Alexanda loved to spend time at the vineyards, watching the master growers go about their tasks. He loved to watch a talented blacksmith hammering dark, sooty metal into a gleaming blade, or a wheelwright crafting a perfect circle from a straight length of wood. The best craftsmen, his father had shown him, had a passion for their work. And so it was with soldiers, too. Faldini had a weakness for crazy riding, was an unashamed egotist, and could have probably been a first-rate, bloody-handed butcher in the service of some other duke. But he loved his work with a passion, and he was the best available in Pazira. Promoting him to captain meant that Alexanda had to live with certain irate relatives. But overlooking him for one less talented would have meant living with his irate self. As his lovely wife often contended, that was difficult enough when there was nothing to be mad about.

“What news?” he asked Faldini in a low voice, as his wife and their guests, mingled with the surrounding crowd.

“Fast messages travelling between Cuely and Steiner Mansion,” said Faldini. “They rode all night. I think perhaps Patachi Steiner and his dukes plan to attack Dockside and reclaim the star. If Dockside truly do have the star.”

“Oh they have it all right,” Alexanda muttered. “My reports tell me the crowds on Dockside grew all through the night. Gods know how it shall stand this morning. But no, a war against the Dockside is the last thing Patachi Steiner wants. For one, it would unite all the Nasi-Keth factions against him, probably under Cronenverdt, since he's by far the greatest warrior. Right now, they're happily disunited.