Speak to the Devil (10 page)

The monk’s bright little eyes shone with sincerity. “But I was guilty of Speaking, my lord count! If I did not confess and repent, I would be tried, and an investigation of Speaking allegations is most arduous, most unpleasant. Eventually, when the Speaker can endure no more, he will either admit his guilt or call out to the devil to rescue him. It was better to repent while I had the chance.”

“And now? Will you betray us?”

Brother Marek clasped his hands as if to pray. He closed his eyes. “If I do not report this conversation to the abbot, I shall be asked at my next confession and be refused absolution unless I make amends.” Then he looked sadly at Wulf. “Repent, Brother, while there is still time! Stay here with us. We can teach you how to resist the devil’s lures. It is a hard road to walk, but I learned, with prayer and penance and the holy brothers’ patience. They taught me how. Repent and stay!”

Wulf shook his head.

“And you are now proposing to ride through limbo to the northern marches?” Marek continued. “Is that what the cardinal wants: to block a war by sending two young men to roast in hell for all eternity?”

Wulf felt the walls of the abbey closing in on him. Possibly also on Anton, as an accomplice. The gates would be locked against them. But anything would be better than a lifetime shut up in a cloister, being turned into a worm like Marek, never running a horse over the hills, never dancing with fair maidens …

“Did it hurt?” the monk asked eagerly, eyes gleaming. “There is always pain, and undeniable witchcraft must have hurt severely.”

“It hurt some,” Wulf admitted, pushing his trencher away. His nausea did seem to be fading, so that he could almost admit that he was hungry. He poured himself more wine.

“And yet you think you can just race all the way from here to the
Pomeranian border? I warn you, Brother, if you think you know what pain is now, you cannot imagine what that will cost you. It will last for days. You will go mad, or even die. Many Speakers have died from their torment, for it is far worse than anything that human torturers can inflict. Does this sound like holy miracle or demonic treachery?”

Brother Marek was ablaze now, leaning forward, spraying spit and thumping his fists on the board. “Even if you survive, you may well be beyond help already. I was a neophyte. I had done only one false miracle. An experienced Speaker cannot be taught control, as I was taught when I came here. A hardened practitioner of the black art is too dangerous to restrain. Stay your present course and soon the only way to stop you summoning the devil will be to burn out your tongue!”

“So you
are
going to report this conversation to Abbot Bohdan?” Anton asked. “Back at Dobkov, Father and Vlad and Ottokar stood by you. They would have run the troopers out of the county with their lances if the Dominicans had not been there to threaten them with a bishop’s warrant of excommunication. You will now denounce Wulfgang as a Speaker?”

Marek covered his face with his hands. He did not seem to be praying, nor weeping either.

Wulf stood up, sick at heart. “Thank you for your advice, Brother Marek. I was instructed to come and consult you, and you have duly instructed me. I expected to learn from your advice, but I fear I have been warned by your mistakes. If you will show us the way back to the stables, we shall be on our way. We can saddle our mounts ourselves. We don’t want to disturb your brothers’ Sunday devotions, nor your servants’, neither.”

Anton rose also, watching Wulf, letting him lead. That was a first.

Marek sighed and straightened up. He was biting his lip, but now there was a repellent beaten-dog expression in his eyes. “Who,” he murmured softly, “told you to hide your face, Brother?”

“It just felt like a good idea.” Wulf pulled his sallet down again.

“A very good idea.” Louder he added, “Let me show you my herb garden. Not mine, really;
our
herb garden. You can get from there to the stables, although it is not the most direct route.”

“An excellent idea.” Wulf glanced hopefully at Anton. “That is most kind of you.”

“Are you suggesting,” Anton demanded, “that the monks may try to prevent us leaving here?”

“Not you, my lord,” Marek whispered. “But they might delay your companion … ask questions … demand to see his face, and so on. He may have trouble getting out of the monastery. Hurry! We must be quick.”

Three trumpets blared in unison to announce the arrival of Count Vranov before the gates of Castle Gallant. The one on the left was slightly out of tune, which made the fanfare especially unpleasant for Juozas, the count’s herald, who was standing right in front of them. As soon as the noise ended, he marched forward a few paces and loudly proclaimed the name and rank of his master, come in peace. Out came Arturas, his Bukovany counterpart.

Juozas said he’d been told that the agreement was the old man, two sons, the priest, and twenty knights. Arturas said there had been a change: it was to be only five knights and no priest. The sons were still all right, but everyone else had to go back down to the High Meadows and wait there.

Juozas walked back to Count Vranov, who muttered something blasphemous about meddling
landsknechte
, but sent him back to report that the terms were acceptable. The count chose five men-at-arms to accompany him, then urged his horse forward and led the way into the ground-floor chamber of the barbican. The inner gate on the far side was still closed, but a sally port beside it stood open. Arturas led them through that, into a roadway that flanked the cliffs of the mountain called the Hogback, and then, at last, through
another gate into the town. There they were welcomed by Constable Sir Karolis Kavarskas.

Huddling beside Giedre in St. Andrej’s Cathedral, Madlenka Bukovany thought she had never known a Mass to last longer, yet she cherished every fleeting minute of it, because it was a calm before what might be a very bitter storm. Two weeks ago she had sat here in the family pew with Petr and her parents. Last Sunday Petr had been dead, and she had stayed home to watch over a dying father and a prostrate mother. Now she had only Giedre to keep her company.

She would have to be as stupid as the church gargoyles not to guess why the Hound had come to Castle Gallant yet again. She could not help knowing that she was a rich prize for any nobleman seeking a wife. She was too tall and too skinny to be a beauty, not plump and cuddlesome like Giedre, but her family tree was rooted back in the tenth century and she would bring her husband a very large dowry.

Now she was the only heir, so he would get it all. Vranov was the first of the ravens to land only because his nest was closest. Oh, how she needed her mother to send him packing! Yes, her legal guardian was King Konrad, far away in Mauvnik, but he could not even know yet that Count Bukovany was dead, and would probably not react for weeks. By that time, Count Vranov would have his claws firmly into Castle Gallant. Who could stop him? He had bought off that pernicious traitor, Constable Kavarskas. The German mercenaries would sell out to the highest bidder and likely already had. How much should she offer to buy them back? How much money did she have available?

“I must speak with your father!” she whispered to Giedre, who nodded.

St. Andrej’s was large and ancient, but Petr had called it small and old-fashioned after he returned from Mauvnik. Arches now were round, not pointed, he had said, and modern churches had domes. But Gallant’s other three churches were tiny and even older than the cathedral. All four were filled to capacity every Sunday, for anyone who missed Mass very often had soon been advised of Count Stepan’s displeasure. The count’s pew stood near the sanctuary and opposite the pulpit; from there
he could keep an eye on the congregation just as well as the preacher could. Only the count and his family could sit in church; everyone else stood or knelt as the action required.

Bishop Ugne had almost reached the dismissal. Soon Madlenka would have to leave this precious sanctuary and face the world, the flesh, and the devil, with the flesh very likely being in the shape of one of Devil Vranov’s odious sons. She had met three of them, and each had been worse than the last. What pressure would the Hound apply to force her consent? To be legal, her marriage must be approved by the king, but legality had never bothered Vranov before. Why start now?

Bishop Ugne announced an unexpected prayer. She lowered her face …

“My lady!”

She jumped at the whisper coming from the end of the pew. Three men stood there, but they were not yet Vranov’s men come to get her. The speaker was Giedre’s father, Ramunas Jurbarkas.

“My lady, please come with us now!”

She rose with Giedre at her back, and followed the seneschal out of the cathedral by the side door. His companions brought up the rear, moving quietly. Perhaps no one in the cathedral saw them leave—except the bishop, of course, who must have arranged the diversion and therefore must approve of whatever was happening.

Jurbarkas was a small man, stooped and prematurely gray, but soft-spoken and universally popular, rarely without a smile for everyone. He had married twice, and was old to have a daughter of Madlenka’s age. But he had never disparaged Madlenka as a child and was unfailingly gracious to her now.

Just as Constable Kavarskas had been Father’s military officer, so Seneschal Jurbarkas ran the finances of the county. But he did much more than that, distributing the count’s alms, supervising the castle staff, arranging for road repairs, and many other things. If some tenant’s son in an outlying holding had reached an age to need a job, then the keep would suddenly want another kitchen brat or stableboy. Few people in the county had not sought his help at some time or other, and every petition had been swiftly handled or brought to the count. He was honest and loyal. Madlenka could trust him.

But he was no longer the man he had been. Father had said so many times, and had been looking for a man to take over at least some of Jurbarkas’s duties, but had failed to find one he considered honest enough before he himself had died. That blow had shaken the old seneschal more than almost anyone. He had found himself thrust into responsibilities he had never had to handle before, and he was looking older by the day.

In the cool winter sunshine, his companions were revealed as two hulking nephews. Madlenka had known them all her life and knew them to be sergeants in Kavarskas’s garrison, although they were currently wearing civilian clothing and armed only with staves. What was the town coming to if the seneschal felt he needed protection in the streets?

He started walking in the direction of the palace and she went to his side—his right side, because that was his better ear. Giedre brought up the rear, and her two cousins moved out in front as vanguard.

The narrow alleyways were almost deserted that Sunday morning and the few townsfolk they met all bowed or curtseyed as Madlenka went by. She barely noticed, eager to make the most of what must be a very brief word with Ramunas Jurbarkas.

“You know that Count Vranov is here, my lady?”

“Yes. And I think I know why.”

“You are ahead of me, then. I have left him and his entourage in the hall and provided a light repast. Your mother refuses to attend.”

“Seneschal, can I buy him off?”

The little man looked startled. “Buy him off? I very much doubt it. Havel Vranov must be one of the largest landowners in the kingdom.”

“But he wants to marry me to one of his sons to get hold of my inheritance, doesn’t he?”

“Maybe. But I doubt you have enough money to bribe him, and paying tribute to bullies just encourages them to come back for more.”

“But we might buy some time! I need time for the king to respond! Father told me we were rich.”

The little man tut-tutted. “
He
was rich, yes. Had your brother succeeded, then he would have been rich also. But I don’t know that you are. The tapestries in your bedroom are family heirlooms and now yours. But Castle Gallant and its town belong to the king. Everything else is
debatable. The tolls your father imposed on travelers were a royal tax, strictly speaking, so who owns the gold in the money chest? What’s yours and what’s the king’s will have to be determined.”

She felt a stab of despair: was nothing to be left to her? “Determined by the king, I suppose?”

They climbed a steep stairway between two houses, only just wide enough for two abreast. The distance from St. Andrej’s to the keep was not far for a crow to fly, but she was no crow.

“His Majesty has officials called escheators to work the abacuses, but if he reveals in advance what sort of answer he wants, then that will be the answer he gets. As an orphaned daughter of one of the king’s tenants-in-chief you are in the king’s gift. He can marry you off to any man he wants. Of course you can refuse, but the results might be very unpleasant. You get a gold ring and your husband gets your dowry, carefully calculated, not a mite more.”

“Is that unfair, or am I just biased?”

Jurbarkas sighed. “I quite understand your dislike of it, but it is the law. You have never wanted me to lie to you, my dear. The easiest and most practical solution, from everyone’s point of view but yours, is to marry you off to a trusted and experienced soldier, who can be appointed lord of the marches in your father’s place. That way he gets everything except the king’s heriot and your mother’s dowry, so it won’t matter who owns what, and the Silver Road will be securely guarded again.”

“Some fat, battle-scarred, foulmouthed forty-year-old with the manners of a rutting boar?”

The seneschal did not venture an opinion on that. “An experienced soldier is usually old enough to have been married at least once. You can refuse the king’s choice, of course, but his second choice might be worse, and the terms harsher. The third suggestion will be a one-way visit to a nunnery.”

“No choice could be much worse than any of Vranov’s spawn.”

“Perhaps not,” the old man agreed sadly. They began to climb the wooden ramp to the door of the keep, which stood on the highest point in the town. “The townsfolk do not want Vranov as the next count of Cardice, but that is for His Majesty to decide.”