The Tears of the Sun (77 page)

Tiphaine moved her hand again, looking at the white scar. The Countess cleared her throat. Felipe was looking at
his
hand. He spoke first. “The dog
died
? With green and yellow foam coming out of its nostrils? From swallowing the
bandage
?”

“Yes, my lord, it did. You can imagine how
I
felt about it. You're getting help earlier; on the other hand, it's an actual bite. Be cautious.”

Ermentrude said thoughtfully, “You went to a pious wisewoman, and she sent you to Bethany to the Sisters . . . and then you sought a spiritual patron to protect you against the evils of the CUT?”

Tiphaine smiled slightly.
Evidently I'm keeping things general efficiently while also getting across the essentials they
do
need to know.

“Yes. As I said, I've never been particularly pious. But I found a real expert to . . . guide my meditations. One I trusted implicitly. And I had quite a, ummm, change of heart.”

It was late by the time Tiphaine d'Ath and Delia de Stafford waved good-bye to their guests from the verandah of the manor house, a warm summer's night with bright stars and a great near-full moon rising over the forested Coast Range a little to the west, full of the scents of cut grass and roses and honeysuckle and a faint tinge of woodsmoke and fir sap. The steel wheels of the black carriage crunched on the crushed rock of the driveway, and then the lanterns at its rear faded down the long road that glittered white beneath the moon, flickering as they passed behind the wayside oaks. The lance heads of the escort swayed after them, until it all faded into the night. Moths battered against the big silver-framed lights above, and the wind moved quietly in the trees.

“My lady?” the house steward asked.

“Leave us,” Tiphaine said.

“That will be all, Terrin, for the night,” Lady Delia de Stafford added gently, with a smile. “And tell Goodwife Catrain that the Lord Chancellor Conrad said he'd weigh twice what he does if she ran the kitchens at Castle Odell, and the Lady Regent added that she had never eaten better slowcooked spring lamb, even in Todenangst or Portland.”

Tiphaine added a slight sideways jerk of the head. Young Terrin—his uncle-predecessor had retired last year—bowed and motioned the other servants away with his white wand and followed them.

And Delia managed to get all the ladies-in-waiting and pages and assorted highborn suchlike out of the house for the night, one way or another, without even offending them. A seldom-repeated miracle. Here I am, overlord of Ath in my own right, land and woods and water and villages and manors and a thousand families over whom I have the Low, Middle and High Justice, and I actually had more
privacy
when I was living in a two-bedroom apartment with my single-parent mom. Mind you, the wealth and power and land and so forth go a long way to compensate. Still.

Montinore had been a mansion before the Change, built long ago on mining profits as a country retreat and then the headquarters of a vineyard in the days of the Pinot Noir boom, a neoclassical house with white walls and tall pillars in front. Not many modifications had been necessary to make it the manor of the home estate at the core of the barony; adding a Great Hall at the rear, and outbuildings. The village a little to the east on the flats adjacent to the Five Great Fields was nearly all new, though. You could see the bell tower of the church, and a little of its red-tile roof, which was near enough for the outdoor servants to live there. The house faced southeast, but if she had walked out onto the lawn she could have seen the watch lights on the grim square towers of Castle Ath, on its hill half a mile west.

“Glad I finally talked you into moving down from the castle?” Delia said. “And it took a
year
.”

“You're always right, sweetie. Though I have fond memories of the place; we met there, after all. And it was wartime.”

The gardens and rolling lawns were still here around the mansion; better, if anything, under Delia's supervision. And the vineyards to the north that were the most valuable part of the manor's demesne farm. Delia had always been good at keeping the reeves and bailiffs and castellans and stewards honest and up to the mark.

“Always nice to see Conrad and Sandra in a setting that isn't
entirely
business,” Tiphaine said, looking after the coach.

Though they'd come out here with her partly precisely to occupy the traveling time with consultations.

Strictly speaking I should be going back with them. Damned if I'll cut the flying visit
that
short, though. I'm going to spend at least forty-eight hours with my sweetie, after all this time in the field!

“I wish they could have stayed longer,” Delia said. “And that Conrad could have brought Valentinne and the children.”

“We're all a little busy, right now,” Tiphaine said as they turned to go back in; she offered her arm, and Delia slid hers through it.

I'd have made the same call. The situation is just too volatile right now. I'll be leaving soon and leaving Delia alone
again
. Rehab in Bethany took a lot longer than I thought it would. And it's going to cost something fierce, the Sisters put the screws to the nobility so they can heal the poor for free. Delia will have a cow if I don't warn her before the bill gets here. She manages the place well and that means she cares about the details.

The ceremonial keys tinkled gently at Delia's silver chain belt, the mark of her status as Châtelaine across from the equally ceremonial dagger that marked her as an Associate. She was in noblewoman's
at home
dress, what could be worn when dining
en famille
, a short over-tunic of cream silk, elaborately tucked and embroidered with a royal blue ankle-length under-tunic. It suited her, which it should, since she'd invented and spread the fashion.

Most things did suit her; she had a curling mane of night-black hair that torrented down from her light wimple, huge eyes of a blue like the sky on a spring morning, and a tip-tilted nose, and a scent that was like flowers. Just now her figure was a little riper from the birth of her daughter.

“Odd thing, that,” she said to Delia as they came into their sitting room.

“What?” asked Delia, turning away from Heuradys' crib and putting a finger to her lips.

Tiphaine grinned. “It'd take a bell ringing over her head to wake her up. You know that. This love seat is big enough for two, if they're friendly.”

Musing, she went on: “The odd thing was learning that Jason Mortimer was betrothed to the older Reddings girl. Things got very rough for her, being pregnant and her prospective groom subtracted.”

“Oh, yes. What brought that to your mind?”

“I've been thinking about the ramifications of things. I killed Jason, on orders from Sandra; that's why the Reddings chit ended up in the family way with no family.”

“Why should that eat at you? You've killed enough men and even a few women. Every one of them probably had relatives and obligations. What's special about Jason?”

Tiphaine winced slightly; Delia had come to terms with her profession, but never really
liked
it. Though to be fair she didn't make any distinction between her black-ops beginnings and her current status. As she said, dead was dead.

“It's mostly just how miserable the entire Mortimer family seems to have been. And then I learn something good about them . . .
and
something bad. Did you know Jason offered to marry
me
? If I got him out of that place in Corvallis the Dúnedain had him stashed. Practically begged.”

Delia turned in her arms and looked up at her from her shoulder. “Were you tempted?” she said, with a wicked grin. “You were a landless minor Associate then, after all, and he was a knight.”

“Hardly. He didn't realize I'd been sent to kill him, but I'd have been tempted to off him anyway after that; he thought he was offering to do me a
favor
. But the odd thing is that Guelf and Mary Liu blamed me
anyway
, even though they think the Dúnedain did it . . . which they were intended to do, of course. Idiots. They screwed the entire timing of the Protector's War with their little scheme for vengeance and then their not-even-idiotic brother got
caught
. I increased the average intelligence of the human race by getting him before he could successfully breed. Still, it's a pity about the girl.”

She sighed and took a deep breath. Before she could speak, Delia murmured: “You know, darling, that's a familiar look. It sort of reminds me of the time we were at Forest Grove and Diomede and Lioncel walked in on us and their eyes bugged out and you had to tell them about the birds and the bees . . . and the birds and the birds and the bees and the bees, and then Rigobert came in looking for
them
and he heard and he started laughing and I thought you were going to strangle him, standing there in your bathrobe. Or the time Lioncel was all indignant about the song accusing me of being a witch and we had to tell him I
am
a witch and explain about
real
witches.”

“Speaking of which, witch . . . it's time for a talk about religion.”

“And you'd rather pull your toenails out with your teeth,” Delia observed, and then gurgled laughter at her start. “I'd be a very unobservant witch if I didn't know you well after fifteen years, love. You don't just let sleeping dogs lie, you prefer to bury them and plant a tree on the grave. For someone so brave you can be so
chicken
sometimes.”

Tiphaine knelt on the rug and extended her right hand, twitching back the fall of the houppelande. The overlong cuff on her shirt slid up, exposing the seamed pucker of white on the back of her right hand. Delia's face went pale, throwing the spray of freckles across her cheeks into high relief. She gasped as she pulled it across her lap for a better look.

“Why haven't you shown it to me?” demanded Delia, bending the hand and carefully tracing the length of the scar. “What happened! You were talking about
idiots
and then keeping this secret?”

“I was afraid it was a danger to you . . . and Heuradys,” Tiphaine said, which halted Delia's tirade in midword. “And it
was
. Dangerous to you and her; which means I was entirely justified; plus reasons of state. Mary Liu did this.”

“
What?
In person?”

“With her embroidery needle.”

Tiphaine winced again at her look; this time it was her professional vanity that twinged. It was rather like a wolf confessing to a rabbit bite on the buttocks.

“With a
sewing needle
?”

Delia's callused finger tips stroked the length of the scar. Her strong fingers turned the sword-hand towards the light. Tiphaine nodded grimly.

Great. We could be running around the bed playing
The Lustful Knight and the Innocent Country Maid
and what are we doing? Discussing wounds and prisoners in Fen House.

“I don't think it actually
scratched
the skin, just ran down it . . . but by the time I walked back down the stairs it was a welt and it was hurting. It got badly infected and I wouldn't let anybody touch it. Mary said,
Bad cess to you and yours
, and I believe that she meant what she said and knew what would happen. That's magic, Delia. Real magic!”

Delia didn't look any calmer, and her grip on Tiphaine's hand was hurting. “Damned right, that's
magic
! Why didn't you get help! What did you do? Why haven't you . . .”

“I went to BD. You know, of the Kyklos.”

“Oh.” A hesitation. “I'm . . . well, she is a witch, I know that. I've met her, of course. And a good field-competent healer. I just wish . . .”

“I know. If it had been an ordinary wound, I would have come to you.”

Tiphaine gently put a forefinger over Delia's parted lips. “Sweetheart, listen. This is very hard for me to talk about.”

Delia closed her mouth, let go of her hand and walked over to the crib in the corner. She picked up the sleeping Heuradys and held her close. “I'll be quiet, but you'd better tell me everything!”

Tiphaine nodded. “Gods do live and walk among us and . . . I don't believe in the Christian god, His son or His mother.”

“They're real enough,” Delia observed—not enthusiastically, but readily; her arms cradled the infant and she stroked a cheek.

“Yes, they're
real
. Oh, what my mother would have given to hear me say it! But I don't . . .”

“I understand. Actually it's probably your mother's fault you don't
like
them, after she tried to force-feed you. That's just not how your heart inclines. But now you want someone you
can
believe in, a guardian and pillar. Of course that means They must want
you
.”

Delia kissed Heuradys and the baby stirred. She frowned as she put her back in the crib and turned to Tiphaine.

“I'm not going to yell . . . but there's a very big yell in me. Why didn't you go to Mount Angel or the main hospital in Portland, or Bethany? BD may be a witch, but she's not a doctor. Good field-grade healer, but not a professional, at that.”