The Waters Rising (43 page)

He held her as she slept, and she did not move in the circle of his arms. In the night there was another light snowfall that he knew would erase all tracks of people or things around the tower. In fact it did that, as well as the tracks of the wolves that had carried every fragment of their feast far away to other, scattered places and the tracks of the vultures and crows, the weasels, raccoons, skunks, and other small carnivores that had scavenged the site when the wolves had gone.

When Xulai woke, late the following day, she said Jenger had bribed Derris, killed him, and taken her. She could not remember what had happened after Jenger had left her in the cell. There had been something in it about deer, or changing reality, but she couldn’t remember what it was. Abasio, looking deep into her eyes, saw something there he had not seen in her before. He had seen that same look, however, in the eyes of people and speaking beasts who had survived terrible battles and did not want to remember what had happened.

He concluded that whatever had happened to Jenger had been done by someone else. Perhaps Xulai had seen it happen or heard it happen. People did not get that expression in their eyes if they had been horrified only in their imagination.

S
olo Winger received a message from Abasio. On the outside, it said, “
Deliver to the librarian, Elder Brother Wordswell, no one else.
” On the inside—Solo had become an expert at unsealing messages and resealing them—it said, “
Derris was bribed by Jenger, a servant of the Duchess of Altamont, to help kidnap Xulai. Previously Jenger conspired with Bear to kidnap Xulai, but her reluctance to move into a house near the back wall delayed those plans and Jenger grew impatient. Xulai overheard some of this conspiracy but does not know Bear’s true intentions in the matter. Jenger has disappeared. Xulai has been rescued. The bird-sign of the house is the Old Dark House of Altamont. The bird-sign of the vulture is the sign of the Vulture Tower west of the abbey. These places may well be linked through old mine shafts. The bird keeper told me these were signs used only by the abbot. I question this. Whose idea was it to house the Tingawan party near the back wall, which is unguarded, where they might be easy prey?
”

Solo Winger carefully resealed the message, tucked it into a pocket, and impatiently waited until nightfall. Wordswell was known to work in the library at night. He did it, Winger thought, in order to be uninterrupted, and he was confirmed in that opinion by the old man’s brief expression of annoyance when he was interrupted.

Winger handed over the note and moved away to let Elder Brother Wordswell read it. He did not leave; there might be an answer, after all.

“I suppose you read this,” said Wordswell in a dry voice.

“Why, Elder Brother . . . ,” Winger began in offended tones.

“Don’t give me that pigeon shit, Solomon Winger. You read everything that comes through that tower.”

“Sometimes thins ak-see-dentully come unsealed, like.”

“The man asks a good question. Whose idea was it?”

“A message from Old Dark House come while them ladies from Woldsgard wuz on their way here, them an that Bear an t’other fellas. A message went back ’n’ forth, two, mebbe three times, in fack.”

“From whom?”

“Who d’y’think from
whom
brought ’em to me? Who brings everthin’? Who sees everthin’ afore the abbot gets a look? Who takes everthin’ the abbot sends and reduz it? Hm?”

“Did they start fixing up that house before or after those messages?”

“Can’t say’s I took notice. I guess sumbuddy’d have ter ast the crew adoin’ it.”

“I suppose you have no idea how the person who sent this message managed to get an abbey pigeon?”

“Well, and you think I wunn’t know where’s my own birds? Course I do! He ast for three. I guv him three. He said he wannud to let the lady know how he’uz doin’. He said the old one, but I figured it wuz the young one he reely had on his mind. She’s a nice girl, and I figure she’d care ’bout how he was doin’.”

“Misuse of abbey property . . . ,” mused the librarian.

“Misuse, pfff. Dang good use, I figger,” said Brother Winger. “Don’ I hear you tellin’ people alla time now-lidge is pow’r? Well, now you got some now-lidge you dint have afore. And it’s bin goin on for some years.”

“I suppose you have copies?”

“Man c’n s’pose anythin’, ’fhe wants.”

Wordswell actually smiled. “Come back and see me at midnight, Brother Winger.”

W
ordswell was an elder brother but not the eldest. He held in his hands what others of the elders, male and female, would consider an accusation of the abbot’s complicity in crimes of kidnapping and murder—that is, if one did
not
know that the prior handled virtually all the abbot’s messages and appointments. The elders did know. They would not consider the messages proof of the abbot’s complicity; they were as likely as the librarian to suspect someone else. What proof might there be? Two cages of pigeons in the abbey bird loft with certain signs. The allegation that these signs were of Altamont and of an old mining tower could be proven. A party could be sent to the old mining towers to look for evidence of that same sign; it might be found somewhere, on a bird cage, for example. Wordswell himself had authority to send someone to explore that possibility.

But that didn’t prove the existence of this Jenger. It wouldn’t prove there had been any message sent by the abbot or received by him or by some other person in the abbot’s stead. Unless, that is, the abbot or that other person kept the messages he received, in either case in their personal quarters. There would be some difficulty searching there! Though there might be copies in the mining tower itself of messages sent and either copies or the originals of messages received! Now would be an excellent time to explore that possibility, for the Dragdown Swamps still covered the slopes westward and it was unlikely there was anyone there to take notice.

What a pity the writer of this message had not taken time to search for messages or to say that he had done so and there were none. Though if there had been none in the tower at the time of the rescue, it meant nothing. Pigeons might have arrived there after the rescue. Besides, the writer of this note had been preoccupied. He said the girl was rescued, but he didn’t say what condition she was in, injured perhaps, perhaps . . . sexually attacked. Wordswell’s face showed a moment’s fury before he purposefully smoothed it. He liked Xulai! If someone had abused her, Wordswell hoped fervently that person was dead.

He found a particular book of maps. They had been drawn years before, when the mining of the western and northern slopes of this massive highland had been at its height. He noted the round red circles that denoted towers, the spots that indicated communication-flag poles, the round black circles that meant shaft entries, the dotted lines that meant underground tunnels, layers of them shown in different colored inks, one atop another. At the top of the slope there were three red circles. One, far south, was merely a ruin. It had been undermined and collapsed a lifetime ago. Wordswell had seen it. Another stood farther north. If the duchess were indeed involved in this abduction, the chances were that she or her agent would have used the middle tower, the one closest to the abbey. Less than a day’s ride away. The one around on the northern slope was closer to Benjobz.

There might be a chance of finding evidence of the duchess’s complicity, though after Xulai’s brief dissertation on the career of Queen Mirami, evidence against the duchess seemed unlikely. The woman was old in villainy, well schooled, no doubt. If all that Xulai had said was true, Queen Mirami and her daughter, perhaps Prince Rancitor, also, and the Duke of Kamfels, were of a measure far beyond Wordswell’s power to comprehend. They frightened him.

Then there was the matter of Xulai herself. Her people were grieving, the old woman most seriously. She had not been at meals recently, though of course, the others may have taken her food. He decided to make a quick call upon her, which he did, taking the message.

He found Oldwife Gancer much worse than he had feared: pallid, weak, so deeply troubled as to be incapable of caring for herself. He told the women, Precious Wind and Nettie Lean, that he had a message for her to be delivered privately, and they agreed, reluctantly, to leave him alone with her.

“Oldwife Gancer,” he said. “I have a message from Xulai.”

“Who’re you?” she grated.

“Someone Xulai trusted,” he said. “Someone who could receive messages without other people knowing. Can you read, lady?”

“Of course I can read,” she said. “All us folk at Woldsgard were schooled!”

“The message is delicate, be careful with it, don’t tear it.”

She took it in her cupped hand, drawing herself up in surprise, her eyes alight. “Why, it’s one of those pigeon things! Duke Justinian was always sending off those things. Many’s the times I’ve sat in the loft with him and Xulai watching those birds . . .”

She took it from his hand and unrolled it carefully with trembling hands, turning it until it was right-side up. “This isn’t Xulai’s writing.”

“It’s Abasio’s writing,” he said. “The dyer. The man with the wagon.”

She was still reading, her mouth falling open. “Bear? Bear did that? Oh, why would, why . . . he was like a . . . like an uncle to her, or a big brother would have been. Why would he . . .”

“Money most likely,” said Precious Wind from the door. Her voice was bitter. “Sorry to listen, Elder Brother, but I was worried for Oldwife.”

He gestured for her to enter and shut the door behind her. “This message is secret. You must not tell anyone here about it.” He handed the message to Precious Wind. “You see what it says about the abbot.”

Oldwife cried, “That nice old man! He sent such a sweet message telling us to keep up our spirits. Why would he . . .”

Precious Wind looked up from the fragile paper, her face quite still. “I don’t imagine Elder Brother has any certain
whys
yet, Oldwife, or any certain
whos,
either. He looks to me like a troubled man who has just learned something that’s upsetting him a good deal. Why would that be, sir?”

He grimaced. “Not having known this was going on, of course. Not knowing for sure even now. And not knowing what to do. Each of us elder brothers and sisters has some departments or offices that we control as far as manpower and material allocations go. The bird loft is one of mine, ostensibly. Actually Brother Winger runs it very cleanly and simply, and I seldom have reason to question anything he does. Now he tells me he’s known of this correspondence for some years! Though he works hard at giving the impression of an unschooled and ignorant man, I have had my doubts about that. I’ve suspected for years he reads everything, but he’s never said a word about it until now. I find what he tells me more troubling than I can say. From what Xulai told us about the duchess, she is a very evil woman. I cannot imagine why the abbot would have anything to do with someone like that, especially since she apparently has evil designs upon the Duke of Wold, who has been a friend of the abbey for decades. Why, this abbey maintains Netherfields. It is this abbey that guards the graves of Wold!”

“Who puts an abbot in power?” asked Precious Wind.

“We all do, all of us, elder brothers and sisters. It is an election.”

“How many of you?”

“A hundred or so, not all of them working here at the abbey, of course.”

“So getting them all together secretly wouldn’t be possible, would it?”

“Getting any ten of them together secretly would be impossible,” he said. “And before I even tried, I’d have to have real evidence, not just a note alleging things. You know, various of us do things in the abbot’s name. Because something is addressed to the abbot, it doesn’t mean he necessarily sees it. If Abasio were to come back here, with the girl, she might know more about it, she could give evidence, but . . . I don’t even know how to reach him.”

“And he wouldn’t bring her back here for anything,” said Oldwife through her teeth. “She wouldn’t be safe here, and that Abasio, he’ll keep her safe. That’s one thing I know is true. He’ll keep her safe. He loves her, that’s why. I saw his face, I did. He loves her. Don’t even know if he knows it yet, but I know it!”

“Do you think the abbot was alone or a part of this conspiracy, I mean, here in the abbey?” asked Precious Wind. “Or someone else, using his name?”

He shook his head. “Who knows? I don’t keep track of him, who he sees, who he talks to most. I know almost everything goes through the prior.”

“Maybe she promised him Netherfields,” Precious Wind offered.

“The abbey already
has
Netherfields, or will, when the duke passes on. I have the documents on file! He willed Netherfields to us years ago!”

Precious Wind put her hand upon his shoulder. “Then maybe she promised him the duke would pass on sooner. Sir, forgive me, but you seem out of your depth here. I have some knowledge of conspiracies and their ilk. Will you let me help you? Will you let it go for now and do nothing?”

“I was going to send someone to that tower, to see if there were copies of messages or originals from the Old Dark House . . .”

“You know what tower it is?”

“I’m assuming it’s the closest one, northwest of here at the crest of the slope. There’s a fairly well-used track through the woods near there. We cut timber in that area, though we don’t go all the way to the crest as that is Altamont land.”