Treachery's Tools (14 page)

“You already knew much of that.”

“What else do you know about … shall we say stresses between various factors and High Holders?”

“Hulet holds significant notes from several High Holders. So do Estafen and Weezyr—even if his Banque D'Aluse is only five years old.”

Weezyr? Estafen?
After an instant, Alastar recalled the second name. “That's Elthyrd's son, the one who has the Banque D'Excelsis? Is it true that he's already far wealthier than many High Holders?” Again, that was a guess on Alastar's part.

“Many? Who would know. Certainly, he's better off than Paellyt, Laevoryn, Delcoeur, or Aishford.”

The quick listing of High Holders revealed just how many Alastar still didn't know, since the only names he recognized were those of Delcoeur and Aishford. “Delcoeur? I haven't heard that name in years.”

“The late Lady Asarya's brother keeps a very low profile. Wouldn't you, in his position?”

“Do his financial straits come from the dowry her father…?”

“That is doubtless part of the problem. The major difficulty is that most bulls have more intelligence. Lady Delcoeur—Elacia—manages the lands well, but not well enough to support all Delcoeur's habits.”

“He games excessively?”

“Two nights out of seven he'll be at Tydaal's or Alamara's. The other nights … few are spent with Elacia.”

“Are Tydaal and Alamara considered factors?”

“So long as they pay their dues to the council.”

Almost a glass later, Alastar stood. “I must thank you. You've been most helpful.”

“How could I not, Maitre, if I want both my children's futures to be bright?” Kathila rose gracefully in a manner vaguely familiar, yet not exactly. It took Alastar a moment to recognize from where he'd recalled that almost sinuous grace—
Thealia
. Somehow the past was never always past.

“Maitre … did I offend you?”

Alastar laughed. “No … not in the slightest. Sometimes … let us just say that some matters that should remain ashes don't always.”

“Too many, at times.” She smiled. “I may have kept you too long.”

“Not at all.”

“You will think about what else I suggested?”

“At some point, before year-turn, you will receive what I promised.” Alastar wasn't quite certain why he'd agreed to image a pair of formal boot or shoe buckles, except that he was obligated for the wealth of information, and rather than play favorites among factors, providing a good was a better alternative—although he had no doubts that Kathila would sell the buckles discreetly … and for far more than they were worth.

There was also the fact that he'd always been slightly susceptible to manipulation by women, which was one reason he found Alyna so attractive. Not that she couldn't manipulate, Alastar suspected, but she found it distasteful in dealing with those she respected or loved and lowering herself in dealing with those whom she found unworthy of respect.

As he departed, Alastar did note the faint but amused smile on Kathila's face. He had no doubts that she felt she had the better end of the bargain … and, if he had been a factor, she certainly would have, but so much of what was mere gossip about what was commonly known among factors did not often reach Alastar, or anyone on Imagisle.
Something else that needs remedying.
He'd known that for years, but he'd felt that until the Collegium had more mature imagers and depended less on Lorien's financial support, developing what amounted to an intelligence network would have been unwise, especially if discovered, and not worth the risk. In addition, selecting and training such imagers would also take years.

He was still thinking about the lack of information when he reached his study and found Cyran waiting for him in the anteroom. “You can come into the study and tell me what else went wrong while I was gone.”

“You know me too well,” said the senior imager as he closed the door behind himself. He did not sit down but stood beside the desk and said, “A merchanter's son is missing.”

“Don't tell me. He won at the tables from some High Holder's spoiled offspring, left either Alamara's or Tydaal's, and vanished.”

“Alamara's. Early on Solayi morning, just after midnight. A beggar claimed to have seen a coach stop by a man and that two others jumped out and grabbed him and threw him inside. The coach drove off. The patrollers don't doubt the beggar, but it was dim and at a distance, and it could have been men grabbing a friend … or grabbing the young man. There was nothing special about the coach.”

“What about the horses or the driver?”

“The beggar couldn't tell, and no one else saw it … or wants to say anything about it. The street couldn't have been empty, but so far no one else seems to have seen what happened.”

That didn't surprise Alastar. “A merchanter's son … not a factor's son?”

“The young man's grandfather was a factor. The son fell on hard times, but he has a shop that sells and tailors garments. Not all that far from the theatre district.”

“That suggests that the young man was either very good at plaques or very skilled at cheating at plaques.”

“Both, according to Patrol Captain Heisyt. But it wasn't plaques. It was bones. Tydaal's men have been watching him, but they can't figure out how he does it.”

A low-level imager who hid his talent?
“I doubt it matters anymore. His body might turn up downstream if they didn't weight it enough.”

“You know that?”

“It's just a guess, but that's how most people disappear in L'Excelsis, just like most of those who disappear in Westisle end up as fish food.”

“Why a merchanter's son?” asked Cyran.

“As a warning, I'd guess. Both to others who are too good for their luck and talent, and to factors' offspring who win too much. It's bad enough for a High Holder's offspring to lose to a factor's son, but to a mere merchanter's brat.…” Alastar shook his head. “The gaming houses will let anyone in who is moderately well dressed and has golds or silvers and is willing to hazard them. Very few who are not well-off have either the talent or the golds to last long in gaming.”

“The problem is that more and more factors' sons have both golds and skill?”

“That's what Alamara as much as said. I'd be very surprised if Captain Heisyt doesn't have more problems in the months ahead.”
If not sooner.
“And so will we.”

“Sir…?”

“I hope I'm mistaken, but I think there's more going on than we have any real idea about. It may even involve Lorien. He's asked for a meeting this afternoon. He never asks for meetings anymore unless there's a problem that he can't handle … or doesn't want to.”

“You'll let us know?”

“Whatever it is that the rex wants … hopefully not something like more road repairs or an expansion of the paving in the chateau courtyard.” Alastar's last words were acidically dry. The stone repaving and expansion of the chateau stables the previous year had not been one of his favorite imager projects, possibly because the rex had kept changing his mind.

Cyran's face registered dismay. “I hope not. Anything but something like that.”

“That's not even the worst. The stable business was irritating, annoying, and frustrating, but limited. We could face something like the tariff disaster when Guerdyn defied the rex.”

“Cransyr can't be that stupid, can he?”

“He's more arrogant than Guerdyn and colder. At times, there's not much difference between arrogance and stupidity. Arrogance, though, is the brother to treachery. I'll let you know, either this afternoon or tomorrow, depending on how long it all takes.”

After Cyran left, Alastar just sat behind the desk thinking, before going back to search the Codex Legis.

What with one thing and another, he had to hurry to get out of his study by a quint past second glass to meet with Konan and Borlan, who had his gray waiting outside the administration building.

He reined up at the foot of the unblemished and apparently indestructible stone steps leading up to the main entry of the chateau less than half a quint before the glass, and reached the top of the grand staircase, only to find Lady Chelia standing there with her three children. At sixteen, Charyn was already taller than either of his parents, but thankfully, so far as Alastar was concerned, his eyes were green, and his hair thick and sandy blond, unlike that of his mother—and her other male relations. Bhayrn was slightly built, more like his father, with dark hair, but blue eyes, while Aloryana was blond and blue-eyed. She smiled at Alastar, but the expression was both tentative and mischievous.

He smiled back, then asked Chelia, “To what do I owe the honor of encountering the whole family?”

“Mere chance, Maitre Alastar … and Aloryana's desire to meet a ‘real imager.' We won't keep you.”

“It is good to see you all in good health.” Alastar inclined his head, then turned toward the north hall. He could hear Aloryana's words to her mother behind him.

“… he's old…”

Alastar winced. He wasn't that ancient.

He barely made it to Lorien's study before the bells chimed out third glass.

“No one anywhere is satisfied, except perhaps for you, Maitre Alastar,” said Lorien as Alastar sat down in front of the goldenwood table desk. The rex brushed back a lock of limp black and silver hair from his forehead. “The factors are unhappy with tariffs. The High Holders are unhappy as well and are demanding that, if tariffs are to be increased, the increases fall on the factors…”

But Meinyt said that the High Council wasn't to meet until Meredi.
Was Cransyr acting alone and claiming the council was behind him?

“… and the High Council's latest petition is demanding that, as rex, I override the Chief Justicer's decision that any case of murder on High Holder lands must be tried in a justicing court and is not within the purview of traditional low justice.” Lorien glared at Alastar.

“From the first, under the Codex Legis, murder cases have never been the under the low justice authority of the High Holders. That's all you have to write in upholding the Chief Justicer.”

“Easy enough for you to say. High Holder Lenglan was charged with murdering his lady after he found her in bed with the younger son of High Holder Farlan. Lenglan claims it wasn't murder, but self-defense, because they were conspiring to murder him, and that it falls under low justice because it was on his lands and his holding was therefore threatened.”

“So why did it even come to the High Justicer?”

“Because the late High Holder Farlan insisted. He also likely bribed more than a few people, including Justicer Kastelyn. I've heard rumors, but…” Lorien shrugged. “Anyway, Farlan's son was crippled. Lenglan beat them both with a blunt blade while they were asleep. At least they were asleep when he started. Lenglan closed his gates and retreated behind his considerable walls. Farlan had no other options but to insist on a trial. He also persuaded all the exchanges and the local banque to refuse any transactions by Lenglan.”

“What happened to Farlan?”

“He had a seizure in the hearing before the regional justicer in Daaren, who also vanished mysteriously after rendering the verdict of deliberate murder against Lenglan. Farlan died later, but his eldest son filed his own petition requesting that Lenglan's appeal be denied.”

“It does sound messy.” Alastar kept his voice level, although the ramifications of what had started as a simple but deadly love triangle were looking to be staggering.

“I asked Chief Justicer Veblynt about it. No High Holder has ever been charged with murder before the High Court … or any regial court.”

“In over four hundred years with more than fifteen hundred High Holders?” Alastar didn't find it so surprising that some deaths had never come to official light—or to court—but that none had was certainly indicative that the High Holders of Solidar regarded themselves as sovereigns over their own lands. “Why now?” His voice turned ironic.

“Partly because the Factors' Council in Daaren petitioned the High Justicer not to allow the claim of self-defense to be a matter of low justice. They also pointed out that Lenglan has a long history of refusing to obey the regional justicer's findings that Lenglan owes more than a thousand golds to members of the local Factors' Council.”

“Murder and a power struggle over golds.”

“I see that. I can't let a High Holder get away with something like that, but I'll probably have to send a battalion of troops—and some cannon—to drag the bastard out of his holding.” Lorien snorted. “Every High Holder will claim that I'm using what was a killing out of self-defense and infidelity to allow factors unlimited use of the high court to exact damages from High Holders.”

“He owes the golds and won't pay them?”

Lorien rummaged through the papers on his desk, finally finding what he sought and thrust it at Alastar. “Read it.”

Alastar took the single sheet and began to read.

Lorien, Rex Regis D'Solidar

Your Grace—

It has come to the attention of the High Council that the Factors' Council of the river village of Daaren has lodged petitions with you and with the High Justicer in the pending appeal of High Holder Lenglan …

Upholding even the trial of a High Holder for murder in a case where that High Holder was threatened and dealing with spousal infidelity is a clear and obvious violation of the provisions of the Codex Legis that reaffirm the long-standing practice of low justice administered by each and every High Holder. In addition, the attempt by small and local factors to link their claim of fiduciary jurisdiction over High Holders by regional justicers is a clear attempt to invalidate the right of
locus dominatus
by High Holders …