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‘It’s absolutely uncanny,’ Kalten was saying one evening. ‘He doesn’t really do anything at all. He doesn’t talk to them; he doesn’t smile at them; he doesn’t do any of the things he’s supposed to do. I don’t know what it is, but every time he walks through a room, every young woman in the place starts to come all unravelled.’
‘He is a very handsome young man, Kalten,’ Ehlana pointed out.
‘Berit? He doesn’t even shave regularly yet.’
‘What’s that got to do with it? He’s tall, he’s a knight, he has broad shoulders and good manners. He’s also got the deepest blue eyes I’ve ever seen – and the longest eyelashes,’
‘But he’s only a boy.’
‘Not any more. You haven’t really looked at him lately. Besides, the young ladies who sigh and cry into their pillows over him are quite young themselves.’
‘What’s really so irritating is the fact that he doesn’t even know what effect he has on all those poor girls,’ Tynian observed. ‘They’re doing everything but tearing their clothes off to get his attention, and he hasn’t got the faintest notion of what’s going on.’
‘That’s part of his charm, Sir Knight,’ Ehlana smiled. ‘If it weren’t for that innocence of his, they wouldn’t find him nearly so attractive. Sir Bevier here has much the same quality. The difference though, is that Bevier knows that he’s an extraordinarily handsome young man. He chooses not to do anything about it because of his religious convictions. Berit doesn’t even know.’
‘Maybe one of us should take him aside and tell him,’ Ulath suggested.
‘Never mind,’ Mirtai told him. ‘He’s fine just the way he is. Leave him alone.’
‘Mirtai’s right,’ Ehlana said. ‘Don’t tamper with him, gentlemen. We’d like to keep him innocent for just a while longer.’ A hint of mischief touched her lips. ‘Sir Bevier, on the other hand, is quite another matter. It’s time for us to find him a wife. He’ll make some girl an excellent husband.’
Bevier smiled faintly. ‘I’m already married, your Majesty – to the Church.’
‘Betrothed perhaps, Bevier, but not yet married. Don’t start buying ecclesiastical garb just yet, Sir Knight. I haven’t entirely given up on you.’
‘Wouldn’t it be easier to start closer to home, your Majesty?’ he suggested. ‘If you feel the urge to marry someone off, Sir Kalten is readily at hand.’
‘Kalten?’ she asked incredulously. ‘Don’t be absurd, Bevier. I wouldn’t do that to any woman.’
‘Your Majesty!’ Kalten protested.
‘I love you dearly, Kalten,’ she smiled at the blond Pandion, ‘but you’re just not husband material. I couldn’t give you away. In good conscience I couldn’t even order anyone to marry you. Tynian is remotely possible, but God intended you and Ulath to be bachelors.’
‘Me?’ Ulath said mildly.
‘Yes,’ she said, ‘you.’
The door opened, and Stragen and Talen entered. They were both dressed in the plain clothing they usually wore when making one of their sorties into the streets.
‘Any luck?’ Sparhawk asked them.
‘We found him,’ Stragen replied, handing his cloak to Alean. ‘He’s not really my sort. He’s a pickpocket by profession, and pickpockets don’t really make good leaders. There’s something fundamentally lacking in their character.’
‘Stragen!’ Talen protested.
‘You’re not really a pickpocket, my young friend,’ Stragen told him. ‘That’s only an interim occupation while you’re waiting to grow up. Anyway, the local chief’s named Kondrak. He could see that we all have a mutual interest in stable governments, I’ll give him that. Looting houses when there’s turmoil in the streets is a fast way to make a lot of money, but over the long run, a good thief can accumulate more in times of domestic tranquillity. Of course Kondrak can’t make any kind of overall decision on his own. He’ll have to consult with his counterparts in other cities in the empire.’
‘That shouldn’t take more than a year or so,’ Sparhawk noted drily.
‘Hardly,’ Stragen disagreed. ‘Thieves move much more rapidly than honest men. Kondrak’s going to send out word of what we’re trying to accomplish. He’ll put it in the best possible light, so there’s a very good chance that the thieves of all the kingdoms in the empire will co-operate.’
‘How will we know their decision?’ Tynian asked him.
‘I’ll make courtesy calls each time we come to a fairsized city,’ Stragen shrugged. ‘Sooner or later I’ll get an official reply. It shouldn’t take all that long. We’ll certainly have a final decision by the time we reach Matherion.’ He looked speculatively at Ehlana. ‘Your Majesty’s learned a great deal about the subterranean government in the past few years,’ he noted. ‘Do you suppose we could put that information on the level of a state secret? We’re perfectly willing to co-operate and even assist on occasion, but we’d be much happier if the other monarchs of the world didn’t know too much about the way we operate. Some crusader might decide to smash the secret government, and that would inconvenience us a bit.’
‘What’s it worth to you, Milord Stragen?’ she teased him.
His eyes grew very serious. ‘It’s a decision you’ll have to make for yourself, Ehlana,’ he told her, cutting across rank and customary courtesies. ‘I’ve tried to assist you whenever I could because I’m genuinely fond of you. If you make a little conversational slip, though, and other monarchs find out things they shouldn’t know, I won’t be able to do that any more.’
‘You’d abandon me, Milord Stragen?’
‘Never, my Queen, but my colleagues would have me killed, and I wouldn’t really be of much use to you in that condition, now would I?’
Archimandrite Monsel was a large, impressive man with piercing black eyes and an imposing black beard. It was a forceful beard, an assertive beard, a beard impossible to overlook, and the Archimandrite used it like a battering ram. It preceded him by a yard wherever he went. It bristled when he was irritated – which was often – and in damp weather it knotted up into snarls like half a mile of cheap fishing line. The beard waggled when Monsel talked, emphasising points all on its own. Patriarch Emban was absolutely fascinated by the Archimandrite’s beard. ‘It’s like talking to an animated hedge,’ he observed to Sparhawk as the two of them walked through the corridors of the palace toward a private audience with the Astellian ecclesiaste.
‘Are there any topics I should avoid, your Grace?’ Sparhawk asked. ‘I’m not familiar with the Church of Astel, and I don’t want to start any theological debates.’
‘Our disagreements with the Astels are in the field of Church government, Sparhawk. Our purely theological differences are very minor. We have a secular clergy, but their Church is monastically organised. Our priests are just priests; theirs are also monks. I’ll grant you that it’s a fine distinction, but it’s a distinction nonetheless. They also have many, many more priests and monks than we do – probably about a tenth of the population.’
‘That many?’
‘Oh, yes. Every noble mansion in Astel has its own private chapel and its own priest, and the priest “assists” in making decisions.’
‘Where do they find so many men willing to enter the priesthood?’
‘From the ranks of the serfs. Being a clergyman has its drawbacks, but it’s better than being a serf.’
‘I suppose the Church would be preferable.’
‘Much. Monsel will respect you, because you’re a member of a religious order. Oh, incidentally, since you’re the interim preceptor of the Pandion Knights, you’re technically a patriarch. Don’t be surprised if he addresses you as “your Grace”.’
They were admitted into Monsel’s chambers by a long-bearded monk. Sparhawk had noticed that all Astellian clergymen wore beards. The room was small and panelled in dark wood. The carpet was a deep maroon, and the heavy drapes at the windows were black. There were books and scrolls and dog-eared sheets of parchment everywhere.
‘Ah, Emban,’ Monsel said. ‘What have you been up to?’
‘Mischief, Monsel. I’ve been out proselytising among the heathens.’
‘Really? Where did you find any here? I thought most heathens lived in the Basilica in Chyrellos. Sit down, gentlemen. I’ll send for some wine and we can debate theology.’
‘You’ve met Sparhawk?’ Emban asked as they all took chairs before an open window where the breeze billowed the black drapes.
‘Briefly,’ Monsel replied. ‘How are you today, your Highness?’
‘Well. And you, your Grace?’
‘Curious, more than anything. Why are we engaging in private consultations?’
‘We’re all clergymen, your Grace,’ Emban pointed out. ‘Sparhawk wears a cassock made of steel most of the time, but he is of the clergy. We’ve come to discuss something that probably concerns you as much as it does us. I think I know you well enough to know that you’ve got a practical side that’s not going to get sidetracked by the fact that you think we genuflect wrong.’
‘What’s this?’ Sparhawk asked.
‘We kneel on our right knee,’ Emban shrugged. ‘These poor, benighted heathens kneel on the left.’
‘Shocking,’ Sparhawk murmured. ‘Do you think we should come here in force and compel them to do it right?’
‘You see?’ Emban said to the Archimandrite. ‘That’s exactly what I was talking about. You should fall to your knees and thank God that you’re not saddled with Church Knights, Monsel. I think most of them secretly worship Styric Gods.’
‘Only the Younger Gods, your Grace,’ Sparhawk said mildly. ‘We’ve had our differences with the Elder Gods.’
‘He says it so casually,’ Monsel shuddered. ‘If you think we’ve exhausted the conversational potential of genuflectory variation, Emban, why don’t you get to the point?’
‘This is in strictest confidence, your Grace, but our mission here to Tamuli’s not entirely what it seems. It was Queen Ehlana’s idea, of course. She’s not the sort to go anywhere just because somebody tells her to – but all of this elaborate fol-de-rol was just a subterfuge to hide our real purpose, which was to put Sparhawk on the Daresian Continent. The world’s coming apart at the seams, so we’ve decided to let him fix it.’
‘I thought that was God’s job.’
‘God’s busy just now, and He’s got complete confidence in Sparhawk. All sorts of Gods feel that way about him, I understand.’
Monsel’s eyes widened, and his beard bristled.
‘Relax, Monsel,’ Emban told him. ‘We of the Church are not required to believe in other Gods. All we have to do is make a few allowances for their speculative existence.’
‘Oh, that’s different. If this is speculation, I suppose it’s all right.’
‘There’s one thing that isn’t speculation, your Grace,’ Sparhawk said. ‘You’ve got trouble here in Astel.’
‘You’ve noticed. Your Highness is very perceptive.’
‘You may not have been advised, since the Tamuls are trying to keep it on a low key, but very similar things are afoot in many other Daresian kingdoms, and we’re beginning to encounter the same sort of problem in Eosia.’
‘I think the Tamuls sometimes keep secrets just for the fun of it,’ Monsel grunted.
‘I have a friend who says the same thing about our Eosian Church,’ Sparhawk said cautiously. They had not yet fully explored the Archimandrite’s political opinions. A wrong word or two here would not only preclude any possibility of obtaining his help, but might even compromise their mission.
‘Knowledge is power,’ Emban said rather sententiously, ‘and only a fool shares power if he doesn’t have to. Let me be blunt, Monsel. What’s your opinion of the Tamuls?’
‘I don’t like them.’ Monsel’s response was to the point. ‘They’re heathens, they’re members of an alien race, and you can’t tell what they’re thinking.’
Sparhawk’s heart sank.
‘I have to admit, though, that when they absorbed Astel into their empire, it was the best thing that ever happened to us. Whether we like them or not is beside the point. Their passion for order and stability has averted war time and time again in my own lifetime. There have been other empires in ages past, and their time of ascendancy was a time of unmitigated horror and suffering. I think we’ll candidly have to admit that the Tamuls are history’s finest imperialists. They don’t interfere with local customs or religions. They don’t disrupt the social structure, and they function through the established governments. Their taxes, however much we complain about them, are really minimal. They build good roads and encourage trade. Aside from that, they generally leave us alone. About all they really insist upon is that we don’t go to war with each other. I can live with that – although some of my predecessors felt dreadfully abused because the Tamuls wouldn’t let them convert their neighbours by the sword.’
Sparhawk breathed a little easier.
‘But I’m straying from the point here,’ Monsel said. ‘You were suggesting a world-wide conspiracy of some kind, I think.’
‘Were we suggesting that, Sparhawk?’ Emban asked.
‘I suppose we were, your Grace.’
‘Do you have anything concrete upon which to base this theory, Sir Sparhawk?’ Monsel asked.
‘Logic is about all, your Grace.’
‘I’ll listen to logic – as long as she doesn’t contradict my beliefs.’
‘If a series of events happens in one place and it’s identical to a series of events taking place in another, we’re justified in considering the possibility of a common source, wouldn’t you say?’
‘On an interim basis, perhaps.’
‘It’s about all we have to work with at the moment, your Grace. The same sort of thing could happen at the same time in two different places and still be a coincidence, but when you get up to five or ten different occurrences, coincidence sort of goes out the window. This current upheaval involving Ayachin and the one they call Sabre here in Astel is almost exactly duplicated in the kingdom of Lamorkand in Eosia, and Ambassador Oscagne assures us that the same sort of thing’s erupting in other Daresian kingdoms as well. It’s always the same. First there are the rumours that some towering hero of antiquity has somehow returned. Then some firebrand emerges to keep things stirred up. Here in Astel, you’ve got the wild stories about Ayachin. In Lamorkand, they talk about Drychtnath. Here you have a man named Sabre, and in Lamorkand they’ve got one named Gerrich. I’m fairly sure we’ll find the same sort of thing in Edom, Daconia, Arjuna and Cynesga. Oscagne tells us that their national heroes are putting in an appearance as well.’ Sparhawk rather carefully avoided mentioning Krager. He was still not entirely certain where Monsel’s sympathies lay.
‘You build a good case, Sparhawk,’ Monsel conceded. ‘But couldn’t this master plot be directed at the Tamuls? They aren’t widely loved, you know.’
‘I think your Grace is overlooking Lamorkand.’ Emban said. ‘There aren’t any Tamuls there. I’m guessing, but I’d say that the master plot – if that’s what we want to call it – is directed at the Church in Eosia as opposed to the empire here.’
‘Organised anarchy perhaps?’
‘I believe that’s a contradiction in terms, your Grace,’ Sparhawk pointed out. ‘I’m not sure that we’re far enough along to deal with causes yet, though. Right now we’re trying to sort through effects. If we’re correct in assuming that this plot is all coming from the same person, then what we’re seeing is someone who’s got a basic plan with common elements which he modifies to fit each particular culture. What we really want to do is to identify this Sabre fellow.’
‘So that you can have him killed?’ Monsel’s tone was accusing.
‘No, your Grace, that wouldn’t be practical. If we kill him, he’ll be replaced by someone else – somebody we don’t know. I want to know who he is, and what he is and everything I can possibly find out about him. I want to know how he thinks, what drives him and what his personal motivations are. If I know all of that, I can neutralise him without killing him. To be completely honest with you, I don’t really care about Sabre. I want the one who’s behind him.’
Monsel seemed shaken. ‘This is a dreadful man, Emban,’ he said in a hushed tone.
‘Implacable is the word, I think.’
‘If we can believe Oscagne – and I think we can – someone’s using the arcane arts in this business,’ Sparhawk told them. ‘That’s why the Church Knights were created originally. It’s our business to deal with magic. Our Elene religion can’t cope with it because there’s no place in our faith for it. We had to go outside the faith – to the Styrics – to learn how to counteract magic. It opened some doors we might have preferred had been left closed, but that’s the price we had to pay. Somebody – or something – on the other side’s using magic of a very high order. I’m here to stop him – to kill him if need be. Once he’s gone, the Atans can deal with Sabre. I know an Atan, and if her people are at all like her, I know we can count on them to be thorough.’
‘You trouble me, Sparhawk,’ Monsel admitted. ‘Your devotion to your duty’s almost inhuman, and your resolve goes even beyond that. You shame me, Sparhawk.’ He sighed and sat tugging at his beard, his eyes lost in thought. Finally, he straightened. ‘All right, Emban, can we suspend the rules?’
‘I didn’t quite follow that.’
‘I wasn’t going to tell you this,’ the Archimandrite said, ‘first of all because it’ll probably raise your doctrinal hackles, but more importantly because I didn’t really want to share it with you. This implacable Sparhawk of yours has convinced me otherwise. If I don’t tell you what I know, he’ll dismantle Astel and everyone in it to get the information, won’t you, Sparhawk?’
‘I’d really hate that, your Grace.’
‘But you’d do it anyway, wouldn’t you?’
‘If I had to.’
Monsel shuddered. ‘You’re both churchmen, so I’m going to invoke the rule of clerical confidentiality. You haven’t changed the requirements of that in Chyrellos yet, have you, Emban?’
‘Not unless Sarathi did it since I’ve been gone. At any rate, you have our word that neither of us will reveal anything you tell us.’
‘Except to another clergyman,’ Monsel amended. ‘I’ll go that far.’
‘All right,’ Emban agreed.
