Part 33 (1/2)

Amiel sat sobbing on one couch, and Mar&i was trying to comfort her. She calmed, and told me what had happened.

About five years ago, she and her husband had taken a couple, the Tansens, into their service.They'd been perfect in every way, so much so that Lord Kalvedon asked the couple to move into one of the cottages on their estate. The couple had performed almost every service for the family, from groundskeeping to shopping to simply keeping their masters company. They'd had two children, ”babes like I'd want,” Amiel said, ”if I ever wanted children. Beautiful little ones.” The woman had been supposed to go with Amiel that morning to visit her milliner. But she had not come up to the Kalvedans'

mansion when she was supposed to, and so Amiel went to see what was the matter.

”I thought maybe one of their children was feeling poorly, and I'd tell her to forget it. I'm a big girl, and could buy ribbons by myself.”

The cottage door was unlocked, and Amiel pushed it open, then screamed.

Sprawled on the floor was the woman, and beside her one of the children. In another room lay her husband. All three of then were dead, strangled with a yellow silk cord.

”But that wasn't the worst,” Amiel said, and started crying again. ”I went into the little room they used as a nursery. The baby... she was dead too. Killed like the others!

”What kind of a monster could do something like that?”

I knew what sort. Tovieti. So the yellow cord was now more in Nicias than whispers and a bauble worn by a foolish rich woman.

But what did this have to do with me? Hadn't she reported it to the wardens?

She had, but it seemed as if they didn't care. Either that, she went on, or else they were afraid.

”Probably.”

”More than that,” Amiel went on, thinking aloud. ”They acted like... like this was just some sort of horrible routine. I know the Tansens weren't rich like I am... but they were my friends!”

”What should she do?” Maran asked. ”I called you because my husband said something once, back when you and the seer were testifying before the Rule of Ten, that you'd encountered a cult of stranglers in the Border States that the councilors closed the room to hear about.”

I said I didn't think I could discuss that, but that there had been some truth to what her husband had heard. I knew of these people, and how dangerous they were.

”If they came into our estate, past the guards, over the walls without anyone crying the alarm... they could come back,” Amiel said. ”Do they want me? Do they want my husband next? What should I do?”

Privately I thought that if the Tovieti wanted you, you would probably not be safe in the middle of an army camp. Instead, I said mat they kept apartments in town, did they not? They should move into them this very night. As for being secure, I suddenly remembered a man, no, four men, very unlikely to be Thak's stranglers.

”Write the address down,” I told her. ”I shall have tins man call on you this evening. Pay him well, he and any a.s.sociates he brings, and obey his orders exactly. You can trust him, even though he looks a bit disreputable. He's held my own life in his hands. ”His name is Yonge.”

I finished telling my story about the slaughter of Amiel's servants, and how the wardens treated it as commonplace, and was silent. Tenedos made no response, but turned to the young warden.

”Kutulu?”

”Routine is exactly what it is,” he said. ”There have been four hundred and sixteen such murders within our jurisdiction within the last two months. Rich, poor, it does not seem to matter. Sometimes the place is looted, sometimes not. It seems that the murderers' campaign is less for gold than to create chaos and dread.”

”Yet there's no outcry,” I said.

”We are doing our very best to keep the matter hushed,” Kutulu said.

”Why?” Tenedos asked.

”Those are the specific orders of the Rule of Ten.”

”What the h.e.l.ls good does that do?” I said angrily. ”Ignoring it won't make them go away. What the h.e.l.ls will it take- Thak dancing on their G.o.ds-d.a.m.ned skulls?”

”Thak?” Kutulu looked puzzled. Evidently the Rule of Ten didn't even trust their lawmen with all the facts.

Tenedos looked at me.

”Go ahead, Damastes. We can't follow the Rule of Ten's orders anymore. The times are far more perilous than any of them... and perhaps we, as well... realize. Tell him everything.”

The next evening, I was riding to meet Maran when I saw a rider coming toward me. I recognized him before he saw me, and pulled Lucan behind a high-piled produce cart.

It was Elias Malebranche. He wore a hooded cloak, the hood pulled back. He rode close, but didn't recognize me, since I'd slipped from the saddle and was pretending to examine one of Lucan's hooves.

As he pa.s.sed I chanced a look, and saw, above his beard and burying itself into it, the savage redness of a half-healed scar. I'd marked him well.

I wondered where Malebranche was going. We were in a shabby section of Nicias, a route I habitually took to make sure I had no followers. I wondered what devious business he had in this district As much as I wanted to see Maran, I knew what my duty must be, remounted, and rode after the Kallian. Of course there'd been several times we'd not been able to meet-the price of a clandestine affair. We'd even developed a device for such an eventuality, and” would” meet in the same place the following night unless advised otherwise.

His route twisted and turned, but eventually led to the river. We were almost to the ocean docks, as bad a part of the city as existed. I loosened my sword in its sheath, and my eyes darted around the shadows.

The cobbles were loose, and I had to walk Lucan, afraid of making a noise.

Malebranche turned his horse down a narrow alley, I counted fifteen, then went after him.

I could see clearly down the narrow way all the way to the water. But there was no sign whatsoever of the landgrave.

I rode all the way down and out onto the pier at the foot of the hill and back, but the Kallian had completely vanished. I looked for hidden pa.s.sageways that would permit a horse to enter, but saw none.

There was nothing but solid brick and then the dark water.

I was a failure as a spy. I looked up at the rising moon, and my disappointment fell away. I still had more than enough time to meet Mar n.

I held Mar&n's ankles stretched apart as we drove together, her body curled up, lifting from the bed, feeling the power of that great warm avalanche growing inside me. She moaned, pulled at me, and I released her legs and lowered myself onto her, her b.r.e.a.s.t.s flattened against my chest as her heels pushed against my b.u.t.tocks, forcing me deeper and deeper into her.

My breath rasped as her body shuddered, shuddered again.

I opened my eyes and looked down into hers, staring at me, staring beyond me, her wet mouth gasping for air, head thrown back in sweet agony.

”Damastes, oh G.o.ds, Damastes,” she groaned as her hips thrust, ”I... I...”

”Say it,” I said. ”Say it!”

”I... oh G.o.ds, I love you! I love you!”

”And... and I love you,” I said, the truth as naked as our sweating bodies as the stars exploded in our roaring cry of ecstasy.

Now there could be no turning back.