Closer to the Chest (21 page)

“At least these days we no longer have to copy the text, unless it's a religious manuscript,” she told him. “We just do the pictures and illustrations on the right page, then take the book over to the printer with the pile of pages. Then the printer does the rest.” She shook her head ruefully. “And now we'll have to do twice the work, replacing the ones that were destroyed.”

“Damned unfair,” Mags agreed, not knowing what else to say.

She pinched the bridge of her nose, as if she had a headache coming on. “I think I need something to eat. I hope there's something in the kitchen by now.”

Mags' stomach growled, reminding him that he had gone on for a very long time with nothing but that glass of brandywine.
It's a wonder it didn't knock me out. Reckon I must've been so mad I just burned it off.
“I'll go with ye,” he said. “If
there ain't, me an' Dallen'll go find some pocket pies and bring a basket of 'em here.”

But they found the kitchen completely restored, bread baking, soup cooking, and some of the women who'd come to clean serving the Abbey workers and their fellow cleaners, and what looked like two thirds of the Sisters of Betane. The little kitchen and attached refectory were quite crowded, but pleasantly so. It was a relief not to see any weeping women. Amily was there with the Abbess, talking quietly over soup and bread. Mags and Sister Thistle got bowls and bread and went to join them.

“I got replacements for all the books, and Sister Thistle checked 'em, and said they were the right ones with the right pictures,” he told Amily and the Abbess, as both of them stopped talking and looked up at them.

Thistle nodded, pulling up a stool to the table. “Copy desks are in place, all the supplies arrived, we can start again tomorrow,” she said. “I think we should. The sooner we can get our
work
back to normal, the sooner things will
feel
back to normal.”

“I agree with you,” the Abbess replied. Her eyes were still red, but she seemed to have gotten over her despair. “Herald Mags, I don't know how to thank you and Amily for—well—everything.”

“It's our job, Abbess,” Amily reminded her gently. “And let's not forget Herald Willowby and the Watch Captain.”

The Abbess rubbed her red eyes. “I have not forgotten them. I am simply amazed by all of you. So resourceful . . . and so kind. And Herald Mags,
where
did you find that martial Order? Betane of the Ax? They are the answer to a prayer I had not even voiced! I will be able to go to sleep without feeling I need to get up every candlemark and make rounds to ensure everything is all right!”

“They got hit by whoever did this to you,” Mags said grimly. “That's how I run across them in the first place. And
that's why they was so willing to come on the trot. I got the notion they're really hoping whoever done this dares to come back on their watch.”

The Abbess blinked in consternation, and looked as if she did not quite know what to say. “I suppose—” she began, then looked as if she had decided that the less she knew, the better off she was. “Well, I doubt that anyone will try
anything
with them here.”

“That's the hope,” Amily replied, and turned to Mags, changing the subject quickly. “It's hard to believe, but we've gotten everything cleaned up. It will take some time to replace everything, but the main thing is there's enough food now, and enough drawing supplies to start work again, and the rest will come in over the next sennight or so.” She shook her head. “It's a good thing that the Sisters are . . . a fairly ascetic order. There was less to have to replace.”

The Abbess chuckled sadly. “I never thought I would be
grateful
to be poor. But you're right, it means there is less to replace.”

Mags raised an eyebrow. “Afore this is over, you ain't likely to be poor anymore,” he pointed out. “You got all kinda folk helpin' now.”

The Abbess flushed, and looked surprised for a moment, then, tentatively smiled. “Why—you're right! And here I am, weeping over what was lost, when indeed, it is only
things,
and so many people are coming to our rescue! I should be—well, not
rejoicing,
but I should stop feeling wretched and be
grateful.
”

“What you should be doing is getting some sleep,” Thistle scolded. “It's what I intend to do as soon as this soup is inside me.” When the Abbess looked uncertain, Thistle added, “There is nothing else you can do. We have our guardians, who are never going to let anything get past them. We've got enough food for days. We can go back to our work. The bees, the chickens, the goats, and the garden were untouched. In a
few more days, given how many other Temples and Orders have leapt to help us, not to mention the Prince and the Heralds, you won't be able to tell anyone had troubled us. So! Get some sleep! I'll finish overseeing what's left today before I nap; remember, I was snoring on the floor of the chapel all night.”

“Thank you, Sister Thistle,” the Abbess said, gratefully. “You are absolutely right. I will turn my mind to gratitude, and the proper means of thanking everyone who has helped and is helping us.”

She finished the last few spoonfuls of her soup, then, bidding Amily and Mags an absent “good night,” although it was barely afternoon, she took her bowl and spoon to the sink and headed in the direction of the cells.

Thistle shook her head. “I've never seen her this . . . unsettled. Usually she's the one with a cool head in a crisis. Then again,” she added thoughtfully, “the crisis has usually been something on the order of a leak in the roof. Still.”

“First she got swindled by that double-crossing Priest,” Mags said bluntly. “And she was swindled, no doubt about it. Even in rough shape, that Temple of yours was worth more than this farm. Then this. If I was her, I'd be rattled, too.”

“Ah . . . yes.” Thistle nodded shrewdly. “Well, sleep will help. So will concentrating on being grateful. She's good at gratitude.”

“And you're not?” Amily asked, amused in spite of the situation.

“No, I'm not,” Thistle replied frankly. “It makes me want to bite. That's why I'll never be an Abbess. And I think I'd better get back to overseeing things before I decide I should be grateful to Herald Mags and bite him.”

With that, the little Sister nodded to both of them, got up and went off to the next job, as Amily suppressed giggles.

“Well,” Mags said, weakly. “At least she warned me.”

I
t had been a quiet day . . . and Mags was beginning to look upon quiet days with a suspicious eye. There had been no sign of the Poison Pen; no attempts at further vandalism at either the Abbey of Ardana or the Temple of Betane. No Poison Pen letters at all at the Collegia. Not even the ladies of the Court had gotten any for almost a sennight, and that made Mags uneasy on two counts. First, that if the Poison Pen wasn't making trouble up on the Hill or the other two places he'd hit, he was probably making trouble elsewhere, and second, that if he
wasn't
making trouble elsewhere, then trouble was bound to break out badly, and soon.

And if he ain't doin' somethin', then how can I catch him?

Lord Jorthun had not yet come up with anything substantial either. The King and the Prince were inclined to believe the creature had run its course, but Jorthun didn't believe that, and neither did Mags or Nikolas.

It had been one of Mags' days attending the Law Court, and that, too, had been a quiet one—a day when just his
presence made people who might have been planning something dishonest change their minds and meekly take their losses. He had just finished his stint in the courtroom and was literally on his way out the door when one of the black-uniformed Servants of the Court waved to get his attention before he left.

“There's a Watch Captain to see you, Mags,” the man said. “Captain March?”

“March?” for a moment Mags puzzled over the name—then he remembered, it was the Watch Captain who'd been so helpful with the Sisters of Ardana. “Oh, right. Where is he?”

“Waiting at the back.” The Servant left to see to his own duties and Mags reversed himself and headed for the back entrance.

Sure enough, it was the same man, who greeted him with a little sketch of a salute. “Herald Mags. I wonder if you might help the Watch out?”

Without waiting for an answer, Captain March started walking. Mags fell in beside him, with Dallen trailing behind them both, reins looped up over his neck. “Given how helpful you was with the Sisters of Ardana, don't see how I can fail to,” he replied. “What's the problem?”

“It's not mine, it's my brother's, he's got the district where the Sisters
were,
” Captain March explained—which made Mags feel a tiny little jolt of
victory,
that he'd been able to peg the fact that March's family was multi-generational Watch. “He's a Captain too—it's the district our Pa has. Ned's got the Night Watch, Pa has the Day. Ned's the one with the problem.”

Mags tried not to be impatient with the way the man was circling around the problem without actually getting to it. “I take it he doesn't actually know any Heralds to bring this to?” he asked.

But March shook his head. “No, not exactly. I mean, he don't know any Heralds, it's just that last night was the first time he put everything together.” He took a deep breath.
“Easier to show you. Ain't that far. And Ned's better at explaining things than I am.”

March stopped at a vendor and bought them both a couple of pocket pies, while Mags took a moment to report back up the Hill by Mindspeech where he was going and what he was doing—however sketchy that was. Dallen begged for pies, and with a faint smile, March bought him a pair, too. They moved on, the men eating as they walked—Dallen had already inhaled his.

Shortly after that, they were at the Watch Station in a district that Mags had never been to before; it seemed to be an area with a lot of small craftsmen. Looming over it all was a Temple, a three-story-tall, simple, dignified structure that Mags realized with a start must be the former home of the Sisters of Ardana.

He examined it for a moment, finishing his luncheon, while March trudged stolidly along next to him. It looked austere enough to have been the home of scholars; nothing ornamental, just plain white stone, clean, simple lines and plenty of tall, narrow windows, with a tower rising a story above the rest at the front.

But that was not where they were going, and he followed March around a corner, taking him away from the building.

The Watch-house was easy enough to pick out among the rest of the buildings; all Watch-houses were built to the same plan; red brick, tile roof, square, with wooden-framed doors and windows. Resting on a bench outside it was a man who clearly was related by blood to Captain March.

“Ned!” Captain March hailed the fellow, with a wave. “Brought Herald Mags, like I promised.”

:This will be interesting. Two Captain Marches. How are you going to keep them straight in conversation?:
Dallen asked, facetiously.

:Easy. I outrank 'em. So I call that one ‘Ned' and t'other one ‘Kay'.:

Mags held out his hand to the square-faced, sandy-haired fellow in a Watch uniform who leapt to his feet. “I understand you got a problem, Ned,” he said without hesitation. “An' just call me Mags.”

:See? Sorted.:

Ned March pumped Mags' hand vigorously in both of his. “Thankee kindly for takin' the time to come down here, He—Mags,” he said. “I tell you, my granddad was Watch, and my Pa is Watch, an' Kay's Watch, and none of 'em never had a thing like this come up.”

“So,” Mags said, sitting down on the bench. “Let's hear it.”

“We got—well, all I can call it is, break-in-and-smash.” Ned ran his hand through his abundant hair. “I don't understand it. Somebody's breakin' into shops just to trash 'em out. Not one thing stole, an' it prolly doesn't take half a candlemark, but when they're done, place is a wreck.”

“Huh.” That sounded very like what had happened at the Abbey of Ardana. “Anythin' written on the walls? Anybody leave a note pinned to the door?”

But Ned shook his head. “Nothin'. Just break in the back way, wreck the place, an' leave.”

Mags scratched his head. “Anybody got a feud goin'?” he asked, though he was pretty sure Ned had thought of that already. “There a new gang moved in?” That was always a possibility; the old threat of “nice little shop you got here, bet you wanna keep it nice” was something gangs would try any place they thought the Watch couldn't stop them.

“Nope and nope,” Ned replied. “I thought of gangs first thing. Nothin'. I got ears in the streets, too, I'd'a heard. An'
nothin'
about any of the shops is the same!”

The last was said in tones of despair.

“'Cept one thing,” said the elder March, quietly. “I'm tellin' you, Ned, that's got to be it.”

“What does?” Mags asked, already sure he knew the answer.

“They're all run by women,” Ned sighed.

It turned out there had been six of these break-ins. They all occurred in places where the shop owner lived elsewhere, and there was no one living above the shop, or behind it. There was never any indication that there might be trouble. The owner would lock up, just as she had every other day previously, and when she returned in the morning to open up, she would find the place in ruins. Goods would be piled in the center of the room and trampled, shelves pulled down, large items tipped over, and everything that was breakable would have been smashed to bits.

So far the victims had been a candle-maker, an herbalist—one who carried not only medicinal herbs, but culinary and fragrance items—a stationer, a leatherworker who made nearly everything
except
shoes and boots, a seller of yarns, cords and threads, and a blacksmith who made small items. The candle-maker had not fared too badly; she'd been able to sweep up and re-use practically everything, and only her time had been lost. The yarn-monger had recovered most of her stock, too; apparently taking the time to tangle everything into a giant ball of fiber had been a little too much for the vandal to attempt. And the blacksmith's goods had been unbreakable; the vandal had taken out his ire on her shelves and bins, reducing them to splinters, but fixing that was the matter of a day or so. But the leatherworker had found nearly everything spoiled with water or stained with lamp-oil, and the stationer had to replace everything, as did the herbalist.

None of the women knew each other, or were related in any way. They didn't have mutual friends. They
might
have shared customers, but none of the customers in the days previous to the break-ins had excited any alarm.

There was nothing to link them to the depredations of the Abbey of Ardana, or the Temple of Betane, much less to the Poison Pen's antics up on the Hill.

And yet . . . and yet . . .

The elder March nodded as Mags glanced at him. “Aye. You're gettin' the same feeling, ain't you?”

“They don't seem linked at all,” Mags demurred.

“But yer gut tells you they are.” Captain Kay March nodded. “So does mine.”

:He's just referring to the Abbey, of course,:
Dallen pointed out.
:Nobody knows about the Temple but you, the Prince, the Prioress, and the work crew. And he can't know about what's going on up on the Hill.:

Nothing connected them. Except . . . one thing. They were all in the neighborhoods surrounding the Temple of Sethor the Patriarch.

:Still. What's the odds?:
Mags replied, and turned his attention back to Captain Ned. “I can't think of anything you haven't, but that don't mean I won't. Tell me about anything else that comes up. If I'm not at the East Beech Courthouse, a message left there'll reach me.”

Captain Ned sighed, but didn't look particularly disappointed. “It was long odds you'd come up with anythin' Mags. 'Preciate you tryin'.”

“I ain't givin' up,” Mags pledged as he stood up. “Keep me informed. I'm gonna let 'em know about this up on the Hill.”

“That's more'n I asked for, Mags. Thankee again.” They all three shook hands solemnly, and Mags finally mounted up, and was off with a wave.

But not far.

:You're thinking what I'm thinking,:
Dallen observed, as Mags turned his head in the direction of the Temple that now belonged to the followers of Sethor the Patriarch.

:Mebbe, mebbe not. One thing I do know, religious types are up at all hours, generally. Mebbe someone saw something. Mebbe one of 'em heard something from the people comin' here. They're smack in the middle of everything, an' it ain't goin' out of our way to pay 'em a visit.:

He left Dallen at the entrance—there didn't seem to be
anyone prepared to “take charge” of the Companion, and Dallen was perfectly fine all on his own, although Mags could tell he was a bit miffed at not getting a proper reception. Then he just strolled in, hoping to poke around a bit, and talk to the underlings.

That,
however, was exactly what he was not allowed to do. As soon as he set foot in the austere, white-stone antechamber to the sanctuary, he was spotted by a lesser priest, who hurried up to him. “Ah, Herald,” the man said, deferentially, “Welcome to the Sanctuary of Sethor the Patriarch. Allow me to take you to the High Priest immediately; as it happens, your timing could not have been better, he has just finished afternoon services and is free.”

“That's not necessary—” Mags protested.

“Oh I assure you, it is,” the priest said, and would not hear otherwise. So Mags found himself escorted past all the acolytes and servants and other underlings he would very much have
liked
to speak to, and straight into the capacious office of the High Priest.

“Capacious” was indeed the right word for it. The office was the size of the Lesser Audience Chamber at the Palace, but sparsely furnished. The walls were the same plain, white stone as the antechamber, the Sanctuary, and the exterior. There was a single strip of blue carpet leading from the door to a desk at the back of the room, and two chairs, one behind the desk, and one in front of it. If the High Priest wanted the place to look austere, he was succeeding.

Nice an' cool in here, though. Damn comfortable in all this heat.
Truth to tell at the moment he envied them this stone pile.

“Ah, good afternoon, Herald!” The High Priest was already standing when Mags entered, and Mags' immediate impression was of a hard, cold man, very erect in his blue robes. Deceptively simple, those robes were, but Mags, who was good friends with the now-Princess Lydia, had learned all
about fabrics from her. And he could recognize, by the drape and the suppleness of those “simple” robes, that they probably cost more than double what the more elaborately embroidered vestments of some other clerics he knew cost.

As for the heavy gold chain and medallion around the High Priest's neck . . . it probably represented the combined wealth of a small town.

“I am Theodor Kresh, High Priest of Lord Sethor the Patriarch. And you are—?”

“Herald Pippin,” Mags lied, knowing Pip would cover for him. He took extra pains with his pronunciation and accent. “I was just passing through this neighborhood and I thought I would pay my respects.”