Springwar (28 page)

But he’d do no more smithing today. Another breath, and he levered himself up—and almost passed out, as pain waged war up his leg. He sat down again, and inspected the wound more thoroughly. Dared to probe the toe—and discovered to his horror that he felt nothing when he moved the tip. And then he saw what blood and a few doughty sinews had obscured. He hadn’t clipped the toe at all; he’d all but severed the joint!

Which he was in no position to tend.

And then another thought struck him: one so dire his brain recoiled from it.

He was King of Eron, and the King of Eron must be physically perfect.

Which he would no longer be—if the toe could not be reattached.

But dared he have it tended? Word would get out, and that could spell disaster, with the matter of the gem still to ponder, most especially whether it should remain a secret or be made public knowledge. This was certainly no time for Eron to be changing Sovereigns. He would therefore wait. He’d limp awhile, but people did that. Broken bones were no deterrent to kingship, and he’d simply give out that he’d kicked a table while working barefoot.

Besides, the wound might heal.

And pigs could fly!

It took all the will Gynn possessed to bind his foot with his sweat-scarf, put on his shoe, and mop the blood from the floor. No point risking the questions such a mess might entail.

He snared his tunic and made for the door, dismissing the new guardsman, Myx, with a terse “I just kicked an Eight-damned table, and I want to be alone with my carelessness right now.”

Myx fled, and Gynn eventually made it up a little-used staircase to his chambers. Fortunately, he’d been his own man longer than he’d been Sovereign, and was perfectly capable of scouring the bath after he’d cleaned the toe. He was also capable of sewing the edges of loose flesh back together, renewing the bandage, and throwing the old one in the fire.

It was harder to hide his naked feet from his squires, but he managed. It was not so easy to hide the limp.

Tyrill was well aware that even her peers on the Council of Chiefs referred to her as the Spider Chief. Nor was she concerned by that appellation—save, perhaps, as a compliment. She’d even gone so far—once—to wear a gown embroidered with spiders and their webs to a royal fete. It was therefore with a certain amount of glee that, after a number of webs of a less obvious sort had been cast, she began to reel them in.

They took the form of her squires—young women who,
in many holds, would’ve been called maids, but which term she despised, because it seemed less in status to that applied to young men—like Lykkon—who performed equivalent duties.

Well, not precisely. A number of Tyrill’s brood came from outside the clan, by way of rescues performed in the guise of good deeds, which coincidentally rendered these young women intensely loyal to her—or afraid, which had the same effect.

She was ready to receive the first one now, where she sat primly in her chambers, clad in clan maroon, with her Craft-Chief’s silver tabard prominently displayed.

A knock sounded precisely at the appointed time.

“Enter,” Tyrill called.

The girl who closed the carved oak door was named Lynee. She wore the beige of Common Clan, differenced with a sash of Argen maroon and a silver brooch of Tyrill’s service. Lynee bowed solemnly, and took the ritual cup of meeting silently, before seating herself on a low chair beside Tyrill’s high one. “It took me longer than I’d hoped,” she said clearly, “for which I apologize. But there was need for … circumspection.”

“There was,” Tyrill agreed. “But what I need is results. Confirmation, rather.”

“It is as you suspected,” Lynee replied. “The Roll of Arrivals at Eron Tower has been altered since you sent me there on the forty-first. It appears the whole thing has been recopied.”

“Which implies Lore’s collusion—or else Eellon had Lykkon do it. I don’t suppose you recognized the hand?”

Lynee shook her head. “I’m sorry, Chief, no.”

“No matter. What form did these changes take?”

“The earlier roll listed a visit from Lord Eellon and Lykkon as his squire, a hand and a half after sunset. It recorded the departure of them a hand after that—in company with Tower Warden Veen and two guards named Myx and Riff—along with an unidentified person. The later version only includes the departure of Veen, Myx, and Riff.”

Tyrill nodded sagely. “And that other matter?”

“I had to bribe a young guardsman to get this information, but it is also as you suspected. Two nights after Eellon’s visit, a man was apprehended, having come out of the Wild with news of a wounded comrade. He was taken prisoner, and identified as Eddyn syn Argen-yr—before references to his arrival were altered. He—”

“Eddyn!” Tyrill broke in, lunging forward, as though someone had slapped her back. “But that’s impossible! He’d have come straight to me upon leaving the tower. Unless—” She broke off. “Continue,” she managed breathlessly.

“I was only
told
they were altered, Chief; I didn’t see the earlier version. Later that same night, there was a flurry of comings and goings between the tower and Priest-Hold—messages sent first from the tower notifying them that one of their own had been found injured nearby, and then the arrival of several high functionaries from that clan, and another clandestine departure. Interestingly enough, the references to Priest-Clan comings and goings were
not
altered, only those to Eddyn.”

Tyrill gnawed her lip. “Would that I could see these records myself, but that would draw too much attention.”

“There is one final thing, Chief,” Lynee said hesitantly. “No one would talk about it directly, but I got the clear impression that the King knew Eddyn was coming and had ordered that he be arrested immediately upon his arrival.”

“He has no authority to do that without informing me!” Tyrill all but raged. “I don’t suppose you heard the reason given?”

“I think it had something to do with destruction of a masterwork.”

“Avall,” Tyrill growled.
“Now
this makes sense—of a sort. Except that Avall being here at all makes no sense.” She paused, having realized she was not alone. “You heard nothing I said since coming here,” she said flatly. “You may go, with my thanks. Do not be surprised, however, if I don’t find reason to send you away for a time, as soon as such can be arranged.”

“As you will, Chief,” Lynee murmured, and departed.

“Send in Nisheen,” Tyrill called to her back.

Nisheen was most things Lynee wasn’t. Though born to Argen-yr, her mother was Healer-Hold, and her gifts lay in that direction. Which would probably prompt a defection when the time came for her to state her official calling when she turned twenty, a year hence. She was also slim as a reed and intense, almost angry, though Tyrill had never found the source of that ire.

The obligatory greetings and drinks disposed of, Tyrill got right to business. “How fare things in Healer-Hold?”

“There are many things to tell you, Chief. So many I hardly know where to begin, and some of them things I was
not
dispatched to learn, but which may prove to be of more interest.” At a sign from Tyrill she went on. “Briefly, then, as to the information I was sent to retrieve, I was able to learn no more about Eellon’s condition than you knew heretofore. His body grows frail; that is no secret to anyone in this hold or hall. He hasn’t been sleeping well of late, however, to judge by the increased requests his healer has made for certain ingredients useful in sleeping draughts. And he’s apparently having trouble with headaches, which seem to coincide with periods of irregular heartbeat. He has refused drugs for either, because he says they dull the mind.”

“And how do you know this last?”

“His healer requested the drugs … in case.”

A brow shot up. Tyrill leaned forward in casual interest. “In case of what?”

Nisheen shook her head. “No one would say, though my sense is that they expect something to fail in him … eventually.”

“If only he precedes me in that happening,” Tyrill muttered. Then: “You spoke of other things?”

“Aye, Chief, it would seem that not only is Eellon in need of drugs, so is His Majesty, except that he is seeking painkillers—very strong ones.”

Tyrill leaned back and gnawed her lip again. “I wonder if this is real information, or something planted by His Majesty for whatever reason.”

“I think it is real, Chief. The request for drugs has not come from the Royal Healer, but from the King’s own
daughter, who is apprenticed at Healing. I don’t know who the intercessor is between King and daughter, if there is one, but she seemed very concerned, though she wouldn’t say why.”

“I have some ideas,” Tyrill mused. “More than that is not for me to say—to you.”

“As you will. But there is yet one more thing I thought you should know. His Majesty has been sending his own healer to Priest-Hold to check on someone who apparently came out of the Wild several days back. He is unconscious, but His Majesty is keen to know if he raves in his stupor, and has given orders that word be sent as soon as the lad revives.”

“Do you have a name for this boy?”

“Rrath syn Garnill. I know him vaguely.”

Tyrill nodded slowly. “And you’re sure you know nothing of the King’s pain? Are you not bonded to one of his squires?”

Nisheen blushed, but then her face darkened with emotion of another kind. “I thought we agreed we were to keep that out of it. I
love
Barri; I don’t want him to think I’m using him, and certainly not to someone else’s ends.”

Tyrill’s anger surged in return, but she fought it down. “We did agree,” she acknowledged. “But anything he volunteered without your asking, and to which he has not sworn you to silence, would violate very little.”

Nisheen’s brow furrowed in thought. “He told me out of concern, and I
will
tell you, but remember what I risk here, Chief.”

“I remember,” Tryill replied coldly.

“It wasn’t much, really. He only said that he’d noticed that the King was not using his squires as much as heretofore, and that he had himself noticed that the King seemed to limp when he thought no one was around.”

She paused. “Chief,” she dared, “do you think there is a connection between the limp and the King going through his daughter to acquire painkillers?”

Tyrill stilled her face to calm. “If I were to answer that, which I will not—officially—I would say that there might very well be.”

Tyrill did not confront Eellon the next morning, however. Nor the King. Rather, she acted on a notion that had been fermenting in her since hearing from her squires, but from which good sense had, so far, dissuaded her. That, and fear of what Eellon and the King might do, should she nose around their secrets too openly. Still, she had Nisheen in tow, and the girl had obligingly passed word of their intended destination to Argen-yr’s sept-chief, so Tyrill doubted she’d find herself disappearing without at least a search, as Eddyn (so discreet inquiries indicated) apparently had.

Therefore, it was with dawnlight still spreading across the sky that Tyrill and Nisheen made their way from one of Argen-Hall’s lesser gates to the promenade beside the river. Tyrill wore full clan regalia minus the too-distinctive tabard, but also a mouth-mask beneath it, the better to obscure her features. She wanted her presence noted for safety’s sake, but not her identity. Nisheen simply wore gown, cloak, and hood in clan colors.

Their breaths showed white in the chill air, but boots, gloves, and layers of thick fabric made it tolerable, as they walked with casual briskness toward the southwest end of the gorge. Crossing the river on its last span before the waterfall, they soon found themselves facing the calculated wildness of Priest-Clan’s precincts.

Unique in all Eron, Priestcraft had no ruling house, and was therefore clan and craft alike, drawing its members from all aspects of society, at, so they said, the Will of The Eight. And though its members were as educated as the other High Clans, and their tastes as urbane, they chose to present an outward face of ascetic austerity. For that reason, they’d hollowed their hold into the cliffs, leaving as much of the natural facade as possible. The interiors were as luxurious as any High Clan hold.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” Nisheen murmured as they paused before the rough-stone trilithons that marked the compound’s formal entrance.

“No,” Tyrill grunted. “But it’s the only way I can find out
what I want to know, without a lot of follow-ups and guessing.”

“Nisheen san Argen-yr,” Nisheen informed the gate-warden in the bored tones of ritual formality, “on business for that clan. And the King,” she added—which in a way it was, though not in a manner to win royal approval.

The warden studied her warily, then nodded toward Tyrill. “And your companion?”

“This is royal business,” Nisheen repeated. “Do we need to tell you more?”

The warden studied Tyrill carefully. Happily he squinted, which Tyrill hoped Nisheen would play to their advantage. “She looks familiar,” the warden mumbled.