The Stricken Field (16 page)

"I'm only concerned with my daughter's welfare!" She could not say it more directly than that.

"But that interests me not at all." Ylo untied his cravat. "I told you the first time we talked that I was an unscrupulous liar."

"Yes, you did."

"That's still true." He tossed the cravat to the floor and began unbuttoning his doublet. "Hardgraa thinks I deserted Shandie and came back here just for a romp with you. I did consider it, I admit." With the doublet open, he began unbuttoning the shirt underneath. "At the moment you really don't know if your husband is dead or not, because you have only my word for it, and that's worthless. Now, if you came here to be bedded, get your clothes off, and I'll see what I can do. But don't expect any favors for it. Otherwise, good night, your Majesty."

Monster! Eshiala stamped out, wishing she could slam the door.

The Impress and her mother had been down at the lake all morning, feeding ducks, throwing rocks, and hunting for wildflowers. By the time they made their way home for lunch, her Imperial Majesty was hot, tired, and grumpy; and wanting to be carried.

Eshiala was not much less grumpy herself. News of Shandie's death had shattered the fragile shell she had developed at Yewdark. Her safe little world had collapsed under her feet like ice on a pond. Friends and accomplices had suddenly become jailers, and she felt surrounded by enemies. There was no one she could trust to help her. Down at the water, she had been tormented by a sensation of being watched-that was one of the first signs of madness, wasn't it?

On the way back to the house, though, she noticed tracks in a muddy stretch of the path, with larger prints overlaying Maya's and her own. So she had been followed, she had been watched, she was not suffering delusions of persecution! In one sense that was good news. In another it was very bad. Centurion Hardgraa could be assumed guilty until the Gods testified otherwise in Person.

Continually persuading Maya to walk just a few more steps on her own feet, she emerged from the woods. Peering over and under the wilderness of runaway shrubbery, she spied Ylo sitting on the terrace in the sunshine like an unpredictable watchdog dozing before the door. Had she been alone, she could have gone around the long way to avoid him, but Maya was too tired and too heavy for such evasions.

At breakfast that morning, he had hurled another thunderbolt as casually as Maya dropped rocks in lakes. The reason the Impire had not reacted to Shandie's disappearance, he explained, was that a fake imperor ruled in his place, with a fake impress at his side. If Eshiala walked into the Opal Palace now, she might meet herself face to face.

Since both her sister and Shandie's cousin had disappeared from sight, the impostors' true identities were not hard to estimate. As soon as Eshiala's first stunned surprise had worn off, she had shocked everyone by laughing aloud. Ashia would be enjoying herself enormously. She would make a far better impress than Eshiala ever would, and have the fun of a lifetime doing so. She had a low opinion of Prince Emthoro, but likely she would put up with him in a good cause-not that either of them could have had any choice in the matter. They would be doing whatever the almighty Zinixo wanted.

Later though, down at the lake, she had realized that Ashia had been a potential ally and now was not.

"'Lo, Beautiful!" Ylo smirked cheekily. He seemed very relaxed and comfortable in a soft chair that he must have ordered brought out specially. His sore feet rested on another.

Eshiala ignored him, leading her daughter across the terrace, but she had to pass very close to him.

He ignored her ignoring. "What'cha been doing?" "Feeding the ducks."

"Ah! Nothing tastier than a fat duckling."

She was almost past him when he said, "Eshiala?" She thought his tone had lost its banter, and stopped. "Yes?"

He was squinting up at her, against the sun, but the contempt and arrogance still gleamed under the long lashes. "Auntie's back."

The countess had ordered up the gig that morning and had herself driven into Faintown. If she was back already, she had not stayed long.

"So?"

Ylo smiled his most perfect smile, oozing self-satisfaction. "She reports the place is a madhouse. The news is out. It's even worse than I thought-goblins grinding up legions like coffee beans."

"You seem strangely pleased."

"I don't like to be disbelieved when I'm telling the truth. K do it so rarely that I want to have it appreciated! Now you can believe my story. Now you can surrender to lust without worrying about Shandie ever turning up to complain."

Contemptible clod! Dragging her daughter by the hand, she swept past him into the house. Somehow she could not be angry with Ylo, merely sad that he was not the debonair rapscallion she had believed him to be. She had never approved of him, could never have trusted him as an ally, but he had been amusing once. Now he was merely disgusting.

The image of ice on a pond came to her again. She had barely seen Maya happily arranged at the tasty end of a spoon when her footing cracked and tilted some more.

In the gloomy, ill-proportioned room the proconsul used as a study, she faced him like an errant pupil called out by the teacher. Ionfeu was old; his crippled back tormented him. He was badly shaken by the dread responsibility now thrown upon him, and looked as if he had not slept since Ylo's arrival. He was nonetheless still a count, still an Imperial politician and officer, and still very certainly the ruler of Yewdark. He was gracious and implacable.

He was behind a desk. She was expected to sit before it. She could not believe that her sister, as duchess or impress, would ever tolerate that from a mere proconsul.

Eigaze was there, too, still wearing the finery she had assumed for her trip to Faintown, also wearing a very strange expression. Her fat lips were pursed white; her thick fingers moved restlessly on her lap. Eshiala needed hear no words to guess that Lady Eigaze disapproved of whatever message was coming.

The centurion stood in a corner with his arms folded. Two nights ago old Ukka had called him dangerous, and Eshiala had disbelieved, seeing in him only a trustworthy guardian, as she had for months. Now he was her jailer. He spied on her movements. He was the proconsul's instrument and weapon, and as open to argument as a razor. He was more than dangerous.

She perched on a chair, clasped her hands to still them, and regarded Ionfeu with her best Imperial stare, poor thing though it was.

He began delivering sentence, deliberate and lucid and cold. "The signifer seems to be telling the truth, ma'am. News of the goblins has reached Faintown. The imperor addressed the Senate yesterday. As we know that ... know that he could not have been the real imperor, I must accept that Ylo is also telling the truth about the substitution that has been made. In other words, I have decided to accept all aspects of his story. Do you disagree with my conclusions?"

She could say that Ylo was a notorious liar, but the count would not see that sort of lying as being the same as this sort of lying. Lying to men was a crime; lying to women only a sin. And she did believe Ylo's tale. She nodded her head to agree.

Before the count spoke again, Hardgraa's iron growl intervened. "I'd still like to know why he's here at all." For the first time in two days, a faint smile appeared on the old aristocrat's face. "Perhaps he's telling the truth there, too, Centurion. I think he met with a little divine justice at Woggle. He certainly wouldn't be the first young man to wake up naked and penniless in a strange bed. Normally he would have appealed to the army for rescue and retribution, and would have suffered no more than ridicule. But this time he daren't. Yewdark was the only refuge within reach, that's all."

"K expect you're right, my lord."

"And we might give him credit for wanting to break the news to us. He has a sense of duty, too, you know. His record shows that."

"I suppose so." But Hardgraa seemed unconvinced. "His record reveals other abilities also." He sneered at Eshiala, and her temper exploded, taking her completely by surprise.

"How dare you!" she shouted. "How dare you suggest that there is anything between that lout and me? You actually dare suggest that Ylo came here for my sake? That ... that ... lout?"

Ionfeu's smile had faded like the winter snows. "I certainly hope that he was not implying any such thing, ma'am! Centurion?"

Hardgraa muttered, "No offense intended, your Majesty!" He seemed suddenly puzzled. Perhaps he had just realized that no sane suitor would behave as Ylo had been behaving.

The count coughed diplomatically. "We are all a little overwrought. Now, ma'am, with your husband dead, your daughter is titular ruler of the realm."

"The rest of the world would not agree with you, my lord."

"But I must be guided by my conscience." The old man cleared his throat, glanced hesitantly at his wife, and then continued sternly. "You may not be aware of this. It is common gossip, though. Prince Emthoro is thirty-two years old, and unmarried. His various mistresses have not complained of their treatment, but they have borne him no bastards. A prince who has not fathered children by the time he is thirty-two is probably not going to produce any children at all. Rumor blames an attack of mumps in early manhood. His brother died at Karthin. Now Shandie. Ma'am, that child of yours is unusually precious!"

"She is infinitely precious to me."

"To all of us, ma'am. Don't you see? The Affaladi branch is morganatically disqualified. I do believe that without the princess, Agraine's house may be effectively extinct. That means change of dynasty, and changes of dynasty almost invariably bring civil war."

The old man was forgetting that the effective impress at the moment was Ashia, and Ashia might see her duty to the Impire in ways that would shock the count out of his stoop. In the circumstances she almost certainly would. Eshiala was not going to mention that complication, though.

"Prince Emthoro is not a very likable person," Ionfeu said, "but he is not a monster. He will not harm an innocent child."

"Unless he produces children of his own, perhaps." Or my sister produces them for him.

"A son would take precedence. I admit the temptation will exist if he sires daughters and no son, but I repeat that he is not an evil man! I see it as my duty, your Majesty, to return your child to court so that she may come into her inheritance."

The countess made a small sound that conveyed both scorn and anger, but she did not speak. She would have spoken earlier and been overruled. Eshiala must fight this alone.

"You surrender to the Covin, Proconsul? You yield your rightful impress into the hands of a mad dwarf ?"

A rosy tint bloomed in the pearly-gray skin over his cheekbones. "The chances that Shandie could overthrow the Covin were never very good, ma'am; although I swore to aid him, we all knew that. With Shandie himself dead, the odds are impossible. We have no leader. We must assume that the Protocol has ended. From now on, for all our days, there will be a single supreme sorcerer behind the throne. We must hope that the rule of the One will be no more onerous than that of the Four. He will certainly outlive all of us, and I expect he will establish a successor for future centuries-I don't know. My concerns are mundane, not occult. I know that your daughter's place is in Hub and my duty is to return her there."

She raised her voice. "Shandie would not agree!" The words came out too blustery, and the old man remained unmoved.

"With respect, ma'am ... He left no instructions for this event. I must therefore use my discretion and best judgment. I have known him all his life. He always placed his duty to the Impire before anything else, and I believe he would expect the same dedication from his family."

Meaning, A grocer's daughter cannot understand how aristocrats think. She felt her face burn like the noonday sun.

"And I? Do I relieve my sister of her temporary promotion?" She held his gaze, and it was the proconsul who looked away. The roses were ugly blotches on his face now.

"That must be your own choice, ma'am." His voice was growing harsher. "We do not know what sort of magic has been used. The prince and your sister may be their usual selves, except for their appearance. They may be collaborating willingly with the Covin out of a sense of duty, to maintain the rule of law and order. Or they may have been coerced. At the extreme, they may actually be convinced in their own minds that they are who they seem to be."

Her anger flashed out then, but it could find no more useful weapon than an unfamiliar vulgarity. "Either way, I shall likely end up under Emthoro!"

"Your decision, ma'am. If you do not wish to accompany the child, I shall not force you. I can see what might await you."

Eigaze spoke up for the first time, her voice dry and bitter. "Of course, when the usurper is done with her, she may not realize it is Emthoro at all. He may look just like Shandie down to the mole on his toe, and she may have forgotten that the original died. What a wonderful chance to undo tragedy and regain a lost marriage!"

Eshiala had never heard the countess use sarcasm before.

"Be silent!" the count snapped furiously. "Ma'am, I have made my decision about your daughter. Whether you choose to accompany her is up to you. My wife and I can testify to her identity. You are free to depart if you wish. I am preparing a letter to send to the palace. Please advise me of your decision as soon as you can."

"How long have I got?" she asked. Her throat was so tight that every word hurt.

"A day or so at most. There may be panic in the streets if the goblins head south. Who knows how close on Ylo's heels they may be? We must act swiftly."

Countess Eigaze surged to her feet. "Ion, you know what I think! Write your stupid letter! Then read it over and try to find the honor in it. Eshiala, my dear, let's you and me go and have a cup of tea and talk this over."

Eshiala rose, also, feeling grateful. She wondered what Ashia would say in her place. The mind boggled.

As they reached the door, Eigaze seemed to have second thoughts. She turned. "What are you going to do about Ylo?"