Christopher Stasheff

‘Heir?’ Rod raised an eyebrow. ‘Loguire has a son?’

‘Two,’ said Tuan with a tight smile. ‘The younger is a fool, who loves his best enemy; and the elder is a hothead, who loves Durer’s flattery. Thus, what Durer will say, Anselm Loguire will do.’

Rod raised his mug. ‘Let us wish the Loguire long life.’

‘Aye,’ said Tuan, fervently. ‘For Anselm hath an ancient grievance against the Queen.’

Rod frowned. ‘What grievance?’

‘I know not.’ Tuan’s face sagged till he looked like a bloodhound with sinus trouble. ‘I know not.’

Rod sat back, resting one hand on the hilt of his sword. ‘So he and Durer both want the Queen’s downfall. And the other nobles’ll follow their lead - if old Loguire dies. So much for one leg of the throne. What’s the other one?’

‘Secundus,’ said Tuan, with a Cub Scout salute, ‘the people: peasants, tradesmen, and merchants. They love her for this newfound easing of their sorrows; but they fear her for her witches.’

‘Ah. Yes. Her… witches.’ Rod scowled, managing to look sharp-eyed and competent while his brain reeled. Witches as a political element?!

‘For ages,’ said Tuan, ‘the witches have been put to the torture till they forswore the Devil, or have undergone the trial of water or, failing all else, been burned at the stake.’

For a moment, Rod felt a stab of compassion for generations of espers.

‘But the Queen harbors them now; and it is rumored by some that she is herself a witch.’

Rod managed to shake off his mental fog long enough to croak, ‘I take it this doesn’t exactly inspire the people with unflagging zeal for the Queen and her cause.’

Tuan bit his lip. ‘Let us say that they are unsure…’

‘Scared as hell,’ Rod translated. ‘But I notice you didn’t include the beggars as part of the people.’

Tuan shook his head. ‘Nay, they are apart, frowned and spat upon by all. Yet of this flawed timber, I hope to carve a third leg for the Queen’s throne’

Rod digested the words, studying Tuan’s face.

He sat back in his chair, lifted his mug. ‘You just may have what Christopher Stasheff

the Queen needs, there.’ He drank. Lowering the mug, he said, ‘I suppose the councillors are doing everything they can to deepen the people’s tear?’

Tuan shook his head, brow wrinkled in puzzlement. ‘Nay. they do nothing of the sort. Almost, one would think, they do not know the people live.’ He frowned into his mug, sloshing the wine about inside. ‘Yet there is little need to tell the people they must fear.’

‘They know it all too well already?’

‘Aye, for they have seen that all the Queen’s witches cannot keep the banshee off her roof.’

Rod frowned, puzzled. ‘So let it wear a groove in the battlements if it wants to 1 It’s not doing any harm, is it?’

Tuan looked up, surprised. ‘Dost not know the meaning of the banshee, Rod (3allowglass?’

Rod’s stomach sank; nothing like displaying your ignorance of local legends when you’re trying to be inconspicuous

‘When the banshee appears on the roof,’ said Tuan, ‘someone in the house will die. And each time the banshee has walked the battlements, Catharine hath escaped death by a hair.’

‘Oh?’ Rod’s eyebrows lifted. ‘Dagger? Falling tiles? Poison?’

‘Poison.’

Rod sat back, rubbing his chin. ‘Poison: the aristocrat’s weapon; the poor can’t afford it. Who among the great lords hates Catharine that much?’

‘Why, none!’ Tuan stared, appalled. ‘Not one among them would stoop to poison, Rod Gallowglass; ‘twould be devoid of honor.’

‘Honor still counts for something here, eh?’ Seeing the scandalized look on Tuan’s face, Rod hurried on. ‘That lets out the noblemen; but someone on their side’s up to tricks. Wouldn’t be the councillors, would it?’

Understanding and wary anger rose in Tuan’s eyes. He sat back, nodding.

‘But what do they gain by her death?’ Rod frowned. ‘Unless one of them wants to crown his lordling and be the King’s Councillor.

Tuan nodded. ‘Mayhap all wish that, friend Gallowglass.’

Rod had a sudden vision of Gramarye carved up into twelve petty kingdoms, constantly warring against one another, each run by a warlord who was ruled by his councillor. Japanese usurpation, the man behind the throne, and anarchy.