"All right. I'm not sure I buy all that…"

"There are more. The queue seems endless. And none of the would-be killers know why you're needed dead." Februaren added, "For every attack that came close enough for you to notice I've foiled a dozen."

"Why?"

"You're family."

"Don't start…"

"Stop! That isn't all of it. But it's a big part. And none of your fabrications change a whit who you are."

Principatè Delari asked, "You're certain, Grandfather?"

"There is no doubt. Excepting in his own mind, possibly. Because he doesn't want it to be true."

Delari asked, "Did they know who he was when they sent him over?"

"No. They still don't. They sent him because they wanted shut of him. Gordimer feared his popularity with the soldiers. Er-Rashal feared him because of what he knows. He couldn't silence him there because questions would be asked."

Hecht didn't argue. "The world is full of fools."

"One named Piper Hecht," the Principatè said. "I can figure it out third hand. It would be about the truth concerning the brothers who raided the haunted burial ground."

The man in brown said, "Young Piper, you need not fear betrayal. We three alone know who you really are."

"Really? You just mentioned the Rascal. What about a half-dozen Deves who helped me early on? Or Anna? Or Ferris Renfrow, the Imperial spymaster?" He chose not to mention Osa Stile or Bone and his band of the betrayed.

Cloven Februaren stared. He wore a small, knowing smile. "I was the Ninth Unknown, Piper. More powerful than the Patriarch. I gave that up so I could study the world through naked eyes instead of the lens of the Construct. Thus, I've wasted the best part of fifty years. Mostly trying to deflect inimical fortune. The raid that ushered you children into slavery was a complete surprise. Had there been the least likelihood of slavers striking so far from the usual places, neither of you would have been taken. But even the gods themselves don't post guardians against the impossible."

The man seemed much less than Collegium legend declared. He did not stand nine feet tall and fart lightning. He was just a middle-aged man so used to power that he could not imagine being disobeyed. Nothing about him suggested any supernatural power or congress with the Night.

Nothing suggested that Muniero Delari was a big bull sorcerer, either. But Hecht had seen what he could do. And he, in his seventies, was still intimidated by his grandfather.

The man in brown said, "Muno, you and Heris can go, now. You've solved your mystery. I'll join you for breakfast."

Delari started to say something.

"In the morning, Muno. Right now I need to talk to Piper privately."

Heris was a biddable child, though a grown woman who was Hecht's senior. She went to the doorway, her eyes unfocused.

"Use the other door, please. Over there, Muno. In the interests of efficiency. That opens onto the interior hallway. Easier for you."

"As ever, I must defer to your judgment."

"He doesn't like that," Februaren said after Heris and Delari left.

"And you'd be pleased if you were in his shoes?"

"I wouldn't be thrilled. Stipulated. I went through it with my own grandfather. He wouldn't lie down and stay dead, either. But there's a method to my madness, to dust off a cliche. First, get Muno out of here. There's work to do. Now. The emotionalism and long explanations would just get in the way."

"Let me confess to complete ignorance of whatever the hell it is you're talking about."

"Clever. Excellent. Borrowing your attitude from your friend Pinkus Ghort."

"If there's something so time-critical that the Principatè has to be hustled out…"

"Where was I an hour ago? Right here. But undiscovered. Just the fact that you're onto me changes the equation. Now I can't be the ghost in the walls who's your guardian angel. You knowing I'm real and here, and Muno doing the same, changes your attitude toward everything. I'm about to be hauled out of the realm of legend into a world where somebody besides that asshole Hugo Mongoz can see me."

Hecht did not understand. He was disinclined to pursue enlightenment.

Februaren said, "We've failed to examine one whole class of would-be assassins. The Instrumentalities of the Night."

"What?"

"The soultaken you defeated at al-Khazen were neither the beginning nor the end of your war with the Night. Their reasoning is fallacious. It's too late to stuff the djinn back into the bottle. But the Night doesn't see time the way we do. They think in centuries. They don't often recognize individuals. But you they know. You're a threat. You're the Godslayer. You have to be stopped. Despite the obvious fact, from our viewpoint, that a lot of other people have figured it out, too, by now. Because you're the spark who sparked bright enough for them to see."

"One who hasn't figured it out being Piper Hecht." Cloven Februaren told him, "A while ago you decided to go along. You'd stop insisting that you're Piper Hecht from Duarnenia. You'd let us define what we want you to be. As once you promised Ferris Renfrow you'd let him. As you've done with everyone since you arrived in Firaldia.

"Right here, right now, I'm telling you—between you and me, boy—the age of bullshit is over. I know every detail of your life. The most critical is that you stumbled on a way to kill the Instrumentalities of the Night. They don't know how you did and they don't know why it works, but they saw you spark. And your entire life since has been shaped by that night in Esther's Wood.

"And your life is only one of thousands. On either side of the curtain between the world and the Night. More so, probably, on the other side. They're slow to learn but they can smell a threat before it arises. The soultaken meant to destroy you began their journey two hundred years before you were born. And though they've failed so far, they haven't failed yet.

"You've shown the world that there's a way to free itself from the Tyranny of the Night. Unfortunately, those dedicated to that end are captained by a lunatic named Sublime who is the slave of his own obsessions. And who is continuously manipulated by people who make sure he never comes into contact with any taint of reality."

"I'm no messiah."

"Of course not. You can't crusade against the Instrumentalities of the Night. You have neither the will, the skill, nor the temperament. You're a talisman. A totem of the living. While you live, the Night feels threatened."

"Wouldn't it be threatened anyway, if the knowledge is loose?"

"Of course. But the Night is constrained by its own mythical thinking. You need to understand that. You can't reason with the Night any more than you can with a crocodile. But you can figure out what goes on behind the curtain by studying the shadows cast."

"I'm lost. I always am around this kind of talk."

Februaren said, "The wells of power are weakening everywhere. The same thing happened in antiquity. Which is partly why those people were able to tame that generation of Instrumentalities. The wells came back that time. Hopefully, they will again. Meanwhile, though, we suffer the consequences. Sea levels are falling. The ice is coming south. And building up in the high mountains. Fast. Populations are running ahead of the ice. The Instrumentalities of the Night as well as humans and animals."

"Animals?"

"It shouldn't be many years before we see species formerly found only in the north. They shouldn't be a problem. Refugees will. They are already. But worst will be the hidden things. As they flee the ice they'll be forced into closer contact. The predators will get stronger. The confined, constrained, and shattered monsters of the past will grab the imaginations of fools, offering a lie. 'Free me. I will be your God, before all others, and you shall reign over all the nations.' That sort of thing."

"Resurrecting the old devils."

"As you wish. What they're called doesn't matter. What does is, it's already happening along the edges of the ice. And in the other cold places. They've smelled the essence of Rook in the End of Connec. The ghost of the Windwalker has been seen up where your imaginary forbears battled the pagan horde. On the steppe…"

"Hang on. Kharoulke the Windwalker isn't a Sheard god. He belongs to a pantheon displaced by the northern Old Ones." 

"You're right. And those Old Ones have fallen, blessings be upon you. Some of their strengths have been taken by the monster in the Jago Mountains. The survivors are locked inside a pocket reality that is, itself, trapped inside a closed realm they created for themselves long, long ago. Meaning they can't constrain the terrors they conquered when they arose anymore. More are sure to reemerge after the Windwalker."

"There are worse things to come?"

"It will happen, Piper. Everywhere. But this time we can fight."

"Uhm?"

Irked, Februaren snapped, "Because of your damned toy cannon! What was it called? A falcon? A silver and iron blast from one of those will stop the most powerful Instrumentality."

"Even God Himself?"

Februaren missed only one beat. "Most likely. If He assumes a corporeal form."

Hecht shuddered. It was true. Godslayer.

"Like it or not, the God of the Chaldareans, and the God of the Pramans, is just a glorified brownie."

"Excuse me?"

"Brownie, Piper. Pay attention. A little bitty Instrumentality. The difference between a grain of sand and a mountain is the size of the rock. A brownie is a God who hasn't grown up yet."

"There is no God but God."

"You can't possibly be that blind ignorant. Take five minutes when you have five free. Use them to think. Then use the next five to think some more."

Hecht started to say something underpinned by a foundation of his faith. The faith on which his life had been built since his earliest days in the Vibrant Spring School.

"Stop it, Piper. You're over that nonsense."

In a way, Hecht realized, he was. But dogma was a shield against reason. Faith was the way you defended yourself against real world evidence.

"It's hard."

"It's hard for everyone, boy. You spend three decades being fed half-truths and untruths by trusted elders who have an abiding interest in having those who come up behind them swallow the same nonsense that they imbibed when they were young. Then you begin to discover details of the landscape and horizon that faith just doesn't explain. You begin to grow suspicious. But you're part of a culture that just can't survive and prosper if it becomes infected by a widespread disbelief in the absurd."

Hecht could not restrain himself. "What in the hell are you babbling about, Your Grace?"

"I'm saying it's all bullshit, boy. The Episcopal Chaldarean Revelation. Everything Praman. Any other belief system you want to toss in. Every religion. The truth is, there are the Instrumentalities of the Night. As huge as God. As tiny as a water sprite. All neutral in fact. All wicked in declaration by true believers of other religions. The believers shape the Instrumentalities by believing. They create reality with their faith. Change the minds of the true believers and you change the face of God. That's what the first Pramans did. And the first Chaldareans. Before Aaron and the Founders, the Devedians found that they could no longer honor the harsh God of the Dainshaukin."

"You're saying it doesn't matter what I believe? That God wears whatever face I want? That any belief, however heretical, is as valid as any other?"

"An uncomfortable way of stating it. But nearer the truth than most of my profession would admit."

Hecht was honest. "I need the foundation."

"Most people do. It's essential to their spiritual well-being. They need to be a brick in a great edifice to feel like they have any meaning."

"I'm happy the way I am."

"Fine. Don't let it blind you when the claws of the Night are pulling you down. Remember: Neither your God nor mine showed up at al-Khazen. But gods were there."

The Godslayer reflected: Who but the God Who Is God could have inspired him to load that falcon with silver that night in Esther's Wood?

Cloven Februaren revealed another thin smile suggesting he knew what Hecht was thinking. He said, "I'm not shilling for the Adversary, Piper. I'm trying to waken what small spark of reason you have, somewhere. You need to keep a watch for things that aren't what they seem."

"Yes." With a touch of sarcasm.

"For example. The amulet you wear. Useful, yes? Saved your life several times, no doubt. But a huge frustration, now, to your great enemy. Who no doubt curses himself daily for having given it to you. In the form that he did."

"Sir?"

"Relax. No one else has the skills to detect it. Though Bronte Doneto and Muno surely suspect there's more to you than meets the eye."

Hecht said nothing. He pursed his lips. He would gut it out.

"I think er-Rashal discovered something distressing after he armed you with the amulet and sent you our way. Maybe from the mummies. Maybe because of what happened in Esther's Wood. Suddenly, you were more valuable dead than alive. But he can't strike directly because of the amulet. His hirelings failed the straightforward attempt in Runch…"

The old man was thinking out loud, now. "Failure in Sonsa. Not er-Rashal's fault. Grade had been warned there might be a person of interest aboard ship, but that wasn't why he was traveling. Failure in the Ownvidian Knot. Substantial failure by Starkden and al-Seyhan, here and at al-Khazen. Failures by the soultaken and even by He Who Harkens to the Sound. And numerous failures since. It's almost as if you have a guardian Instrumentality."

"Thank you."

"I nearly failed with the firepowder cart. Can I be lucky forever? The amulet. I know what a boon it's been. But it's coming time for it to go. It's how they track you."

Hecht had begun to nod. Exhaustion was wearing him down.

The old man told him, "I'll replace it with something better. As soon as I can. Does it cause much pain?"

He was too tired to dissemble. "When something big gets close, it's bad."

"I'll fix that. Er-Rashal isn't half the sorcerer he thinks he is. Sit back down. Let me see your wrist." Februaren dropped down cross-legged, took Hecht's left hand, ran fingers lightly over his wrist. "The madman was cleverer than I thought. This is difficult to sense, even knowing it's there."

"Ouch!"

"Cleverer. That stung me, too. And here's the problem. He'll know the instant it comes off. And he'll know where. That offers us a strategic opportunity to switch it out in the right place, at the right time, and panic someone."

"Sir, I don't feel like being clever. I feel like cutting throats to get a message out. Leave my people alone."

"I understand your anger. Your frustration. How many of my family have I seen victimized? But people who behave that way aren't often persuaded. They haven't yet gotten the message when you start shoveling dirt into their faces."

"I'm in a mood to fill a big hole." "If we must, we will. There's one more thing. The ring."

"Uh… Ring?"

"The ring accidentally given you by Principatè Bruglioni. The ring of forgetfulness. Where is it?"

Wow. He had forgotten it. That quickly. "I gave it to Principatè Delari to study. Why?"

"It's of no consequence right now. But it could be, someday. If it's the ring I think it is."

"Grinling?"

"Excuse me?"

"A ferociously nasty and treacherous magical ring in northern mythology. Shares some characteristics with this one."

"Not that ring. Which probably does exist. Buried under the ice, one hopes. That sort of artifact can be crafted only with the connivance of the Instrumentalities of the Night. But it exists independently afterward. If Grinling, or any number of mystic swords, hammers, lassos, runespears, and whatnot, failed to get folded up inside the pocket reality forged by the rebel soultaken, we'll have to deal with them as soon as they seduce a suitably foul character." Hecht stared.

"All real, remember. There is no God but God. And ten thousand other beings equally wicked." Sarcastically.

"Your Grace!"

"Spend another century on this vale. Or just one decade inside the Construct. You'll see this world through new eyes.

If you retain any religious inclinations at all, it'll be to buy into the dualist heresies of the Maysaleans and their theological cousins."

"I know nothing about the Maysalean Heresy, Your Grace. But I'm sure it won't be long before I get to see some heretics up close."

"It won't be long, no. Get that ring back. And keep it close."

Groggy, drained, Hecht went down to the street. One of his lifeguards helped him mount the horse they had brought. The sergeant in charge glowered but did not chide him for wandering off yesterday.

The Castella was in a ferment. Hecht did not notice. Colonel Smolens observed, "You seem distracted."

"Uh. To put it mildly."

"Anything you want to talk about?"

"It's family."

"Woman trouble." Buhle Smolens had off days related to conflicts with his wife.

"Yeah." That was good enough. "What's on the table?"

"Rumors running hot and heavy this morning."

"Worse than usual?"

"Way. And Consent says Dominagua, Stiluri, Vangelis, and some others mean to try to slide out from under their obligations if we call up their field contingents."

"We knew there'd be problems with Dromedan and the Patriarchal States in Ormienden. The heretics have a strong influence there. Brother Sedlakova. Good morning."

Clej Sedlakova observed, "Convenient as the dualists are, blame really comes from a deep disinclination to do the Patriarch's bidding."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning they think Sublime is out of his head. Meaning the Maysalean Heresy doesn't bother them enough to make them kill their cousins and neighbors over it."

Titus Consent invited himself into the conversation. "The Patriarch is the problem. In any choice you can count on him to pick the stupider option."

"Excuse me?" Bronte Doneto snapped. "What did you say?"

How had Doneto managed to sneak up? Hecht said, "The man stated a plain fact, Your Grace. Reporting what people in the Patriarchal States are thinking. And elsewhere, as well, I expect."

Sedlakova's credentials as an Episcopal Chaldarean were beyond challenge. "There are hundreds of bishops and princes who pray daily that God will call His infallible servant home, Your Grace. That's truth. It won't go away if we just wish hard enough."

The Principatè scowled but dropped it. He was not blind to his cousin's ever-expanding unpopularity. "Captain-General, I need you to come with me."

Two of Hecht's bodyguards had followed him into the planning center. They were not about to let him get away again. They closed in. Hecht said, "We can trust His Grace." And what good could they do if that were untrue?

Doneto started walking. Hecht followed. The Principatè asked, "Are they all so disdainful of my cousin? Are you?"

"They are, in the main. I try to reserve judgment. I've seen the man only a few times, never to talk to."

"Not that you know. Keep up. There isn't much time."

"I'm still suffering the effects of that explosion."

Doneto went into regions of the Castella Hecht had not seen before. Down and into passageways obviously seldom used: cold, damp, creepy, and lighted only by clay lamps carried by the visitors. Doneto said, "This isn't pleasant down here. I always expect to bump into a minotaur or some other monster out of the old myths."

"It's the kind of place where I'd expect to meet all the Instrumentalities of the Night," Hecht puffed. "Where are we going?"

"Krois."

Hecht said no more. He made sure he could see Principatè Doneto all the time. Not that he expected anything. Not here and now.

Underground. Again. This time under the Teragi. Imagining all that water overhead dampened his spirit.

"Oppressive, isn't it?" Doneto asked as he started up a long stairway. It curved away to the right, opposite the direction customary inside fortresses. Meaning the architects had been thinking about retreat downward rather than up.

Hecht's thoughts seldom wandered from his calling. He could not look at a hill and appreciate it as a hill. His mind instantly began working out how to both defend and assault that particular piece of ground. The same with any building, inside or out. And this one, so safe on its island, was vulnerable through its escape routes.

He did not mention that.

There were sentries. Two Patriarchal lifeguards posted at the archway where the stairwell debouched in a hidden alcove. Hecht did not disdain Sublime's protectors as soldiers. They had performed well when the Calziran pirates attacked the Mother City.

They expected Principatè Doneto. They greeted him by name but did not let him past without examination. The Captain-General suffered an even closer search. Meanwhile, additional lifeguards arrived, summoned in no obvious way.

Hecht carried one weapon, a sixteen-inch blade. The Patriarchals did not take it. As he and Doneto followed an escort onward, Hecht asked, "What was the point of that?"

"To make sure we aren't smuggling some Night-inspired piece of mischief in."

Hecht scratched his left wrist. They had missed his amulet.

Er-Rashal al-Dhulquarnen was skilled indeed.

Hecht was startled. Honario Benedocto, using the reign name Sublime V, appeared to be suffering from a wasting disease. He was pale, sweating, and shaky. His clothing appeared unchanged for days. He smelled bad. He was barely recognizable as Honario Benedocto. And his hangers-on did not appear to care.

Hecht had seen the man seyeral times, even exchanging a few words informally. This man was a shadow of the one he recalled.

Was he dying?

Hecht went to his knees, touched his head to the cold stone floor. Doneto had rehearsed him. The forms were little different from those one showed before the Kaif of al-Minphet. Doneto repeated it all, in a more restrained style.

The Patriarch's cronies circled like flies round a cow patty. The Captain-General did not recognize any of them.

"Get up," Sublime barked. "I'm not having a good day. I don't want to waste time on frivolities."

The flies stopped circling, startled.

Hecht rose but kept his head bowed. "At your service, Father."

"Can you do it?"

"Do what, Your Worship?"

"Scour the End of Connec. Rid me of this heretical pestilence calling themselves Seekers After Light. I'm in torment. I'm in hell on earth. I can't sleep. I can't keep food down. These cackling old hens stall and delay and put me off… It's time God's Will was done." The little man shuddered, as though stricken by a sudden chill.

Hecht signed himself, eyes still downcast. "God's Will be done."

Sublime half stumbled backward. He settled into a massive chair that seemed to swallow him. The awe of his position did not illuminate him whatsoever.

After a half minute of silence, Sublime shouted, "All of you! Leave us! I wish to consult the Captain-General privately."

Sublime's cronies and handlers and Principatè Doneto alike protested.

"You will leave us!" Screeching like a whore cheated of her fee.

The hangers-on went, Bronte Doneto last. Giving Hecht his hardest scowl.

Sublime observed, "They hate to leave me alone."

Hecht nodded. That was obvious.

"They're afraid an unapproved thought might creep from your mind to mine."

"Your Worship?"

"Forget my title. I'm Honario Benedocto for the next few minutes. Tell me what you really think about the crusade against the Connecten heretics. Your Patriarch is about to preach it."

Right. He was going to shoot the bull with this man like they were private soldiers at a campfire dissecting the shortcomings of those who made decisions for them. He had been through this before. The friendship would wither the instant he said one word honestly.

"I think it's risky. I haven't gotten any solid intelligence out of the Connec. What little I do get suggests a stronger local strain of nationalism than outsiders perceive."

"Meaning?"

"That even the most devout adherents of the Church don't like outside meddlers. Due mainly to a plague of incompetent, corrupt, foreign bishops."

Honario Benedocto scowled fiercely. The air was filled with noise that he did not want to hear. He heard his judgment being questioned.

Hecht said, "When the command comes I'll do everything I can to turn the Maysalean Heresy into an odd memory. But you have to understand that Connectens are stubborn people. They're fiercely resentful of foreign intrusion. My spies say Connectens of every philosophical camp are fighting the refugees and Arnhander freebooters plaguing the province right now."

"I hear the same. While my legates are treated with scorn and dishonor. I don't understand it."

"Your Worship, only your advisers ever see you. The lies of your enemies take root because Chaldarean folk never see you. They don't know the real Sublime."

Hecht spouted nonsense in order to avoid being critical. Leaving the Patriarch with room to assume that all shortcomings had to be someone else's fault.

Hecht had no interest in giving Sublime tools that would make him a more realistic leader. In an actual campaign in the Connec he would be only as successful as he must to continue directing the Patriarchal armed forces. If Sublime survived to proclaim it, Hecht wanted to be in command when the crusade against Dreanger and the Holy Lands began.

"Can you expunge the Maysalean Heresy, Captain-General?" Sublime asked again.

"I will. It'll be difficult, though. King Peter found pagans still active on Shippen during the Calziran Crusade. After a thousand years of Chaldarean and Praman rule."

The Patriarch considered him in silence so long Hecht began to grow nervous. "May God forgive me," Sublime said. "But if they resist, kill them all. Without exception. God will know his own."

"Is this the time we've awaited? Are you directing me to act?"

"The wait is over. I have decided. I have no more patience with the Connec. Rid it of heresy. Bring the rebellious Episcopals to heel. I'll arm you with all the warrants, documents, and powers you require."

"As you command, Your Worship, so shall it be done. But the tool I need most desperately is specie."

"Come here, Captain-General. Pray with me."

Hecht followed instructions. And wondered what the Sha-lug would think, could they see him kneeling beside the Adversary's very viceroy in the Realm of War.

As he mumbled the rote formulas he focused on what needed doing before he took Sublime's army into the field.

Crash preparation consumed twenty-two days. Hecht got little sleep. And enjoyed more disappointments than successes. Despite Patriarchal promises.

There was little crusade enthusiasm outside Krois.

"You had a private audience?" Pinkus Ghort asked. Ghort was underfoot all the time, now. He had been appointed commander of the field brigade Brothe would contribute to the Patriarchal army. Principatè Doneto insisted.

"I sure did. We prayed together, shared a meal, talked and talked and talked."

"What did you think? What's he really like?"

"He's crazy." They were outside and alone. He could speak freely. Within limits. "It was like being with three people who live inside the same body. He's inconstant. Excited for a while, then depressed. Convinced he wants a complete bloodbath of a war—till he decides thinking it's all a horrible idea foisted on him by his cronies. Only he won't name names."

"What I figured. Fits the rumors. Guess what? Bronte Doneto invited himself along."

Unsurprised, Hecht asked, "Think he misses the Connec?"

"Could be. He had such a wonderful time last time he went."

"I'm not thrilled." An impossible and stupid war was bad enough. Having the Patriarch's cousin perched on his shoulder could only make it worse.

Particularly if, as Principatè Delari believed, that cousin was up to his nostrils in some grand scheme of his own.

Hecht scratched his left wrist and wondered how deeply Pinkus was involved in Principatè Doneto's machinations.

12. Plemenza: The Plot to Clear the Jagos

Inspired letters and personal pleas to Katrin, before the Empress finally left Brothe, won Helspeth permission to go home to Plemenza instead of having to recross the Jagos to Alten Weinberg, where Katrin could keep her under thumb. Helspeth was determined to be the best younger princess she could. She wanted Katrin to have no excuse to deepen her misery.

Katrin had miseries of her own. The Council Advisory worked at creating them. Grand Duke Hilandle was especially unpleasant. Because of events during his desperate attempt to catch up with the Imperial procession before it reached Brothe, especially. Helspeth could not believe the stories the survivors told. They sounded like tales cooked up to conceal the wickedness of human monsters.

On reaching the Dimmel Palace Helspeth slept. For ten hours. Then she got up for a few, removed the road and ate, then slept some more. Then she dragged herself out. She had duties. She had been away a long time.

Those left behind had done well. Only a few whiners showed for the summary assizes. Their petitions were easily handled. Helspeth retreated to her quarters.

There had been changes among her women. Gruff Lady Chevra diNatale had gone home. Lady Delta va Kelgerberg had wheedled her way into Katrin's entourage. She had been replaced by Lady Hilda Daedal of Averange. Helspeth was glad to have her.

Lady Hilda was only a little older than she. Helspeth knew her from the Imperial court. Her husband's father had been a favorite of Johannes Blackboots.

Lady Hilda was a tall, slim blonde, in the mold of Katrin Ege. At twenty-three she had been married nearly nine years. She saw her husband Strumwulf just often enough to become pregnant regularly. She had given birth five times. Two of her children survived.

Lady Hilda's life appalled Helspeth. Yet it was typical of a woman of her class and time.

Despite all those pregnancies she remained attractive.

There were rumors. Lady Hilda might not be one hundred percent faithful to the Landgraf fon Averange. One suspected lover was her husband's father, Sternhelm, the Graf fon Sonderberg. Averange was a walled town inside Sternhelm's barony.

Other names mentioned all belonged to older men.

Lady Hilda was a Brothen Episcopal. "And I won't hide the truth, Princess," she told Helspeth. "I'm supposed to keep an eye on your religious practices. Though I'm not a fanatic myself."

"I don't understand. Katrin never showed any religious interest before Father died."

"It was there. Secretly. Because her mother was religious. What she's doing now is more about prying the fingers of the Grand Duke and Council Advisory off her throat. She'll be less devoted to Sublime once she rids herself of those foul old men."

"The men she's allying with aren't much better."

"They'll follow the Council. Katrin wants to be as powerful as your father was. Without having to give what he did on behalf of the Empire."

Helspeth doubted Lady Hilda. She had seen her sister regularly in Brothe. Not once had Katrin changed in private, in her suite in the Penital, when there were no witnesses.

Helspeth would not disagree with Lady Hilda. There was much she wanted to learn from the more experienced woman.

"What is that you keep fussing with?" Lady Hilda asked.

Helspeth had been reading a letter when Lady Hilda joined her. Searching for any missed nuance.

She dared all. Took a huge risk. Trusted a woman whose mind she did not know, for no better reason than that she liked her. "It's a letter."

"From the way you say that, and from the way you're coloring, it has to be from a man. About whom you've had unchaste thoughts."

Helspeth felt the heat rise to her cheeks.

Lady Hilda laughed softly.

"It's not funny."

"I wasn't… Never mind. You poor girl. Your age and never been touched. Too valuable a counter in the game of empire." She extended a hand. "Let me see what he says."

Helspeth felt like she was caught in a trance.

Lady Hilda was not impressed. "Plainly, he isn't any more practiced at this than you are. And he doesn't get carried away saying anything romantic or concrete. Does he?"

"You don't understand. The important thing is, he replied. I almost died of anxiety waiting to see if he would."

"You wrote to him? First?"

Heat in the cheeks again. "Yes. Several times. I…"

"Not the way the jongleurs sing it."

"I can't help it. I'm fascinated. Like the mouse in stories about mice and snakes."

"This snake doesn't sound eager to catch a mouse. He sounds wary. He's afraid you're a living pitfall."

Helspeth grimaced. Princess Apparent Helspeth Ege, lethal pitfall.

Had she truly pelted the Captain-General with letters while she was in Brothe? She had gotten no opportunity to do anything but exchange glances with him, otherwise. The one time they might have met, he had gotten caught in an explosion beforehand.

The big thing was, he had answered her. Twice.

The second letter she would share with no one. Ever. It contained hints that fed her imagination. And might be enough to betray their author.

"Are you going to report this?"

"Of course not. I'm supposed to protect your soul, not your chastity. You do have sense enough to know you need to remain a virgin, don't you? Anyway, this can't go anywhere."

"I'm not… It isn't a matter of…"

"Calm down. I know what you're going through. Though I didn't go through it till I'd been married a while. I was just ready to turn seventeen. I was pregnant. For the third time. I'm pregnant a lot. The first two times I miscarried. And that one would be stillborn, later. Strumwulf was off to the Holy Lands. He'd be gone for two years. I'm saying things I shouldn't."

Helspeth took her letter back. She folded it and slipped it into the hiding place it occupied when the other women were around. "Are you ashamed?"

Lady Hilda seemed surprised. Like that had not occurred to her. "No. The flesh has its hungers. Some endure them more easily than others. Can you imagine a dragon like Lady Chevra engaged in passionate congress? The victim of her appetites?"

"You can't control yours?"

"I can. I don't want to. You can't possibly understand, now. You may not even after you're married. If you fail to marry a man who shows you the best of that."

Lady Hilda's sour tone suggested direct knowledge. She continued. "The final, ugly truth is, your husband will end up more interested in some pliant peasant slut… Never mind. I have no room to be bitter. Providence fashions some of us to be rutting animals, Princess, with little more self-control than coupling dogs."

"You aren't helping me, Lady Hilda. You make me ache for a lover to show me the pleasures hinted at in the songs of the jongleurs."

"I apologize, Princess. I don't intend to make you regret your virginity. Ignore me. Your innocence is priceless on the marriage market."

"I'm sure." Sourly. Though she understood her value to the Empire. Of Johannes Blackboots's children she was most like the Ferocious Little Hans.

"I doubt you'll bear the burden long, Princess. The factions at Alten Weinberg are shopping for husbands for you and Katrin, both. If your sister had her choice she'd take Peter of Navaya."

"But…"

"He's taken. And all she knows about him is a painting she saw in Brothe. She was taken with his beard."

"Really?"

"Really. Katrin feels the fire but doesn't know what it is. Or doesn't want to acknowledge it."

"She always scorned that when we were younger."

"The court would like to make a match for her in Arnhand, with Regard of Menand or the son of the Count of Earistnei, a cousin of Charlve some want to succeed Charlve."

"Wouldn't marriage to the Empress decide the succession?"

"Probably. For you the leading candidate is the Duke of Brandecast."

"Who? Uh… Shouldn't your betrothed be somebody you've heard of?"

"Errol, first Duke of Brandecast. The oldest son of King Brill of Santerin. The Crown Prince. You'd be queen, someday."

"And forever at war with my sister if she was Queen of Arnhand. But your smirk tells me there's a joke here somewhere."

"Errol is eleven years old."

Helspeth sputtered. Ridiculous! But similar arrangements happened all the time.

Lady Hilda said, "There's also talk about Jaime of Castauriga, in Direcia. Your sister wants a Direcian connection. Jaime is younger than you, too, but he's seventeen. And will be king—unless Navaya swallows Castauriga. Jaime is both handsome and a seasoned rakehell."

"Considering those options, I don't think I'll marry. The Empire will survive."

"The Empire may, Princess. But will the Empress?"

"Excuse me?"

"There's disaffection already. Katrin's rapprochement with Sublime is unpopular. Her granting the Society the right to operate inside the Empire is unpopular. Her decree that churches in the Empire must forward twelve percent of their incomes to Brothe to finance the war on heresy is unpopular. She's won no friends at all."

"She overstepped herself. Even my father wouldn't have dared tell the Church how to distribute its monies. Even if Defender of the Faith has been added to the Imperial titles. What is it, Claire?"

Claire was a fair-haired wisp of ten, the daughter of one of Helspeth's new attendants.

"I'm to tell you that a man named Ferris Renfrow is here. Captain Drear said to tell you."

"I'll be there shortly. Lady Hilda. Help me make myself presentable."

"Can we dispense with the formalities in private, Princess? Just call me Hilda. You're excited. Is this him? The spymaster? Or is it the Braunsknechts captain?"

"Neither. Ferris Renfrow was my father's friend. He's like a second father to me. I like having him around. He makes me feel safe."

Lady Hilda accompanied Helsepth to her audience. "Most of the Council Advisory don't want you here, on your own, with the Jagos between you and them, Princess. Playing at being a man again. The Grand Duke and the Lord Admiral both have volunteered to take you into their households."

"I envy the peasants their freedom from such nonsense."

"You wouldn't envy them anything else."

As usual, Ferris Renfrow was tired and Algres Drear was worried. Neither said anything substantial till Claire and Lady Hilda cleared off.

Renfrow asked, "Did you enjoy your stay in the Mother City?"

"Not especially." Startled. She had forgotten how informal Ferris Renfrow was in private. "I got few chances to see the famous places or monuments."

"Or anyone."

She scowled. "What? I don't know anyone there."

Renfrow's smile was enough. He knew she had tried to see the Captain-General. Algres Drear did not. Though he might suspect.

Renfrow said, "War is coming. Chaos is coming. This may be the last summer we can cross the Jagos safely. You have choices to make, Princess."

After a pause, she said, "You've lost me."

"Sublime has unleashed his Captain-General. Told him to tame the heretics of the Connec. The Patriarchal forces gather strength from the Patriarchal States as they travel. Two of the most intimidating members of the Collegium are with them. The Captain-General and his staff have justified our fears. They've worked wonders. They've changed the way things are done in Firaldia. He may collect twenty thousand men, mainly well-equipped and properly trained veterans. Forming what may be the most professional army seen since the Old Empire.

"Arnhand's factions have put together several smaller armies. Once they're engaged, Santerin is sure to take advantage. King Brill has been raising troops, too, since last winter. None of the Amhander factions have seen fit to buy a truce. King Peter of Direcia will get involved somehow, too, for Isabeth's sake. And to his own advantage.

"Once the Patriarchal forces get bogged down in sieges the independent Firaldian republics and principalities are sure to act up. Some of them supposedly subject to the Empire. If you see what I mean."

She did. The perceived weakness of the Imperial proconsul in Plemenza would encourage misbehavior. What could a mere girl do? Especially a mere girl who had only her lifeguard and a rabble of a city militia?

"Not just because you're a woman but because the Empire is fragmenting. Most of our nobility disagree with the Empress about her surrender to wicked Sublime.

"I take no position on that. I just point out the obvious. Someday soon I'll say the same in Alten Weinberg. I serve the Empire. I hope Katrin will listen."

Not wanting to hear the answer she expected, Helspeth asked, "What do you mean, this may be the last summer we can cross the Jagos?"

"That might qualify as hyperbole. Between the worsening weather and growing threat of some insane Instrumentality, the Remayne Pass will be unusable."

"Alternatives are available."

"If people up north stop fussing about religion and pay attention. We need to secure the east and west routes. Then we need to deal with the monster in the Jagos."

Reports from the survivors of the Grand Duke's party, unfortunately, did not seem exaggerated. Helspeth said, "If something needs doing, please do it."

That startled Drear and Renfrow alike.

Helspeth put on a big-eyed little-girl expression, smiled cutely.

She had employed the formula used by Johannes Blackboots to urge actions for which he preferred not to be seen as responsible.

Helspeth said, "What about the monster? How do we destroy it?"

"Destroy it? That's impossible, Princess. We may still be able to constrain…"

"Destroy it! That's not impossible. I saw what became of an older and far more powerful entity at al-Khazen." She would not call Ordan a god, though he had been a mighty one in his time. "The Instrumentalities of the Night are no longer invulnerable."

"They never were, Princess."

"I'm not talking about tricking them into an idol that you shatter into a thousand pieces and broadcast across the continent. I'm talking about destruction. About what happened to the Gray Walker at al-Khazen. I'm talking about killing the Dark Gods." She gasped. She had not meant to state it quite that bluntly.

Algres Drear observed, "That would be extremely risky, Princess. We don't know how it happened. It might have been magical happenstance."

"Ferris?" Renfrow was certain to be better informed.

"I've had reports. I must say, I don't find them particularly plausible."

"Why not?"

"The method is too simple. A mix of silver and iron flung at an Instrumentality. And it dies? Silver and iron have been around forever. The Instrumentalities of the Night never liked them, of course. All kinds of charms use iron and silver to stave off the malice of the Night. Why would the gods themselves suddenly be mortally vulnerable?"

"You're missing something."

"I can't imagine what. But you're right. There's something. Without knowing what that is I wouldn't attack a water sprite."

"Find out. Isn't that what you do?"

"It's what I try to do. I'm less successful than any of us like."

"Where is the Patriarchal army now?"

"Princess?"

"Where is it? Right now. You know that, don't you?"

"Roughly. In northwest Firaldia. Or eastern Ormienden. Probably at Dominagua, resting and waiting to hear from Sublime. There may be some sort of subsidiary campaign involving Sonsa. Aparion or Dateon might have bribed Sublime to finish them off. Or I might have missed something." 

Helspeth did not recall Ferris Renfrow being ambiguous when she was younger. "They'd be just the other side of the Ownvidian Knot, then, wouldn't they?"

Narrow of eye, Renfrow admitted, "Yes. They would be. Why?"

"The Captain-General is the authority on godslaying. One of you, named Algres Drear because he knows the way, should volunteer to toddle through the Knot and find out how it's done."

"No," said Renfrow.

"I can't leave," Drear insisted. "I promised your father."

"My father is dead. I give the orders now."

Renfrow argued. "The Captain-General won't just turn the secret over. It's too valuable."

Drear said, "He wouldn't want the pass open behind him. That would make sure the Empire got up to mischief."

"The Empire is already up to mischief. My sister supports the Patriarch. And you, Ferris, were just saying I'm going to be cut off on this side of the Jagos if nothing is done. I won't let you have it two ways."

After brief silence, Drear observed, "She is her father's daughter."

Renfrow nodded. "I heard the echo of his bark that time."

Helspeth asked, "Captain, what do you need to make this happen?"

13. The Connec: First Despair and First Flight

Black despair blanketed the End of Connec. Even Count Raymone Garete had shed his optimism. The eastern counties were carpeted with corpses. The soil of a thousand farms had been enriched with the blood of Grolsacher starvelings and Arnhander soldiery. And still they came. Seldom in any organized fashion.

The Arnhanders came anarchically because there was no central authority behind their invasion. Anne of Menand's friends and enemies were in a race to see who could steal what the fastest. Both were paying a harsh price.

Caron ande Lette had fallen. Likewise, Artlan ande Brith. No word of the fates of the Rault brothers or the Tuldse family had reached Antieux. Brother Candle and Socia feared the worst.

Count Raymone remained aggressive but he was like an old woman chasing chickens, trying to stem the tide.

Brother Candle joined Socia Rault for dinner. The fierce Rault daughter said, "Raymone wrote. He's having trouble getting his men to do what needs doing. They're tired of killing and getting nowhere."

The Perfect Master shuddered. He knew Count Raymone's men. Few were less hard than Bernardin Amberchelle. It was difficult to imagine the magnitude of the slaughter that would put them off their enthusiasm for murder.

"We're all at the mercy of our consciences."

"Conscience isn't the problem," Socia countered. "It's that, if you're even a little bit sane, there's only so much bloodletting you can stand."

"I understand." Most men could resist armed invaders with little soul searching, but butchering the endless stream of refugees…

Socia said, "I'm sure Raymone exaggerates when he says he's killed more than ten thousand. But…"

Brother Candle feared the converse was true. That Raymone had reported smaller numbers because of the horrific scale of the killing.

Count Raymone's vigorously optimistic nature made him overlook the earthy, harsh character of his beloved.

Make that his vigorously self-delusional nature. The invaders now beginning to benefit from the moral exhaustion of the Connec's sons ought to thank their God that they did not have to face this daughter of the land.

The girl surprised him. "I've sent letters, in Raymone's name, to Tormond, Peter, Jerriaux, Huntar of Biorgras, Deitrich of Cienioune, and a dozen others. I asked for the loan of troops. Strictly to support Antieux's defenses. Raymone can afford to pay them."

Brother Candle scowled. This girl-child was even more dark and wickedly clever than he had thought. Each of those nobles had been feeding mercenaries into the private and local armies of the Connec.

The feuding had fallen off dramatically, lately, in those counties where raiders from Arnhand had appeared. The hunchback Rinpochè, now a bishop paid for by and owned by Anne of Menand, had his own little army of eight hundred men. By dint of speed and fury he had captured Tomacadour and Firac. Now he was stalled on the Dog River across from Calour. His troops, foraging or being too enthusiastic in their search for heretics, had strayed into Tramaine, Which garnered them no friends amongst a nobility subject to Santerin and already eager to do mischief to all persons Arnhander.

Socia asked, "Where do you think the Patriarch's army will attack?"

Good question. It seemed disinclined to move at all, now that it was in Ormienden. "Here. If Duke Tormond fails in Salpeno. The enemies of the Connec have suffered too many embarrassments at Antieux."

Duke Tormond had gone to Arnhand to plead with his second cousin, King Charlve. A fool's errand, most thought. Charlve was a lap dog of that whore, Anne of Menand. But a good sign, to others. The Duke was doing something. The poison no longer held him in thrall.

Brother Candle mused, "The Captain-General, once loosed, will come here. Then to Sheavenalle and Castreresone. Then Khaurene itself. And the Connec will lie at Sublime's feet."

"And you don't think we can stop him."

He did not. The Patriarch's army was large, well trained, well equipped, paid, and competently led. It lacked the internal conflicts of a gathering of Connectens. "I'm telling you how I think they'll see it. It may not work out that way. There'll be resistance. But it won't be effective if our soldiers are busy with Arnhanders and Grolsachers."

"It's all so awful. So frightening."

"But you're the famously ferocious Socia Rault, fearless fiancee of Count Raymone Garete."

"Count Raymone. I'm beginning to wonder. Why won't he get back here and cure me of virginity?"

"Well?"

"All right. I know. Even though we share some sacraments with the Church, including marriage, Maysaleans aren't supposed to be interested in pleasures of the flesh."

'True."

"So where do you get new Seekers After Light? Suppose you convert everybody? Wouldn't you run out of people pretty soon?"

"No need to worry on that score, child. Sin is eternal. There'll always be sinners. Which assures us an endless supply of students."

"Can it work out? Without war, I mean."

"War is like sin, child. It's always with us."

"It could be a lot more harsh."

"It could. But Sublime's demands are tolerable. Especially since he doesn't have the Emperor behind him, ready to stab him in the back."

"Can't you give a straight answer?"

Brother Candle thought he had. "Negotiations are going on. Everyone but the Society wants to avoid a holocaust. But nobody is ready to ante up the full price of peace."

Connectens were proud, stubborn, unruly, and particularly averse to outside meddling. Devout Brothen Episcopals rode with Count Raymone, despite the Writs of Excommunication and Anathema issued against him. Despite the publication of letters proclaiming plenary indulgences, erasing the accumulated sins of anyone who joined the battle against heresy, accompanied by a decretal formalizing the Holy Father's permission for those who fought on God's behalf to confiscate the properties of heretics, Sublime had yet to issue the final order declaring a Maysalean Crusade.

Forces inside the Brothen Church still strove to forestall the insanity.

So rumor said.

Socia Rault was cynical. "Those rumors are just wishful thinking." She was sure that any priest who became a bishop was as corrupt as Morcant Farfog of Strang or Bishop Serifs of Antieux—and all of Serifs's successors. "It's just a matter of time till everything starts to unravel."

Brother Candle thought the unraveling was well under way.

"The price of peace… It's simpler than you old farts make out."

"Really?" Amused.

"The problem is, you old-timers just want to talk. But the real solution is, kill all the Brothen Episcopal bishops." There were eighteen to twenty-four of those assigned to the End of Connec. The number fell into a range because the bounds of the Connec were largely a matter of viewpoint. "Along with anyone who has anything to do with the Society."

The Society had begun to adopt the conversion tactics of the Perfects of the Seekers After Light. Monks roamed the countryside, trying to convince common folk that the Brothen Church had a monopoly on spiritual Truth. In cities the missionaries debated leaders of the local Maysalean communities.

Those leaders usually accepted the challenge. Not smart, in Brother Candle's eye. Thoughtful, articulate Seekers normally bested the missionaries, who quoted dogma rather than presenting reasoned arguments. They almost always claimed to have won, though.

"That might be effective. Temporarily."

He was being sarcastic. She did not get that. Another divide between generations. The young were literal, linear, and ferociously direct.

Duke Tormond, in Salpeno, sent messengers flying in every direction. He would do anything to keep the peace, now. A serious army was poised to force what he had put off so long. He sent ambassadors to Brothe to plead with the Patriarch. He begged his nobility to restrain themselves, to disband their private armies, to restore properties they had taken from the Brothen Church. He told them to make peace with the Brothen bishops and to stop interfering with the Patriarchal Society for the Suppression of Heresy and Sacrilege. Count Raymone he directed to withdraw from the field. He should prepare Antieux to be purged of heretics and unbelievers.

Socia Rault said, "As far back as I can remember people complained because Duke Tormond wouldn't take a stand. Wouldn't make a decision. Wouldn't act. Looks like they got what they wished for."

Tormond won no sympathy in the Connec or Brothe. Count Raymone never bothered to acknowledge his letters. His answer was to ambush a company of Arnhander knights and slaughter them more savagely than he had the enemy at the Black Mountain Massacre.

Tormond's cousin Charlve could do nothing for him. Though he did evade Sublime's demand that Arnhand immediately hurl its full might into the wicked province. Charlve might be dim but did understand that throwing the full resources of his kingdom at his cousin would leave him naked in the rain if King Brill or the Grail Empress decided to take advantage. And Santerin was probing already.

Charlve temporized. Adopting the habit of his kinsman. He did not deny anyone who chose to take the Crusader mantle, though. There would be stay-at-homes who could be called up if the neighbors got pushy.

Duke Tormond changed his itinerary. He abandoned plans to visit the Empire. News from home made him want to hurry back to Khaurene.

The conspiracies round Charlve worried Tormond. He slipped out of Salpeno in the middle of the night. He and a handful of supporters raced for territory held by Santerin, just thirty miles west of the Arnhander capital.

Sixty hours later Duke Tormond found himself in the presence of the lord of the island kingdom. Whose presence on the mainland was not yet suspected in Arnhand. King Brill was waiting for the right moment to stab Arnhand's heart. His encouragement and promises to Tormond were entirely transparent.

Brill did gift the Duke with a regiment of four hundred Celebritan crossbowmen whose wages he paid a year in advance. Celebritans were renowned for their deadliness on the battlefield. More than one Patriarch had threatened to place their home city under interdict if they continued using their evil weapons against fellow Chaldareans.

That interdict never quite went into effect.

News about the capture of Sonsa swept across the End of Connec. No one could figure out what the Patriarch was doing. Sublime's enemies were sure some foul scheme lay behind that action.

Not long after the news about Sonsa, word came that Brothen soldiers had surprised Viscesment and had captured the city against minimal opposition.

"I HEARD AN INTERESTING STORY TODAY, MASTER," SOcia Rault told Brother Candle as they settled down to a late, simple supper.

"Yes?" Sure it would involve bloody behavior somehow.

"You remember Father Rinpochè? He was at Khaurene when we were there. That hideous little hunchback."

"I remember. There aren't many men more arrogant or obnoxious. What about Rinpochè?"

"They made him an auxiliary bishop. And gave him permission to raise his own force to deal with the Maysalean Heresy."

"Hard to believe how much stupidity can be loose in the world at one time."

"Not for me. Anyway, Rinpochè's gang have been plundering the far northwest part of the Connec. He nearly got killed for his trouble, too."

"Due to his own stupidity, no doubt." Brother Candle's exposure to Rinpochè had been limited. But a man did not need to pigeonhole the hunchback. Rinpochè did that for himself. You're bursting. So tell me."

"He was on the wrong side of the Dog River to attack Calour. There are a lot of Seekers there."

Brother Candle knew. He had visited Calour. That was wild country.

Socia continued. "The local men of substance got Rinpochè talking. They stalled him for almost a month, keeping him thinking he might get what he wanted without fighting. That they'd turn over the local Seekers if he treated everybody else all right. But they used the time to bring in two hundred Sevanphaxi darters."

"I think I see what's coming."

Sevanphax was a remote mountain principality between Direcia and Tramaine. Several neighbors claimed suzerainty. The Sevanphaxi acknowledged none. They fought anyone who tried to tame them. And hired out as mercenaries.

Their reputation far exceeded that of the Grolsachers. They were exceedingly professional. They favored a short throwing spear, or dart, smaller than a javelin but longer and heavier than an arrow. Those darts would penetrate all but the thickest plate. And Bishop Rinpochè had only a handful of destitute knights backing him.

"The darters dropped the Arnhanders by the score when they tried to ford the Dog. The Sevanphaxi captain, named something like Ghaitre, let them force the crossing, though. He fell back to the town. Crossbowmen on the wall covered them till they got inside. The Arnhanders were tired and wet and cold after forcing the river crossing. They didn't press the attack against the town."

"So…"

"So while all that was going on townsmen who swam the river the night before attacked Rinpochè's camp. They destroyed his stores, killed his animals, scattered his camp followers. Rinpochè nearly drowned in the rush to get back over the Dog to salvage what he could. And he might've been killed later, when the darters came out to finish his mob off."

So now there would be leaderless bands plaguing that part of the Connec. Hopefully, trying to get home to Arnhand. Defenders of the Connec would do their damnedest to keep them from making it, no doubt.

The news became less grim after Rinpochè's embarrassment. The flood of refugees began to dry up. Brock Rault got a message through to Antieux. Caron ande Lette's occupants had escaped to Ormienden. Now they were with Count Raymone. Several small encounter engagements against disorganized Arnhander forces had gone well.

Socia told Brother Candle, "It's coming together. The villains will be defeated."

Pessimistic of late, the Perfect observed, "There's still a fat Patriarchal army waiting in Ormienden."

That was the great puzzle. The Patriarch had launched his might out of Firaldia with apparent gleeful anticipation of the damage it would do. But now all those soldiers were just sitting there.

Rumor suggested ongoing diplomacy. But with whom? Negotiating what?

The fighting tailed off. Count Raymone managed to protect almost all agriculture south of Yperi, the town that marked the southernmost advance of the Arnhander invaders. Raymone's jubilant but exhausted followers began to arrive in Antieux. Most tarried only briefly before heading home.

Brother Candle remained pessimistic. He predicted, "Next time the Arnhanders will have a strategy. And they'll have someone in charge who'll see that things get done. If the Patriarch leaves anything to attack." He looked northeastward, toward Sublime's Captain-General and his Collegium accomplices, poised like vultures waiting for the body of the Connec to expire.

There were a thousand dark rumors about the upsurge in activities of things of the Night. Every outsider brought tales about old wickednesses resurfacing. Especially where there was fighting.

Brother Candle reminded anyone who would listen, "None of those people have seen anything themselves. You realize that, don't you? Every single tale-teller is retelling something he heard from somebody who heard it from his cousin, who wouldn't ever lie about anything."

Socia never failed to remind him, "You were there when Rook went by so close you ended up squishing maggots in the morning."

He would growl some nonsense back but could not dispute the truth.

Bernardin Amberchelle slipped into Antieux with a group of pilgrims headed west, to the shrines in Khaurene and thence to the waters at St. Overdret. He had put his ferocious nature aside. He seemed a reasonable middle-aged gentleman, typical of the wealthier quarter of any Connecten city. He was portly, dark of hair and eye, and had bee-stung lips. More immediately, he stank, was dirty, and was clad in rags.

He insisted on seeing the Perfect Master and his cousin's fiancee immediately.

Neither knew Bernardin well. Count Raymone's local staff assured them that the man was devoted to form and ceremony. Yet he insisted on seeing them without taking a day to recuperate and prepare for the courtly behavior he loved. Socia observed, "He does come from Raymone."

Amberchelle met them in Raymone's room lined with stone from the Holy Lands. He could not suppress his fearful excitement. He told them, "Count Raymone has a plan. You two are critical to it. The first step is to prepare Antieux for an extended, harsh siege."

They frowned, puzzled.

"Raymone has discovered unexpected friends. He knows our enemies' plans. And what some unanticipated allies are up to, too."

Deeper frowns from the old man and girl.

"The Society has planted agents here. They aren't supposed to reveal themselves until Antieux is under siege. Then they'll seize the gate in the night and open it. The enemy will rush in and kill everyone, Maysaleans, Deves, and Dainshaus first."

"Dainshaus?" Brother Candle asked. "I've never seen a Dainshau here."

"They're here, Master. Several families. The Society plans to exterminate them. Here and everywhere. Deves and Maysaleans, too. And here in Antieux they plan to kill everyone else, too. Even their own. As an example to the lesser cities that owe fealty to Count Raymone. So they'll surrender without a fight."

Socia said, "That's the insane rationality you find only in the gods…"

Brother Candle squeezed her arm.

Amberchelle said, "Its sanity is irrelevant. I've been told to ready the city for a long siege. Your job is to lead the Deves, Dainshaukin, Seekers After Light, and Immaculate's adherents out of here while that can still be done. The Unbelievers need to go to Sheavenalle. The Seekers should go to Castreresone or farther west. Or into the White Hills."

Socia took one deep breath, then another, getting ready to argue. Amberchelle forestalled her. "There'll be some surprises. I haven't been told all about them myself. I do know we all need to do our parts according to Raymone's design, without question or debate, as fast as we can, if we want to see another summer."

Bernardin leaned in close to Brother Candle. "Machinations are afoot. We'll win the victory yet. But you really do have to make the needful moves. Now."

Brother Candle understood. Without grasping specifics. He silenced Socia before she could get her back up. Then he asked for what specifics and directions Amberchelle could provide.

The minority peoples of Antieux showed no reluctance to leave. Which surprised Brother Candle. He was puzzled, too, by the fact that Count Raymone would send away people with the fiercest reasons to resist Brothen Episcopal invaders.

The Count's lady and her spiritual adviser, accompanied by the Perfect of Antieux, led the way. The column stretched for miles. Many of Antieux's leading families were sending their children to relatives in Sheavenalle or Castreresone, or safety even farther away.

Moving the children made sense. They were mouths that would need feeding. The bodies attached would not contribute much to the city's defense.

Country folk were preparing for war, too. Valuables and edibles were being moved into the city or fortifications nearby. Or into hiding in the hills. This county had been invaded several times in recent years. These survivors would not make it easy for the next wave.

Brother Candle could not convince himself that resistance made sense. Despite all the disorder, members of the Society continued to filter into the Connec, pressing the cause of the Brothen Church. They grew increasingly extreme as they failed to whip the land into line. Duke Tormond issued regular proclamations favoring Sublime's cause, now, but no one paid attention. The assumption was that he would change his mind the instant the Brothen Church stopped twisting his arm.

Even agents of the Society doubted Duke Tormond's sincerity.

Beyond his failure to suppress heresy, the Society found fault in his failure to suppress the followers of Immaculate II. His failure to persecute those who attacked or defended themselves against Brothen Episcopal agents. Not that that mattered much, anymore. News out of Viscesment made it pretty clear that Sublime had brought the long struggle with the legitimate line of Patriarchs to a conclusion favorable to the Brothen house. But there was still his failure to return properties seized from corrupt clerics, his fortification of churches, and his employment of Deves and heretics in the instrumentalities of the state. On and on and on. No genius was needed to see that the Duke would never fulfill the demands placed upon him.

The Socia Rault solution might be Tormond IV's only salvation.

The Devedian and Dainshau families left the column not far west of Antieux. They headed south for Sheavenalle. The Chaldarean refugees continued eastward on the ancient road, toward Castreresone. That road made plain how heavily age lay on the Connec. Brothen legionaries had built it fifteen hundred years ago. The bridges dated from that era, too, yet needed little maintenance even now. As the name implied, Castreresone was once the site of an Imperial regional military headquarters. Its walls rested on foundations laid down by legionary engineers.

'Time lies heavy in this land," the Perfect told Socia.

She was not impressed. She was too young for the deeps of time to mean anything. Whatever happened before she was born was ancient history. But she did admit, "It is kind of creepy out here." She looked back at Bernardin Amberchelle, whose party followed close behind. Some uncomfortable people were traveling with the Count's cousin.

Brother Candle felt uneasy when he considered Amberchelle's band, too. He did not know those men. Had not seen them around Antieux. Bernardin said they were lesser nobles, like the Raults, who had been driven out of their homes up near Viscesment. None were Seekers After Light. And they used a dialect that did not sound Connecten.

Socia added, "I'll be glad when we get out of the country." Which seemed a remarkable thing for a country girl to say.

Her comment crystallized the unease the Perfect had felt lor days. This southern Connecten countryside was distinctly uncomfortable. For no reason that was obvious. And that was new. He had wandered this land for decades without feeling anything like this.

His thoughts drifted back to the woods above Caron ande Lette. Rook. There were rumors suggesting the return of other ancient Instrumentalities. Something in the sea. Things of the Night in the darkness. But always hearsay.

Still, the sheer number of reports suggested that the hideous and horrible were creeping forth from the graves that had held them so long.

A city seemed a good place to be, then.

The road west followed the north bank of the Laur, which ran east, back whence they had come, then southeast to Sheavenalle and the Mother Sea. Traffic had passed this way, on riverbank and water, since before men learned to remember by writing things down.

The Laur, navigable to Castreresone and beyond, boasted dozens of boats and barges of shallow draft, some under sail, some driven by sweeps. Brother Candle told Socia, "I've often thought if my life had gone different I might've become a barger."

"Didn't you have tummy troubles going over to Shippen und back?"

"The open sea is something else entirely. Only a lunatic would subject himself to that as a way of life."

"I learn something weird about you every day."

"You should be learning something new and weird and wonderful about something every day, child."

Their path to Khaurene last year had passed thirty miles north of Castreresone. That storied city had been the seat of the governors of the Old Imperial province of Closer Endonensis. Khaurene had been the capital of Nether Endonensis.

Closer Endonensis had been fruitful and pacific and there-tore much favored by the Brothen emperors.

Castreresone was an impressive sight. Some called it the White City. The limestone sheathing its walls was nearly as pale as marble. And those walls, though set on ancient foundations, were the most modern and best maintained in the Connec. Improvements were under way now, the outer curtain being heightened, machicolations being added at key points, roofing being installed over the wall walks. New curtain walls with D-shape mural towers were under construction around two wealthy suburbs that had come into being during the last century.

Castreresone held an odd place in the feudal order of the End of Connec. Its overlord could claim suzerainty over most all Connecten coastal territories from Terliaga to the delta of the Dechear River, excepting those fiefs belonging directly to the Dukes of Khaurene. Such as Sheavenalle. But there was no fixed family of lords in Castreresone. Traditionally, the city belonged to the Duke of Khaurene's heir. Tormond IV had no declared successor. So Castreresone was held by an uncle, Roger Shale, who was actually younger than Tormond. A Maysalean who never married, Roger Shale had no legal heirs. His niece Isabeth was his designated successor.

Roger Shale was nothing like Tormond. He was energetic, efficient, and organized. He had kept order locally during the recent troubles. But he had no power in the broader affairs of the Connec. He spent his energies making Castreresone the best protected city in the End of Connec.

Brother Candle said, "Weird and wonderful. I don't know about that. But I can say this: This quiet, beautiful city is much nearer being the soul of the Connecten nation than is Khaurene, Antieux, or the Altai." The Altai being that part of the Connec, center north, that was most mountainous and most inclined toward heresy. Many Seekers had taken refuge there already. The Altaien population as a whole were convinced that they were the only "true Connectens."

The column from the east first spied Castreresone in the early morning light. The white walls shone. The road went down to a bridge over the Laur wide enough for eight men to march abreast. On the south bank the road traversed half a mile and rose a hundred feet to approach the acre of flat, open killing ground in front of the huge, complicated barbican that guarded the main entrance to the White City. Black wreaths hung on the wall, sad memorial to events in Viscesment.

It was there, as they waited to be let into the city, that the news about the god worm caught up.

"What does it mean?" Socia asked, absent all her usual spiteful spirit. She was subdued because the old man was so obviously deeply shaken.

"I don't know. Except as a signal that the Instrumentalities of the Night have begun to move into a whole new level of involvement with the world."

"The gods will walk among us again?"

"It may be. It may be. And that terrifies me."

14. Crusaders: Wolves on the Border

The movement north and east went too smoothly for the Captain-General. "I worry when things go right," he told his staff as the army settled in to rest near the monastery complex at Dominagua. "You people can't be that good at what you do."

The backhanded compliment sparked smiles.

The high excitement soon faded.

Principatè Doneto brought news from his cousin as Hecht was about to resume movement. "His Holiness is involved in delicate negotiations, Captain-General. He wants you to hold off a few weeks."

"Why? He's been so keen to get on with it for so long."

"I'm baffled, too. I'm not part of the inner circle, cousin or not."

"Does this mean stay here? Can I position myself better for when he turns me loose? Are there any other new constraints?"

Principatè Doneto seemed disconcerted.  He glanced round as though displeased by the presence of so many witnesses. "You just shouldn't take the campaign into the Connec. Yet."

Hecht surveyed his staff. He and they never stopped working. During the rest several notions had gotten schemed out. The professionals wanted to get the maximum return from the city militias during the short time they would be available.

Legally, they could be kept in the field only forty days. The sands were racing through that hourglass. There were ways to balance that. Pay to those willing to serve longer and rotate replacements in at different times.

Hecht asked, "He does realize that in a month this army will start shrinking? And that bad weather will be along soon?"

"I'm reporting, Captain-General. That's all. I can send a letter voicing your concerns, but I can't make him read it. I can't make him pay attention if he does."

"I want to move up to the frontier."

Doneto shrugged. "You're the military commander."

Hecht turned to Titus Consent. "Are those scouts back yet?"

"One party. The ferry crossing will be tough with this many men. It could take a week."

"It took us all day last time with just a few hundred. But we need to secure it. Even if we can't go over we can control traffic. Colonel Ghort. Let's take a walk. I want to pick your brain."

Hecht paid Doneto no more heed, which probably irked the Principatè. He did not care. He had his own personal Principatè. Muniero Delari traveled slowly but he traveled. His presence assured Doneto's best behavior.

There was no sign of trouble between them.

How long could that continue?

Of more immediate concern was the depth of Pinkus Ghort's commitment to his sponsor.

Doneto thought he owned Pinkus Ghort. Pinkus might not agree but would still feel indebted. It was no secret that he still lived in the Principatè's town house.

"What's up?" Ghort asked once they were safe from avesdroppers. Hecht's lifeguards maintained an acceptable cparation but were close enough to intervene if evil showed is face.

"Recall what we talked about during the ride up? Just tossing things around?"

"We talked about a lot of stuff. Gad, it's nice. I like it cool like this."

It was windy, almost cloudless, and unseasonably cool. "Might affect the vintage."

"Yeah. Probably. What do you think?"

"I have no idea. I don't understand wine. The Sonsan nation is what I'm thinking about. Check the map. It's barely seventy miles from here."

A Bronte Doneto involved in a scheme with the Special Office would not find a raid on Sonsa to his taste. If Ghort was in tight…

"You thinking just a raid? Or a general chastisement of the city for being unfriendly?"

"I'm thinking, make Sublime love us by forcing the Three Families to bend the knee."

"And maybe get a closer look at Bit and her crew, too?"

"Absolutely. I do still want the real story on Vali."

They stopped walking, looked across slopes and hills covered with vines. It was beautiful country. Ghort said so. "The Connec is, too. What we saw of it."

"We'll get to see that part again. Sublime is close to obsessed with taming Raymone Garete."

"Lot of that infecting the Society, too. I'd as soon not. It won't be close to easy. Even with a pair of heavyweight sorcerers tagging along."

"One sorcerer. Principatè Delari isn't here to participate. He's here to keep an eye on your boss."

"On my boss? On you? I thought he'd, like, adopted you."

"On Doneto."

"Doneto? What do you mean, Doneto? I don't work for him. I work for the City. What do you mean, Delari wants to keep an eye on him?"

"You still live in his house, Pinkus. And he thinks you're his man. He still tries to lay claim on me, sometimes. I don't know what the problem is between him and Delari. Maybe it's all just Delari. But there is bad blood."

"He hides it pretty well."

"He does. I wouldn't know about it at all if it weren't for the boy."

"Armand? There's something weird about that one, Pipe."

"Wow! Can't get anything past you."

"What I mean is… Can it. The demon himself." Bronte Doneto had come out for a stroll. Not unusual. But his constitutional kept bringing him closer.

Hecht said, "Go snatch Sonsa. If you need more than the Brothen contingent…"

"They should be plenty. How soon?"

"I'm done telling. It's your mission, now. Do what you need to do and go when you're ready. Your Grace."

"Gentlemen."

Ghort said, "I was just telling Pipe that this looks like the place I want to retire, I get lucky and round up enough booty. Go into the winemaking business."

Hecht said, "You'd probably suck down all the profits."

Ghort's man Bo Biogna left camp with a picked team that same night. Next morning the entire Brothen contingent departed. Hecht told the morning staff meeting, "I've given Pinkus a special mission. If our master unleashes us, he'll catch up."

There were questions. Hecht did not answer them. These men did not need to know.

Principatè Bronte Doneto was among those asking. Maybe Pinkus had moved beyond a sense of obligation to him.

Maybe.

"Forget Ghort," he said. "We need to move up to the Dechear. Colonel Smolens, I suggested a feasibility study to you and Lieutenant Consent. Mainly to keep you out of trouble. Did you follow up?"

Smolens admitted, "We did. It should be easy. Sir." The honorific added only because members of the Collegium were present.

Titus Consent said, "There is no plan for stopping you. Assassination is their only worry."

Hecht considered Muniero Delari from the corner of his eye. The old man showed no special interest. He hoped that meant this would not get to Osa Stile. "Good. Get out warning orders to prepare to move up. Smolens, you get the other job."

"Is that an execute, sir?" Smolens asked. He was eager.

"Put it together and do it."

Delari was paying attention, now. And suddenly suspicious.

Whatever anyone thought, Piper Hecht was still his own man.

The Patriarchal army drifted westward, covering barely a hundred miles in ten days. Forward elements reached the Dechear and staked out camps at likely crossing points. The nearest surviving bridge was way upstream, at Viscesment. The Captain-General divided his forces, the better to reduce the strain on Ormienden and to remain tactically prepared. Principatè Doneto chose to accompany the southernmost division. The same favored by the Captain-General himself. This was the largest division that would strike toward Antieux. Doneto had begun to smell blood. He had a score to settle.

There was work aplenty even for Principatès, including turns watching over the bridgehead the Captain-General established on the west bank. Doneto and Delari alike spent hours interviewing locals and itinerant members of the Society, trying to gather solid facts about the strange events plaguing the Connec.

Smugly, Piper Hecht noted that neither Principatè had missed Colonel Smolens. They assumed him to be with one of the other divisions.

Smolens would do to Viscesment what Pinkus Ghort meant to do to Sonsa.

Only Hecht's immediate staff knew. Enough of a bond had formed that even Clej Sedlakova enjoyed belonging to an inner circle putting something over.

Hecht was with Sedlakova, reviewing recollections of the country round Antieux. "They won't make the same mistakes. They'll have built more cisterns and those will be full. Titus says they've reengineered the main gate, adding machicolations and a second portcullis operated from a second guardroom in order to make treachery more difficult."

"I wasn't putting much faith in the Society's secret friends, anyway."

"That may still work."

"What's the ground like? Is mining an option?"

"I think it's on bedrock. That and a height advantage are why it's sited a little back from the river. We'll see something similar, on a larger scale, when we get to Castreresone."

"How high are the walls? There'll be a lot of deep topsoil around if winemaking is serious business."

"You lost me there."

"Something we don't do much anymore, that they did a lot in ancient times. Build a ramp to the top of the wall. Raise it higher than the wall if you can, so you can attack downhill."

Clever members of the Brotherhood of War had done that in the Holy Lands in the early crusades. Praman castles were no longer sited where that would be possible.

Titus Consent entered the room, which was on the second level in an old windmill. The mill had not worked in years. There was no obvious reason for it having been abandoned.

Hecht said, "Something?"

"Several. All hitting at once."

"And?"

"Smolens has done his job. Had a little problem with Immaculate's guards, though."

"They didn't back down?"

"Not soon enough. Smolens got the bad end of the casualty equation."

"I was afraid of that. But why were they still there if the Empress went over to Sublime?"

"I don't know. But Braunsknechts do take themselves seriously. Which could be a problem."

"Meaning?"

"We've got one downstairs. He wants to see you."

"Smolens took prisoners?"

"This one came from Plemenza. He doesn't know what happened in Viscesment. Yet."

It would not be long before the news reached the ends of the Chaldarean world.

That world now knew that Patriarchal troops had occupied Sonsa. Already there were rumors that Sublime had attacked the city because of a deal he had made with Dateon or Aparion. Or possibly Peter of Navaya, whose Plataduran allies wanted the Sonsan holdings on Artecipea.

This Braunsknecht came from Plemenza? That meant from the Princess Helspeth.

This had to be handled carefully.

"This Braunsknecht say why he's here?"

"Because he wants to talk to you. He thinks you'll want to talk to him."

"I don't get it."

"He did say it has to do with the monster in the Jago Mountains."

"Ah." That was much less dangerous. "There was something else?"

"Colonel Ghort is ready to leave Sonsa. The Three Families have sworn allegiance to Sublime. They've promised the use of their fleets come time for a new crusade into the Holy Lands, hoping that comes soon. They have sailors starving and ships rotting at the quayside while Platadura is taking control all over the western Mother Sea."

Hecht nodded. The real message was that Pinkus had taken prisoners and had dug out all the information he could. "That's good news. Anything else?"

"One more thing. Colonel Smolens says there were some weird people in Viscesment when he got there. They took off before he could catch them. Into the Connec. Just a creepy feeling, he says, but he wants you to stick close to your lifeguards."

Hecht shivered. His bodyguards were all down below. He did not like having them so he tended to keep them at a distance. "All right. Tell Madouc I need to see him, soon as you're done here."

"Yes, sir. One more thing."

"You said that already."

"I almost forgot this."

"Well?"

"Count Raymone may be more clever than we've credited."

"What's he done now?"

"It's what it looks like he's ready to do. He's telling all the Connecten Devedians and Dainshaus that they should emigrate somewhere where Sublime and the Society are powerless."

"Does that make sense? He'd deprive himself of his educated class."

"It does if he thinks they're spying. Which they've been reluctant to do. The Society has won us no friends. It makes even more sense if he expects to lose his war. We won't have anyone to keep records. Or any records, either, probably."

"Strategic thinking, not tactical. Interesting. So. Unless you have another one more thing, bring the Braunsknecht, then fill Madouc in on the warning from Smolens."

Hecht met the Braunsknecht outside the mill. He frowned. "I should know you, shouldn't I?"

"Algres Drear, sir. I commanded the company that took you prisoner when you were withdrawing from your previous Connecten adventure."

"Ah. Yes. The Plemenzan captivity. I hope you didn't offend Bronte Doneto too much, back then. He's a member of the Collegium, now. And he's here with us. Again."

Hecht studied Drear while he talked. The man was in his middle thirties, looking older. Gray speckled his beard and temples. His brown eyes were almost soullessly without motion. This was a hard man used to the hardships of the field. Who found himself in too comfortable circumstances in his current assignment. And who was not troubled in the least by the possibility of enduring the displeasure of a member of the Collegium.

Stupidity? Or ignorance?

Hecht said, "You asked to see me. I'm giving you time. In deference to the family you serve. But I do have a war to get ready for. So what do you want?" He stifled any hope that Drear had brought some special message from Princess Helspeth.

"The Princess Apparent has a request. I don't know why she thinks you'd grant it. But it isn't my place to think."

"Anything within reason. And politically feasible."

"She wants to know how to kill a god."

Not much could have been a bigger surprise. "Kill a god?"

"An Instrumentality. A demon, if you will."

"I don't understand." How much had Ferris Renfrow told Princess Helspeth?

"You do. You killed the Gray Walker. At al-Khazen. Deliberately and methodically. The Princess needs the know how."

"I'll bite. Why?"

Drear talked about the monster preying on travelers in the Jago Mountains.

"It's a giant bug?"

"Not many people have survived to describe it. The Grand Duke Omro va Still-Patter is the best known and most reliable. He managed to cut a claw off it. He kept the claw. He describes the monster as a huge praying mantis with a lot of extra legs."

"I know the thing. It was at al-Khazen. If I understand right, it used to be a man. Now it's an insane Instrumentality. I didn't make the connection then but I think it was active just north of Alicea last year."

"How do we kill it?"

He did not want to admit that he had an answer. He was not sure why. The secret was spreading, if slowly. But no one understood why it worked.

Captain Drear read him well. "How do I reassure you?"

"I don't know. I'm not sure why I'm worried."

"Is it because you don't know how?"

"It's easy. You didn't need to come to me. The Princess saw the Gray Walker destroyed."

"Not strictly true, sir. Not strictly true." Drear removed a doeskin wallet from inside his shirt. "The Princess's personal appeal, sir."

Hecht accepted the letter. He read. The contents underscored just how much the girl trusted this man. Otherwise, she would never have dared commit such thoughts to paper. "She trusts you more than I could ever trust anyone. I suspect with reason, because your mission is to protect her. Why should I trust you, though?"

Drear understood him. "True. I serve the Grail Empire. I can't make you trust me. Maybe you can explain why it's important to you not to let anyone know how to dispatch the Instrumentalities of the Night."

"But…" Yes. Everyone did know. Iron and silver. The metals that had afforded some protection for thousands of years. But…

He had not worked it out himself until just a short time ago, despite countless hours spent on the puzzle.

His response in Esther's Wood had been sheer panicky inspiration, silver sprayed out in a blast too wide for the bogon to avoid. He had been lucky. That particular bogon had been especially sensitive to silver. Any iron in the blast would have been there by happenstance.

Now his artillerists nurtured secret charges for their falcons. Three charges of godshot for each of the twelve weapons he now possessed.

Reason eventually led him to the conclusion that it wasn't the fact of the charge that had slain the bogon in the Holy Lands. Nor the Gray Walker at al-Khazen. Instrumentalities of the Night had coped with iron and silver from earliest times.

So what was different now?

Firepowder.

Firepowder weapons, falcons or the light tubes employed by the Devedian fusiliers at al-Khazen, flung their missiles in a velocity too extreme to track and evade.

He read portions of the letter again, amazed that the girl could write such things, then trust anyone to bring them to him unread.

He went to the mill doorway. "Titus. You still in there? Yes? Find Bechter. I need to borrow Drago Prosek." He told Drear, "It'll take a while to organize."

Drear just nodded.

Hecht led the way inside the mill and upstairs. "Find yourself a seat." He collected quill and paper and began to write. Drear waited quietly. Hecht sanded the finished product. He was folding it when Sergeant Bechter arrived, huffing and puffing.

Bechter said, "Prosek's on his way. What's up?" He spent one glance on Algres Drear. And took the man's measure.

"Our new good friends in the Empire have a problem. Only we can solve it. I want Prosek to go with Captain Drear and handle it."

Bechter nodded. He gave Drear another glance. "Braunsknecht?"

"I am. Brotherhood of War?"

"Retired."

"Of course."

Drago Prosek arrived. "Permission to enter, sir?"

"Get in here," Hecht said. "Prosek. This gentleman is Captain Drear of the Braunsknecht lifeguard of the Princess Apparent of the Empire. He's brought an appeal for assistance. I've decided to accede to the Princess's request. Her friendship could serve us well."

"Yes sir." Without any suggestion of a reservation about his superior's thinking.

"I'm going to give you a chance to show us what you can do."

"Yes sir. What would that be, sir?"

"Take two falcons to Plemenza. With their crews. I'd recommend Varley and Stern, but the choice is yours. Take two special loads for each falcon."

Prosek's eyebrows jumped. His eyes widened. "Sir…"

"There's something ugly in the Jago Mountains. Something of the Night. You were at al-Khazen. Captain Drear tells me this is the monster that got away from us there."

Prosek's eyes got bigger. Even Bechter showed some reaction.

Hecht continued. "Go figure out how to ambush it, or trap it, then kill it. Do whatever you have to do. Then get yourself back here because by that time we'll probably be besieging Antieux and we'll want you there to starve with us."

"Yes sir." Ignoring his Captain-General's tone. Prosek turned to Drear. "Drago Prosek, sir." He extended a hand. Drear seemed surprised.

Hecht met Drear's eye. "That's what I can do."

"Good enough. I think. Thank you, sir."

"Take this letter to the Princess." He passed the doeskin wallet back. "Prosek."

"Sir?"

"Don't let these people tell you what to do. Not even the Princess herself. Make them support you. You're smart enough to know what needs doing. And bright enough to figure out how to do it."

"Yes sir."

"All right. Everyone go. I have thinking to do."

Once the last man left, Hecht read Helspeth's letter for the fourth time. And still could not believe the girl trusted Drear that much. Although, mainly, it revolved around her plea for help ridding the Jagos of the monster.

Titus Consent told Hecht, "There's a problem getting intelligence out of the Connec." 

Hecht was tired. The less the army did the more work there was for him. He did not want to hear more bad news. He wanted to go to bed. Maybe to dream about Anna. Or Helspeth Ege. Who was an infatuation he did not yet underhand. He sighed. "Tell me."

"The Society is killing us. Their attitude toward Devedians is black and white. Not Chaldarean? Bad. Kill. So the Connecten Deves won't deal. And they're all going away anyway."

"Explain that."

"The Devedian and Dainshau minorities are emigrating. The Society is so obnoxious that even Maysaleans and some Chaldareans are going with them, some places."

"Really?" His preconception was that he would face raving fanatics who considered yielding to Sublime worse than martyrdom.

"At the best of times the Connec is a loosely structured realm. Anarchy is one tomorrow away. Connectens have enjoyed a comfortable life since Imperial times. They'd tolerate anything as long as people tolerated them. Until Sublime decided to stick his nose in."

"So… Oh-oh." Principatè Delari had appeared.

Some people felt no need to get permission to drop in on the Captain-General. All of them were members of the Collegium.

"See you later," Consent said. He was not comfortable around Principatè Delari. Despite the man's sponsorship.

Delari watched Consent scamper downstairs. "That man is awfully timid for a soldier."

"You have no idea how much you terrify ordinary people, do you?"

Puzzled, Delari asked, "Why would he be afraid of me?"

"To ordinary folks you're like Cloven Februaren is to you." Who was in Hecht's thoughts because Redfearn Bechter had seen him yesterday. "Only more so."

Delari was not pleased. But he brushed it aside. "I hear Colonel Ghort is coming back to us."

"He will be. I'm glad you came. Saves me looking for you. Pinkus should have prisoners who may explain what we saw there before. Who may tell us who Vali is. But Principatè Doneto might want to keep us away from them."

Delari had not mentioned his conflict with Doneto since that fierce encounter in the catacombs.

"And you're afraid Colonel Ghort is still beholden to Doneto."

"Yes."

"Doneto doesn't know what Ghort was doing. Besides taming a republic that wasn't friendly to the Patriarch. He hasn't bothered to find out. That tells me he has no interest in Sonsa."

"Why is he here?"

"Sublime sent him."

"But…"

"All very complicated, right?"

"I don't know how you people live the way you do."

"You're talking? Never mind. I'm sure Bronte Doneto has motives for being here that aren't those of his cousin. Nor those of any conspiracy to thwart Sublime. Doneto has an abiding hatred for Antieux. Bad things happened to him there."

"He asked for them."

"That isn't relevant, Piper. If an enemy is so arrogant as to defend himself and defeat you…"

Titus Consent returned without being invited. He was pale and confused. "Sir, there's a message from Colonel Smolens. Somebody assassinated Immaculate."

"What? Damnit! Damnit! I wish I could swear like Pinkus. Get in here, Titus. Talk to us."

"That's it. Somebody got into the Palace of the Kings. The Braunsknechts weren't on duty anymore. There wasn't any reason for a heavy guard. Immaculate had been overthrown."

"I understand."

Consent continued. "He's made arrests. The assassins were clever getting to Immaculate but not clever getting away."

"The news isn't a hundred percent bad, then, is it?"

"The men they caught were all members of the Society, Captain-General. They were defiling and destroying symbols of the Viscesment reign when they were captured."

"That isn't good," Principal Delari observed. "We've just gotten us thousands of new enemies."

Hecht shook his head. "What were they thinking? Never mind. I know. The human capacity for stupidity is infinite. Instead of a crusade against the Night, how about we exterminate stupidity? Titus. Send a courier right now. Smolens should question those assassins publicly. Then execute them pubbcly. And fast. I won't condone evil even in God's Name. What do you want?"

Principatè Doneto had appeared, also uninvited.

Principatè Delari said, "Deep breaths, Piper. No matter how angry you are, you can't address a member of the Collegium that way."

"My apologies, Your Grace. You've heard the news that has me so distressed?"

"I overheard your instructions to Lieutenant Consent. They're a bit draconian. A response that dramatic is sure to blunt the initiative of Society members."

Principatè Delari caught Hecht's elbow and squeezed with surprising force. "Stifle it, Piper. Bronte, anything less will provoke a firestorm."

"Well. Yes. You could be right. Those people are becoming too full of their mission. Lieutenant, forget your orders."

Delari squeezed till Hecht ground his teeth.

Doneto continued. "I'll go to Viscesment. The trial and executions will have more impact if the Patriarch's cousin presides."

Hecht growled, "If the executions are of somebody besides some poor spear carrier."

Doneto glared at him, for the first time in his recollection directly angry.

Principatè Delari squeezed his elbow again.

'Titus, that's how we'll do it." He bowed slightly to Doneto. "It's in your hands, Your Grace. Please move swiftly, lest the wound fester."

It might be useful to have Bronte Doneto far from the main camp, too.

"I do understand that, Captain-General. I'll be on the road within the hour." Doneto turned and left.

Give the man his due. He traveled without an entourage. He could move fast when he decided to do so.

Hecht waited fifteen seconds to ask, "You think he was behind it?"

Delari said, "No. His anger was genuine. The Society is fast becoming more curse than sword. They win no friends for the Church."

Hecht mused, "So how long do I have to sit here while they make our future more difficult? Sublime has become as wishy-washy as Duke Tormond."

Consent said, "We could get lucky. Tormond and the Patriarch could just sit there waiting for the other guy to die."

"A vision likely prayed for by millions."

Principatè Delari opined, "The news from Viscesment should inspire Sublime. He'll think the murder was a good thing. He'll convince himself that the collapse of the Viscesment Episcopals will follow. That all he needs to do now is exterminate heretics. Who, being inhuman minions of the Adversary, will just line up for execution."

Heartbeat normal again, Hecht said, "Titus, Colonel Ghort is bringing prisoners from Sonsa. Meet him. Take charge of them. Bring them to Principatè Delari. Any couriers going to Viscesment are not to say anything about Ghort or Sonsa."

Hecht tried to get back to the work of the day. He was too restless. He told Delari, "I need to get out in the air. Walk some of this energy off."

"I understand."

Sergeant Bechter followed Hecht out of the mill. Several lifeguards did the same. Hecht wanted to tell them all to go away. He did not waste his breath. They would not go. Bechter said, "Sir, I saw that man in brown again this morning."

"If he's being that obvious he must want to talk."

"Sir?"

"I know who he is, now. He's all right."

"Who is he?"

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you. An Instrumentality in his own mind. But he's no danger. Except to the fool who gets in his way."

"A sorcerer?"

"Of the first water. Let's walk down to those meadows south of camp. Where they pasture most of the animals. We'll watch traffic on the river." He felt like a stress-free conversation about mules or oxen with Just Plain Joe. Joe and his mule Pig Iron were completely comfortable with their lives. What a wonderful peaceful, prosperous world it would be if everybody in it was like Pig Iron and Joe.

Six lifeguards tagged along. They remained at a distance once Hecht left the confines of the camp. They knew where he was headed.

A breeze stirred the meadow. It carried the perfume of late season flowers. There were few trees this side of the river, and only scattered shrubs. The hillsides to the east bore splashes of yellow, carmine, and violet, and several shades of green. The army's animals had not yet stripped the land of fodder. In the distance a bleak gray ruin of a castle watched over the river. Hecht did not know its name or story. The river itself was a sluggish band of olive drab syrup, showing no hint of current. On the Connecten bank Patriarchal troops had raised a palisade round the hamlet of the ferrymen. There was plenty of timber over there. Hecht had work parties harvesting some to build rafts. He had a few more men cross over every day. A casual, slow invasion.

This appeared to be fertile land. Some calamity must have befallen it. Else these meadows would be wine country or farmland like the rest of Ormienden.

Curious. That river down there, the Dechear, was one of the great traffic ways of the continent. Traders had been sailing it before the rise of the Old Brothen Empire.

He did not see Just Plain Joe. Pig Iron, the unmistakable mule, stood out, lording it over the cavalry mounts.

Hecht asked, "Does it feel like the wind is getting cooler?"

No response. He looked around. He was alone. He had wandered away from his protectors. Who didn't seem to have noticed.

His amulet itched something fierce.

He started toward the lifeguards.

"Wait."

Cloven Februaren stood a dozen feet away, having materialized out of nowhere.

"Ah. Ah?"

"Enunciation, Piper. Enunciation. Don't make people think you're a lackwit."

"I'd heard you were lurking around. What is it?"

"You did? How can that be? I've used the strongest sorceries to remain unseen."

"What is it?" The man in brown frightened him. Little else did. He was testy because he considered that a failing.

"I want to caution you. There are schemes afoot with you as their target."

"Not really news."

"True. But arrows are in flight. I don't know what. Or where. But it's coming. Also, it's time to rid you of that amulet. I've created a replacement that will do everything it does, including cloud men's minds when they start asking you about your background. And it may polish up your personality besides."

Februaren laughed outright at Hecht's expression. "That's not true. But, face it, Piper. You're a bit of a stick."

"Why are you here?"

"To swap your amulet for a new and improved version that won't let your great enemy track you. And for the same reason I'm always nearby. To be your guardian angel."

Hecht prepared to quarrel.

"How many times have they tried to kill you?"

Hecht counted off, starting with the effort by Benatar Piola, in Runch, on the Brotherhood island of Staklirhod.

"Very good. At least you do recall the ones you were aware of at the time."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning, you thickheaded and ungrateful excuse for a descendant, that you've survived another two attempts for every one you know about. Thanks mainly to your great-great-grandpa. Since the end of the Calziran Crusade, you've become the focus of an assassination industry."

The old man made no sense. He never had. Hecht said so.

"You're right, Piper. Insofar as your argument goes. You're a talented military personality. You've had some luck. You've had support from some hidden sorceries. But there's no reason to think you're likely to reshape the world. Easier to assume you've triggered a lethal obsession in someone of immense power."

"That's easy. The Rascal. I've never been close to anyone else who has his connections with the Instrumentalities of the Night."

"The Rascal?"

"Er-Rashal el-Dhulquamen. The great…"

"I know who he is. From the little I've been able to find out, he seems the most likely candidate for being your great enemy. And he's completely mad."

"Really?"

"Sarcasm doesn't become you, Piper. Let's get this amulet change done. Your bodyguards have begun to develop a vague notion that something is going on. Give me your left hand."

Whatever happened next, it did not stick in Hecht's mind. After some vague fumbling around his left wrist, there was a moment when he felt like he had been relieved of the weight of the world. Then he was standing in the middle of the meadow, alone. His left wrist itched horribly.

For an instant he thought he must be something more than just Piper Hecht, Captain-General of the Patriarchal armed forces. The word soultaken came to mind. He drove it out.

He might be something wicked, after these years with the Unbeliever, but a tool of the Instrumentalities of the Night he was not, nor would he be.

Before he shook his disorientation completely disconcerted lifeguards surrounded him again.

He had had enough fresh air. 

"Bechter! Titus! What is this?" Hecht had found four similar rings on his map of the End of Connec. The map lay on its own crude table. It never got put away. Three rings were silver. The other was gold.

Bechter and Consent arrived. Consent said, "I don't know."

The rings were covered with symbols, none Chaldarean. Two lay atop sites where serious setbacks for Sublime's cause had occurred. Places where Arnhanders and Grolsachers, striving to do God's work, had suffered severe defeats.

Another ring lay on Viscesment. The last rested atop Antieux, eighty miles to the southwest in the End of Connec.

"Sergeant Bechter, see if you can't find the Principatè for me."

"Which one?"

"How many do we have? Did Doneto sneak back?"

"No. But two more showed up last night. The Bruglioni and Gorin Linczski from Aparion."

"Linczski? I don't know him. And that name doesn't sound Aparionese."

"I think he's from Creveldia, originally. Sedlakova could tell you about him."

"Why are they here?"

Bechter shrugged. "Aparion? Sonsa?"

"The old man is the one I want."

"On the way, then."

"Bechter, when people like that turn up I want to hear about it when they're still on the horizon. Not the next day. No exceptions. No excuses."

Principatè Delari said, "The meaning would be between you and grandfather. You talked to him?"

Hecht nodded. "Mostly he talked about saving me from people who want me dead. You're sure it was him?"

"Yes. The rings may have belonged to someone who had you marked as a target. Though that's just a guess. I couldn't understand him half the time when he explained things face-to-face. Let me study the rings." Seconds later, "They all have the same symbol stamped inside." He indicated a trident that looked like a diving bird. "Piper?"

"Sorry. I was startled. I've seen that before. It's a pagan religious symbol. From antiquity."

"Eastern?"

"I saw it there. But I think it turned up everywhere before the Old Empire tamed the Instrumentalities of the Night."

"Let's look at the map again." After fifteen seconds' study, "Has anyone plotted the appearances of the revenants in the Connec?"

"Revenants?"

"Hilt. Rook. Weaver. Shade."

"Never heard of those last two."

"More of the same. Personifications. Discord. Crop disease."

"Saints?"

Delari chuckled. "You might say. Answer the question."

"I can't. Titus can, I'm sure." He called downstairs for Consent. When Titus arrived, Hecht said, "We need to know where all those weird things were seen. In the Connec."

"Sir?" Consent seemed unfocused.

"Rook. Hilt. Those things. I know you've heard the stories. We've talked about it"

"Oh. Yes. I kept a journal on that."

"Show us some whereats on the map."

"All over here. Where the Grolsachers first turned up. The Sadew Valley." Consent went on. Sightings had been grouped closely where two of the rings had lain. But the ande Lette area had produced the most sightings. No ring lay there.

"What about Antieux? Or Viscesment?"

"No reports there yet."

"Interesting," Delari said.

"Is something wrong, Titus?" Hecht asked.

"Sir?"

"You seem distracted."

"I just got a letter from Noë. Anna and the kids are fine. They've moved back to her house."

Hecht knew. As the Captain-General's woman Anna could take advantage of the courier service.

"She had bad news?"

"My uncle Shire. You met him. Shire Spereo. He died."

"I'm sorry."

"Thank you. But it isn't your problem. What I don't understand is, he committed suicide."

"Wow! That doesn't seem like him."

"You're right. But there have been several unlikely suicides since Gledius Stewpo went."

"Is something going on?"

"If there is I can't work it out. They were all old guys. Except for Stewpo and another refugee from Sonsa, they hadn't left the quarter in twenty years."

Principatè Delari asked, "Were they wealthy?"

"Sure. That's about all they had in common. Though they all knew each other."

Delari nodded to himself. "Bring me your notes about sightings of old Instrumentalities. On the other matter, ask how those men became wealthy. Could their consciences be catching up?"

Consent cocked his head slightly, mouth open. 'That's an interesting thought." He shuddered. "I'll get the journal." He clumped down the stairs.

Before Hecht asked, Delari said, "No. Not me." Then, "But maybe Grade's mission didn't die when he did."

"Small world. If that's it."

"It is a small world when it comes to the people who shake it. And there are far fewer coincidences than we want to believe. The Instrumentalities of the Night weave schemes that arc across generations. We can't see ourselves caught in the web."

Hecht had created Piper Hecht so thoroughly that he was not tempted to challenge that heresy.

"You're amused?" Delari asked.

"The normal course of business here could put us on the Society's list. To do my job right I have to take into account the misbehavior of beings that I'm not supposed to believe exist."

"You can believe. You just can't call them gods." The old man chuckled. "We need to find out what unusual things have happened in the areas the rings marked."

"But…"

"Not just something that might be Rook scattering maggots. Any unusual, unexplained events. Any unusual histories. At this remove, even the most ancient folklore."

"Titus could send people to find out. But we can't twiddle our thumbs while he does." The Connec was growing less restive. The flood of Grolsacher refugees had begun to dry up. The disorganized bands of Amhander crusaders had decided to wait on Sublime because it had begun to look like the Patriarch meant to let them do the dying before he swooped down on a province too exhausted to resist.

"Doneto's party must have the upper hand, now. That can't last. But I've had a thought about the ring business. Suppose those are places where someone liberated scattered bits of the Old Gods?"

"Deliberately?" Hecht asked.

"Deliberately."

"Why would anyone do that? The Night is bad enough now. Who'd want to bring back the Old Ones?"

"That would be the question, wouldn't it? Who and why. And is it real? Is it just a partisan campaign using fragments to create terror? Are the fragments themselves genuine? I could pull together an artificial monster able to ape the more blatant traits of one of the Old Gods."

"There was a god in the north. Who predated the Old Gods, even. Kharoulke the Windwalker. Who couldn't come past the edge of the ice. There's a Windwalker supposedly loose, now. Almost as bad as the original. That couldn't be a modern re-creation, could it?"

'Today's Kharoulke the Windwalker is an example of an unforeseen consequence."

"Your Grace?"

"Certain fading Old Gods sent soultaken to destroy someone they called the Godslayer. Because they did, several unwittingly positioned themselves to be slain. One of the soultaken, connected too intimately to divinity, ascended to become a Great Demon himself. The ascendant, lusting after revenge on those who conscripted him, went after those still surviving. He confined them in a pocket world he created inside the pocket universe they had created for themselves as their realm of the gods. That isolated them so completely that they couldn't constrain the monsters they put down in the dawn of their time. So things like the Windwalker can now come back."

Hecht stared. He realized his mouth was open. "Uh… How did you put all that together?"

"I pay attention. You can pick the trick up if you want."

Titus Consent rematerialized. "Here's the journal, Your Grace."

"Thank you, Lieutenant. Are we in imminent danger from a ferocious Connecten horde?"

"There may be ferocious Connectens, Your Grace, but those people couldn't put together a horde if they promised twenty gold pieces to every man who showed up."

"Then you can afford to take time to relax, Piper. That would be good for your soul."

Pinkus Ghort returned. In his train were prisoners, plus hostages given by the Three Families of Sonsa. The Captain-General arranged a meeting as soon as he could.

Ghort came in saying, "Shit, Pipe, that was exhilarating. Ain't nothing better than catching your target with his pants down."

"I'm glad you enjoyed yourself. I'll let you try your luck on Antieux next."

"I'll hang back and take notes on that one, you don't mind. Them folks won't get caught napping or stupid again in this lifetime."

"So what did you get?"

"I got Bit and Tiny but the Witchfinders was long gone. Bit thought they ran off to the Durandanti but we didn't find them there. It does look like they made that one gold shipment disappear, though. What's this I hear about Bronte Doneto running off to Viscesment?"

"We surprised them, too. He went to take charge of Immaculate."

"He didn't do so good, eh?"

"One wonders."

"Meaning?"

"Let's talk to Bit."

"Figured you wouldn't want to give her no more time to think. She's downstairs."

"Good. Two more Principatès turned up. They haven't come to see me yet. They're very interested in Sonsa, I hear. One is from Aparion. Keep him away from our newfound friends. If you can. Bring her up."

Ghort bellowed down the stairs.

Two men brought the woman. Titus Consent trailed them. Principatè Delari came along behind Consent.

Ghort whispered, "You all right with them?"

"They may be useful."

Bit remained uncowed. Not defiant, though. Just accepting. Fate had overtaken her. That happened in life.

She had chosen a hard profession.

She recognized Hecht immediately. "Mathis Schlink. I thought you were more than you seemed. Why drag an old whore all the way up here?"

"I have questions. I'm too busy to come to you."

She forced a smile. "Of course."

"Be seated, if you like."

The old woman settled into a canvas chair. She glanced around. Principatè Delari examined her intently, moving several times to get a different view. That troubled her, clearly. Maybe she feared recognition.

Hecht said, "You know Buck Fantil. The youngster is Titus. He's more dangerous than he looks. The other gentleman is an eye for the Collegium."

Bit was a practical sort. "What do you want to know?"

"You were involved with men from the Special Office of the Brotherhood. What were they up to?"

"Special Office? They didn't mention that. Some had been hiding at the Ten Galleons since the Deve riots."

Principatè Delari positioned himself behind Bit, out of her sight. He nodded. She was telling the truth.

"You had to think they were up to something, working out of your place all that time."

"Yes. But they paid well for the privilege."

"I'll turn you over to Titus eventually. Tell him the story from the beginning. Name any names you heard. And anything you overheard that seemed unusual."

"I… Of course."

"The reason being, those Witchfinders were working against the Patriarch and the rest of the Brotherhood. They may have been seduced by the Adversary."

Bit did not buy that.

Neither did Hecht. But it was a hypothesis fit to make people think.

"Tell me about Vali Dumaine, Bit."

The old woman frowned. "Give me more to go on. I don't know the name."

One of the staff assistants showed himself long enough to beckon Titus Consent, who went over, whispered, then followed the man downstairs.

"Buck and I came to the Ten Galleons. We did our business. You helped us disguise ourselves to get back out. So you wouldn't get burned out by the thugs then closing in. Women and children were part of our disguise."

"You're asking about the one who wouldn't come back."

"I am."

"What did she tell you?"

"That isn't the subject. The subject would be, who is she?"

"A natural-born liar. She convinced the other girls that she'd been kidnapped…"

Bit was a hard woman who had survived in a difficult trade for a long time. It took a lot to intimidate her.

Principatè Muniero Delari was a lot, however.

She stammered.

"Bit, cut through it. I want to know who the girl is."

"I said. A natural-born liar. A natural-born actor. I bought her from her mother. Doing the woman a favor. She needed the money. And I've been sorry ever since, haven't I?"

Hecht glanced at Delari, who shook his head. Bit hadn't gotten up close with the truth yet. Hecht said, "Real name, Bit. Mother's name."

This line of questioning was not what the old madam had prepared for. "I think it was Erika Xan."

Titus Consent came back to the head of the stairs. He waved for attention. Hecht nodded, held up a finger. "Your Grace, this woman is incapable of telling the truth. Why don't you work on her for a few days?" He went to see what Consent wanted.

Titus said, "Colonel Smolens wants to know if you want to keep control of the Viscesment bridges."

Surprised that Consent would interrupt with that, he said, "Yes. Even if we don't need them ourselves, we decide who does use them. Has he dealt with those assassins?"

"Three. He sent us the fourth. Who wants to buy his life by spinning tall tales."

"We can see about that after we're done here. Is that it?"

"No. There's news out of the Connec. Duke Tormond's uncle, who rules Castreresone on Tormond's behalf, has died."

"And that's important because?"

"Castreresone passes to Tormond's sister Isabeth. Who is the wife of Peter of Navaya. Meaning Peter now has cause to take offense if we attack Castreresone."

"I don't like it. That sounds contrived. Report as soon as you know anything for sure."

"I'm sure it was arranged. This might be why Sublime hasn't given the go order."

"Maybe. But this isn't critical. And I'm busy."

"I'm sorry, sir." Consent retreated downstairs.

"What was that?" Delari asked.

Hecht sketched the news.

"A scheme to keep Sublime preoccupied sounds likely. Sit down. The lady has been made cognizant of the implications of her situation."

"You ready to cooperate, Bit?"

"Your sorcerer convinced me. It makes more sense to fear the devil at hand than the one lurking in your imagination."

"Absolutely true. Tell me about the girl."

"Erika Xan brought her. She said she was the girl's mother. She wasn't. Erika Xan had dark hair, dark eyes, and dusky skin. The child doesn't. She speaks Firaldian with very little accent. Erika Xan had a heavy Artecipean accent. She paid me well to hide the girl. She never came back to reclaim her."

Hecht looked for Principatè Delari's opinion.

"She's telling the truth she believes."

"Artecipea again."

"Yes."

"Bit, why hear this Erika Xan's appeal in the first place?" Her scowl told him that was a question she had hoped she would not be asked.

"She was my cousin. On my mother's side. At one time she was in the life, too, but she found a sponsor. She was scared to death when she came to me. She was mixed up in something really wicked. She wouldn't talk about it."

"And she was Artecipean. Meaning you're Artecipean."

"Yes."

"I missed. I thought you sounded Creveldian."

Principatè Delari asked, "Where is your cousin today, madam?"

"I don't know. I assume that what scared her caught up with her."

"And she told you nothing about the girl?"

"No."

"Piper, I believe her. She didn't want to tell the truth and only sidled up to it, but she told it in the end. Madam, what is the child's real name?"

"I don't know."

Hecht asked, "Where did she come up with Vali Dumaine?"

"She never used that around me."

Delari said, "Yes, Piper. Ever more threads lead to Artecipea."

Hecht asked, "Bit, did your cousin mention where she'd come from? Or where she'd gotten the money she paid you?"

"She came from the island. I expect she stole the money."

"And she told you nothing about what was going on?"

With strained patience, "She was running. She didn't have time."

Principatè Delari stopped Hecht's interrogation. "Wait, Piper."

He waited. The old man meditated more than a minute, then said, "Other lives, other ways of thinking, Piper. You can understand that."

Hecht nodded. A brothel was foreign territory. How could he understand how things were done there? "Who else did Ghort bring back?"

"Mostly hostages from the Three Families, but some relatives of this woman as well."

"I want a girl Vali's age. This one's granddaughter. I don't remember the name."

"I think we have that one."

The old woman showed no reaction. A hard life had schooled her well. She said, "Interrogating the mistress of a sporting house is a waste of time, Captain-General. The essence of the profession is discretion. Clients expect you to fail to pay attention."

Delari responded, "That, madam, is first cousin to your earlier fabrications. Every whore or whoremaster who ever was looked for ways to squeeze their marks. You may not be able to provide the answers the Captain-General wants. But you will be honest when you answer him. Or this will be a long visit for you."

Hecht had the old woman returned to Ghort. "We have to explore this Artecipean connection. It just keeps coming up."

"Knowing my grandfather, that's already well under way."

"He's out there, you know. Sniffing around like a wolf scouting a sheep cote. Which reminds me. Mutton would be a nice change."

"Are you ready to question the Society assassin?"

"It never ends."

"If you'd stayed a spear carrier you'd be somewhere loafing right now, hoping your petty officer won't find you and make you dig a latrine or cut firewood."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning you made your choices. You said yes every time someone handed you more work. Oh!" Delari went white. He slammed both hands to his chest. For an instant Hecht thought it was his heart. Then—

The earth slammed up, fell down, shimmied like a belly dancer's bottom. There had been tiny, barely perceptible tremors for days. Nothing like this. Accumulated dust and dirt fell from higher up in the mill. Chunks followed. "Downstairs!" Hecht ordered. "Everybody out! Earthquake!" Hecht's left wrist itched cruelly. "It's sorcery, not…"

Principal Delari, a ghastly pale, already starting down, said, "I know. Get out. Get the situation under control."

The panic faded. Hecht got down and out. He pushed through a mob of gawkers, all facing downriver. The ruined castle could not be seen. A cloud of dust, or fog, intervened. A breeze shredded that and carried it westward, over the river into the Connec.

Principatè Delari poked Hecht in the ribs. "Don't gawk, move."

Hecht moved. Toward the cloud. Which faded to a trace.

His wrist continued to nag. He barked, "Colonel Sedlakova! Have the officers assemble on me immediately."

The earth continued trembling.

From the vantage of a hummock two hundred yards southeast of the mill Hecht could see that a quarter mile of hillside, sloping toward the river, had split like a rip in the seat of too-tight trousers. At several points he saw a pale bluish mother-of-pearl surface. Pulsing.

Puffing, Muniero Delari trudged past. "Come along, Piper. Come along." The old man's course angled uphill. He wanted a closer look at the crack.

The ground shivered. The pearlescent blue moved.

Pinkus Ghort caught up as Hecht and the old man climbed to where they could look down the length of the tear in the earth. He blurted, "Holy shit! It's a giant-ass fucking worm!"

"Grub," Delari corrected. "A larval stage." A wave of motion ran along the thing in the crack. Its downhill end moved forward slightly. The itching at Hecht's wrist amplified severely. "Piper! You should…"

Hecht had decided what he should. "Consent!" Puffing, Titus was catching up. Random officers followed, seriously confused. "Bring out the falcons! With special loads! I need them up here yesterday! Your Grace. Are we seeing what I think we're seeing?"

"The birth of a god. More or less."

"But what… ?"

"I don't know anything you don't. This could be the hatching of an egg left over from before mankind reached this part of the world. But we don't have the luxury of taking time to worry about who, what, where, and all that. We have to act."

True. That thing would be no friend of Piper Hecht's. Or anyone else round here.

It was Esther's Wood all over again. Another race against time. That thing was maturing. He could sense it nursing on what little free power was in circulation nearby. Soon it would want to feed in earnest.

A backward curved horn began to form atop the downhill end.

"That the head down there?" Hecht asked.

"It would seem," Delari replied.

"Pinkus, you aren't in the chain of command but you have a way with words. Go make those gawking fools take this seriously." The whole army wanted to see the monster. No one seemed smart enough to be scared. "Tell my idiot officers I want everyone moving upriver. With the animals. Except the artillerists."

The falcon crews were running round in confusion in the meadow where they had built bunkers to store their weapons and firepowder. Hecht hoped they would not try to tow the weapons. No. Here came Kait Rhuk and his gang, two men dragging the falcon and three lugging ammunition. The other crews seemed intent on following Rhuk's example.

Hecht told Principatè Delari, "I should go run this show. They know what to do only in theory. If you think of anything useful to do, don't hesitate." He stumbled down the slope. Several officers intercepted him. He repeated his orders to get everyone out of harm's way. "This thing is going to want to eat. Let's don't be its first meal."

Clej Sedlakova asked, "What're you going to do?" Hecht thought it worth noting that the handicapped officer was among the first actually to come for instructions.

"I'm going to kill it."

Seven falcons were in position. The other three crews were still getting organized. There would be personnel adjustments later. If there were survivors.

The god grub continued trying to shake the chains of the earth. Hecht moved down to the front end, which had come out of the ground a few dozen yards from the river. That end had developed obvious mouth parts and dark patches where eyes might appear.

Pinkus Ghort jogged up. Hecht demanded, "What're you doing back here?"

"I couldn't miss this."

"You could be as sorry as you've ever been. Rhuk! Weber! Stand by. Hell, Pinkus, we need to get behind those things."

Rhuk and Weber took his sudden movement for the signal to fire.

The simultaneous roar of both pieces, hurling sulfurous hot gases, felled Hecht and Ghort. Hecht rolled over in time to see hundreds of black spots appear on the grub's vast face. Three more falcons discharged, raking the monster's length.

The earth shook. Three-quarters of the grub rose into the air. It crashed back. Hecht, trying to get up, went down again.

The acne spots on the grub grew quickly. As did the spots that would become eyes.

"Get the eyes!" Hecht shouted. "Keep it blind!"

More falcons barked. The least competent crews were in place. Rhuk and Weber prepared their second shots.

Principatè Delari limped down to where Hecht had given up trying to get his feet under him, dropped to his knees. Shaking his head. "There's no choice. I know there's no choice. I can't guess what spawned this… There's going to be a storm, Piper."

Hecht had no chance to ask what that meant. Falcons discharged. They ruined the face of the grub and tore smoldering black wounds along its length. Ten thousand tails of vapor, like feathers stirring in the breeze. The grub shook and screamed—inside every mind for miles.

Hecht's new amulet was not supposed to hurt. Good thing. He could not imagine how bad the pain would have been were he wearing er-Rashal's gift.

There was always ambient power in the world. It kept the ice at bay, made sorcery possible, fed the Instrumentalities of the Night. Like air, the power was always there. Like air, its presence went unnoticed. It became notable only when it was absent.

Rather than absorbed, the ambient power began to be sucked into the god grub. Its wounds stabilized.

Hecht made a whimpering noise.

Principatè Delari shouted. The storm had arrived. "This is too damned expensive!"

The falcons barked raggedly, voices nearly lost in the psychic roar. A power vortex began to form above the grub. It darkened and grew, spinning, streaked with threads of every imaginable color.

Delari said, "You have to get your men away from here. If the falcons don't work…"

"It's under way." The officers had gotten the rubberneckers moving at last.

Hecht spied Cloven Februaren back up the slope. Which had begun to shake with vigor.

The light grew feeble. Hecht barely made out Februaren falling. He headed for the old man, moving as though through waist-deep honey. Muniero Delari shouted something he did not understand.

The old man uphill tried to get his feet under him. He fell again and began to slide toward the tear where the grub had begun to thrash.

Two more charges ripped along its flank and back. And did not fade.

And did not fade.

The black began to spread.

The deep honey drag weakened.

The grub's thrashing increased. Like the writhing of a broken snake.

A sour, stink bug reek hit Hecht. His nose and eyes watered.

Cloven Februaren's slide toward catastrophe quickened.

The old man clawed at the grass. Hecht knew he would not get there in time.

The old man's left foot tangled in a ground-hugging vine. Hecht did get there as Februaren swung end for end. He snagged the old man's tangled ankle, ripped him loose, pulled him in, hoisted him onto his shoulder, and ran.

Instinct more than thought drove him. He had trouble staying upright. The grub kept punishing the earth around it. The stench punished the air.

He had staggered a hundred yards, gasping painfully, when he recalled the Gray Walker's death.

He pushed even harder, till the fire in his chest forced his collapse. He dragged himself into a low place, pulling Cloven Februaren. The ancient muttered some unintelligible warning.

Where was Muniero Delari?

Lightning filled the universe. The ground shook its worst yet. The earth itself rumbled but no thunder followed the ferocious flash.

Cloven Februaren moved feebly. He tried to say something. Hecht could not hear. The old man stabbed one weak finger.

Hecht looked.

A pillar of scarlet stood a thousand feet tall, its red deepening fast. A red and black ball churned atop it. It seemed to include a cherubic demon's face, looking for something it could never see because it was blind.

Hecht lay there a long time, watching. The pillar degenerated into smoke and soot. Some drifted on the wind. Most fell in a fine black snow.

The old man wanted him to do something.

Get up and take charge. Get up and find Muniero Delari. Get up and growl defiance at the Night.

Hecht got his feet under him. He had no strength left. He spotted a wooden shaft nearby. It had been part of a tool for swabbing the bore of a falcon. Now it was a broken stick but long enough to lean on.

He got the pole, then hoisted the old man. "Hang on. I can't carry you anymore. But I'll go slow."

Februaren grabbed hold, then tried to say something about pain in his side.

Hecht moved a dozen yards uphill, to a vantage from which he could see how fortunate he had been to get down when he had.

From that small eminence he could see that half the world had been toasted. Fires still burned where bushes and trees had stood. Smoke still rose from burnt grass. Yet patches and stripes of green spotted and wove through it all, fading into obscurity beneath falling soot.

A firepowder caisson exploded.

The falcon in a smoldering carriage nearby looked like wax left too long in the sun.

There were human shapes everywhere. Those in the black were charred, though a few still tried to move. Songs of pain rose all around. From the greens, though, healthier men appeared, all fascinated by the collapsing tower above the god grub pyre.

The black extended a quarter mile toward the mill. Which still stood, though its ruined sails had fallen and were burning. The black itself faded into the brown of dead grass, then the yellow-green of sick grass. A mile away the earth was normal.

The ruined castle had collapsed. A gray dust cloud still trailed downwind.

Februaren made a feeble gesture indicating direction.

"Go. Help Muno."

Hecht set him down where he could be found easily, then shuffled off as fast as his body would allow.

He found the Principatè a hundred yards away, stirring weakly in a low place that had not been quite low enough. Delari's backside had been crisped. His behind had suffered local roasting. "Principatè? Can you understand me?"

Delari made funny noises. Hecht turned him gently. There was blood in the old man's nose and mouth. He wiped at it with his fingers, having nothing better to hand. Delari croaked, "Grandfather?"

"He's alive. Maybe a little bruised from me falling on him. I don't know about anyone else. I see a lot of bodies."

Another cask of firepowder exploded. The Patriarch would be livid about the waste.

"Anyone who… wasn't in a… direct line… should be all… right."

A racking cough seized him. It sounded like the cough that had dogged Grade Drocker when he was dying.

Was his conscience dredging up evils to haunt him?

Delari gasped, "I'm not broken… like Grade. I'll… recover." He tried to get onto his hands and knees. He managed, but not without a cry of pain. "What the hell?" He panted like a dog for twenty seconds, then tried to reach back behind him.

Hecht told him, "You didn't get all of you down out of the flash."

"How can I… ever go back… to the baths?"

Hecht chuckled. "I'm wondering how you're going to ride."

A voice suggested, "On a litter, facedown." Cloven Februaren had arrived unnoticed. Much recovered. He wore a broad smile. "This should be amusing in the baths."

Delari snapped, "When did you ever visit the baths? And don't you think you ought to be a little less visible? I'm not the only member of the Collegium here. The rest are going to come weaseling around trying to profit now the danger is past." He turned slightly, looked over Hecht's shoulder. "Here comes Ghort."

Pinkus, with stripes burned on his clothing, wobbled as he walked. He tripped, spent half a minute on hands and knees before getting his feet under him again. Hecht moved his way. When he glanced back Cloven Februaren was gone.

"How did he do that?"

Delari said, "I wish I knew. It would be handy in a few minutes."

Gervase Saluda and the Principatè from Aparion were leading the return of the curious. Carefully.

Hecht said, "Saluda is no coward."

"Nor is Gorin Linczski. He spent several years in the Holy Lands. Their caution is justified."

A recollection from Esther's Wood. "If you're able… Let's look in that crack." Titus Consent and other officers were headed his way, too. The falcon crews had begun to rematerialize.

Another keg of powder cooked off. Those approaching hit the ground.