The Proof House

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

‘Cinnamon,’ said the prefect of Ap’ Escatoy, after a long, tense silence. ‘Cinnamon, but probably not the domestic variety. In fact, I’d say probably Cuir Halla. Am I right?’

‘Close enough,’ replied the chief administrator, with his mouth full. ‘In fact, it’s a new variety. My man on the Island sent me a box with the dispatches. I believe it comes from the south-west, but that’s as much as he could tell me.’

‘A new variety,’ the prefect repeated, brushing crumbs off his fingertips. ‘I have to admit, you surprise me. What are the prospects for securing a regular supply?’

The chief administrator nodded to the cooks, indicating that they could go. ‘I’m not sure,’ he said. ‘The way the Islanders do business is so erratic, I can’t tell whether it was a one-off purchase or part of a long-standing arrangement. They will insist on treating everything to do with business as a game. It’s part of the childish streak that permeates everything they do.’

The prefect looked up. ‘That sounds faintly endearing, ’ he said.

‘Maybe. I just find it irritating, to be honest with you. Childishness is endearing in children. In grown-ups, it’s annoying.’

‘I suppose so,’ the prefect said, putting down his plate. ‘Still, it’s refreshing to come across people who so obviously enjoy what they do. I imagine this is by way of introducing your report.’

‘It’s a good illustration, certainly.’ The administrator sat down opposite his superior, his elbows on his knees. ‘Personally, I don’t find delaying the invasion and thereby possibly jeopardising our forces in the interior to be even remotely endearing. We should have seventy thousand men in Perimadeia by now, and instead they’re lolling about in the camp here, forgetting why they’re there and what they’re meant to be doing. To be frank, it’s playing havoc with my budget and making the Empire look ridiculous.’

The prefect sighed. ‘That’s intolerable, I agree.’

‘And that’s by no means the worst part of it,’ the administrator went on, fidgeting with a small brass dish he’d picked up off the table. ‘Temrai’s marching this way; what if he somehow manages to defeat our field army? How are we going to explain that?’

‘Ah.’ The prefect smiled. ‘It’s not as bad as that. Apparently he’s stopped dead in his tracks and is building a fortress. Remarkably impressive rate of progress, I have to admit. Really, they’re such an energetic people; quite unlike most nomadic tribes I’ve encountered. When this is over, I think I’d like to study them a little more closely. Part of the reason for having an Empire in the first place is to enjoy the strange people you come across, surely.’

‘With respect,’ said the administrator severely, ‘I think the wine-tasting can wait till after the vintage. I agree, if Temrai’s halted his advance it takes the pressure off us to a certain extent. But even so; if we’d been able to proceed according to the original schedule, they wouldn’t have got that far and we wouldn’t be facing the prospect of digging them out of this new model anthill they’re building. The plain fact is, these Islanders are going to cost us lives, money and time. We can’t afford to let that go by.’

The prefect sighed. ‘I suppose not,’ he said. ‘Something has to be done, I agree.’ He closed his eyes as an aid to concentration. ‘It’s a nuisance that we can’t crew the ships ourselves. Relying on their crews is going to slow things down even further. Can’t we recruit sailors somewhere else?’

‘I’ve considered that,’ the adminstrator said. ‘Unfortunately, it’s not that simple. We might be able to find enough men to make up the numbers, but I couldn’t guarantee the quality. Typically, those Island ships are difficult to handle unless you know what you’re doing. I wouldn’t want to take the risk of using inexperienced crews.’

‘Really?’ The prefect opened his eyes. ‘It’s not a long journey, is it?’

‘I don’t profess to know anything at all about ships and sailing,’ the administrator said. ‘I can only go on what my experts tell me; and of course, they aren’t experts in this field, because the only people who really know about sailing Island-pattern ships are the Islanders. However-’

‘I take your point.’ The prefect stood up and looked out of the window. They were pruning the orange trees in the cloister below, and the symmetry of the pruners’ work intrigued him. ‘I think we may have to resign ourselves to a certain degree of delay,’ he said. ‘Or even a reassessment of our strategy. Fortunately, Temrai seems intent on making it possible for us to do just that.’ He steepled his fingers, like a chess-player contemplating the move after the move after next. ‘For now,’ he said, ‘I’ll assign the sixth and ninth battalions to Captain Loredan’s army; that’ll give him another thirty thousand men. How many do you suppose you’ll need?’

The administrator thought for a moment. ‘One battalion ought to be more than enough. In fact, five thousand men should be plenty. It won’t be a difficult job, provided you can let me have a half-decent commander.’

They were shaping the trees so that the pattern of branches formed a perfect sphere; quite an undertaking, considering the natural tendency of the trees to push out sideways. Art is the subversion of nature; discuss. ‘I was thinking of Colonel Ispel,’ the prefect said.

‘He’d be ideal. In fact, he’d be wasted on a job like this.’ The administrator frowned. ‘I know,’ he said, ‘if Ispel’s available, why don’t you give him the army against Temrai and assign this Loredan to me? It seems faintly ridiculous to have one of our best officers conducting a routine police action, while a major field army’s under the command of an outlander.’

The prefect shook his head. ‘Normally, I’d agree,’ he said. ‘But the plain fact is, Temrai wouldn’t be being so obliging if it wasn’t for Captain Loredan. It was Estar’s death and Loredan replacing him that frightened him so badly he abandoned his really quite sensible strategy of taking the war to us and made him start burrowing into the dirt like a groundhog. As a result, I need Loredan to stay where he is, and that means you can have Ispel. Assuming you do want him, that is. If you’d rather have someone else, please say so.’

‘On the contrary.’ The administrator seemed distinctly annoyed; probably, thought the prefect with a certain degree of malicious pleasure, because Ispel outranks him socially and he’ll have to treat him as equal-and-above when they appear in public together. That’ll be an interesting spectacle in itself.

‘That’s settled, then.’ The prefect turned his head and consulted the large, exquisite glass water-clock that stood in the corner of the room. As transparent as the water it contained, the fabric of the walls was the next best thing to invisible, with only the calibrations etched on the two vessels betraying the fact that it was there at all. A gift from a wealthy manufacturer, angling after a contract to supply the army; he hadn’t got the contract, but he hadn’t asked for his clock back, so presumably he didn’t mind. ‘Shall we walk down to the Arcades?’ he said. ‘We can talk on the way. I make a point of going down myself these days; there’s nothing like a controlled distraction to help maintain the concentration.’

The administrator smiled – genuine pleasure, the prefect noted, and was glad to see it. ‘I was hoping I’d be able to find the time to drop by when the fresh stuff comes in,’ the administrator said. ‘But I’ve been so busy lately-’

‘Really,’ the prefect admonished him, ‘nobody’s too busy for really fresh bread. I make it a rule never to trust a man who can’t make time to do his own shopping.’

The portico was busy, as was to be expected at this time of day. The booksellers and stationers had already set up their stalls, and the number of people walking along reading and therefore not looking where they were going made for slow, cautious progress. ‘Remind me,’ the prefect said, ‘to call in at the flower market on the way back. I’m not at all satisfied with the roses they’ve been sending up lately, and there’s few things as dismal to look at as half-dead roses.’

The administrator made a sympathetic noise. ‘I’ve been saying for some time that we ought to look into buying the flowers for all the departments centrally, from just the one reliable supplier. As it is, quality’s pretty much hit-and-miss. A few days ago our consignment at the State Office was white with mildew, and by then it was far too late in the day to get anything to replace them with.’

‘That’s a very sensible suggestion,’ the prefect said, in a tone of voice the administrator couldn’t quite interpret. ‘You go ahead and let me know how you get on.’

Once they were past the portico itself, the crowds thinned out and it was possible to walk at a more comfortable pace. ‘You’d never think that most of this was only ten years old,’ the administrator went on. ‘Tell me, has there been any word from the marshal’s office about their plans for redevelopment? As far as I know, they haven’t even confirmed that they’re going to keep the administration here, now that the siege is over.’

The prefect smiled, acknowledging the skill (fairly minimal, in his opinion) with which the administrator had angled the conversation round to the topic he really wanted to discuss. ‘I can confirm that the bulk of the administration for this prefecture will be staying here,’ he said, watching his colleague out of the corner of his eye to see if he’d react. ‘It was felt that since during the course of the siege we’d effectively built a small town of our own here – and done it pretty well, too – it’d be wasteful to up sticks and move away. As to whether they’re going to rebuild Ap’ Escatoy itself, they’ve referred that decision back to me.’ He looked straight in front and waited for the administrator to respond; but he’d underestimated the man’s patience. They were almost at the gate of the Arcades before the administrator spoke again.

‘And have you reached a decision yet? I don’t suppose you have, or you’d have mentioned it.’

The prefect stopped to examine a passing cart with an unusual arrangement for attaching the brake to the axle. Most of the time the administrator found his superior’s ability to take an interest in virtually anything a harmless, even praiseworthy attribute; there were occasions, however, when it made him want to hit him.

‘It all depends, doesn’t it,’ the prefect said, ‘on what happens with Temrai and the war. If we can take possession of the old Perimadeia site fairly soon, with a view to getting major construction under way before the beginning of winter, then obviously I’d prefer to build there; it’s a far better position and much better situated for communications and the like for when we begin the westward expansion. On the other hand, if we can’t get in there in time to make a start in this fiscal year, I shall have to build here in Ap’ Escatoy or else lose the provincial office funding I had to work so hard to get in the first place; it’s a term of the grant that I commit to a scheme of works before the year end, and there’s absolutely nothing I can do about that. If I lose the grant – quite apart from the frustration, after all I had to go through to get it in the first place – I’ll have to finance the building work out of revenue income and plunder, which means I’ll end up having to make a lot of compromises I’d really rather avoid if I can. You can see how awkward my position is.’

A glimmer of light began to shine in the administrator’s mind. ‘Of course,’ he said, ‘if you had a fairly cast-iron expectation of a substantial lump-sum receipt from revenues and plunder, it’d give you a degree more flexibility in your planning.’

‘Indeed,’ the prefect replied, his expression unchanged. ‘In which case, I think I’d be even more likely to rebuild Perimadeia. After all, traditionally it’s been the centre of gravity for this entire region; people naturally look to the City as their economic and cultural point of reference. It’ll make the job of restructuring in the west that degree smoother if we can make it seem as if we’re carrying on where they left off; restoring things to how they were, even.’ He bent down, still apparently fascinated by the cart. ‘But it’d still be preferable, I feel, if we could find a way to get the war back on schedule. This possible cash windfall is all very well, but wouldn’t it be better to have the grant and the windfall as well?’ He straightened up. ‘In a sense,’ he went on, ‘Captain Loredan’s already done what I needed him to do; we can have Perimadeia, with vacant possession, just as soon as we can land enough men there to hold it. Which makes this Island business,’ he added, frowning a little, ‘even more annoying. I do hope you’ll be able to get it sorted out quickly. It’d be infuriating to miss a rather splendid opportunity because of some trivial obstruction.’

The smell of fresh bread, exquisite and unique, loaded the air with value, and the two men instinctively looked up. ‘Our fault for dawdling,’ said the prefect. ‘And I refuse to be seen trotting through the streets like a runaway donkey. We’ll just have to accept that we’ve missed the best of the day.’

They quickened their pace; but by the time they reached the bakers’ arcade, the pyramids of warm, pristine loaves were already looking battered and worn, like the walls of a city bombarded by heavy engines. ‘When we rebuild Perimadeia,’ muttered the administrator, scowling, ‘we’ll have at least five bakers’ arcades, all baking at different times. That way, we won’t have to be so very critical in our timing.’

The prefect grinned. ‘But if you do that,’ he said, ‘you’ll spoil the whole experience. If you guarantee satisfaction, you deprive yourself of the joy of uncertain attainment.’

‘If you say so,’ the administrator said, sounding less than convinced. ‘Personally, all I want is to be sure of getting really fresh bread.’

‘Of course. What on earth could be more important than that?’

The post-coach was running late; an extraordinary thing, only partly accounted for by the increased volume of traffic on the road caused by the war. In the back among the luggage, and feeling remarkably like a sack of turnips, Niessa Loredan nursed a bad headache.

She neither knew nor cared where she was. It was far too hot, the coach had managed to find every last pothole and rut with a diligence that would have been admirable in some other context, and her bladder was making her feel distinctly uncomfortable. As if that wasn’t bad enough, she was cursed with a travelling companion who simply wouldn’t stop talking, or rather shouting. It was enough to make her wish she’d stayed in Scona and taken her chances with the halberdiers.

The annoying woman had managed to get the impression, gods know where from, that Niessa wanted to know her name. ‘You may find this rather complicated, ’ she was saying, ‘being an outlander. Let me see, now. If I was a man I’d be Iasbar Hulyan Ap’ Daic – Iasbar for me, Hulyan for my father, Ap’ Daic for where my mother was born. Because I’m a woman, I’m plain Iasbar Ap’ Cander; the same idea, but Ap’ Cander because that’s where my husband was born. If I’d never been married, I’d still be Hulyan Iasbar Ap’ Escatoy, which was where I was born. Don’t worry if it sounds confusing,’ she added, ‘it takes foreigners a lifetime to get used to the nuances.’

Niessa grunted and turned her head, trying to give the impression that she found the view (sandhills topped wth scruffy tussocks of dry white grass) unbearably fascinating. The annoying woman didn’t seem to have noticed.

‘Now I expect you’re wondering,’ she went on, ‘what I’m doing hitching a ride on the post-coach; well, it’s the last thing I ever imagined I’d do, but ever since my son – that’s my middle son; my eldest is at home, of course, he inherited the estate when my husband died and he’s a musician, people are beginning to think quite highly of him, and my youngest son’s in the army, still quite junior, of course, he’s aide de camp to this Colonel Ispel everybody’s talking about as the new commander-in-chief in the west; but my middle son, Poriset, he’s the chief administrator of the arms factory at Ap’ Calick – not a particularly interesting job, as he’s the first to admit, but he’s the youngest man ever to be appointed to a position of such seniority so I suppose it’s quite a feather in his cap, and if he does well there, increases output or cuts costs or whatever you’re supposed to do if you run a factory, he did explain it to me once but I’m such a scatterbrain – and so of course he can arrange for me to ride on the post-coach whenever I go to visit him and his wife – did I mention he’s only just got married? Quite a nice girl, though I don’t really think he’s ideally suited to someone that quiet; still, it was his choice and he’s such a serious young man, I’m sure he gave it an awful lot of thought and weighed up the pros and cons-’

Niessa closed her eyes and tried to block out the noise. It was all wasted on her, of course; she’d been in the banking business long enough to recognise a spy when she saw one. The duty spy, presumably; doomed to bounce up and down this hateful road day after day, year after year, as a matter of standard operating procedure. She really wasn’t very good at it; somebody’s aunt, at a guess, for whom a job had to be found. For want of anything better to do, Niessa spent a few minutes assessing the feasibility of pushing her off the coach under the wheels – she ought to have enough physical strength to manage it, but making it look like an accident was problematical, at best. Telling her to shut up would be more straightforward, but she’d learned enough recently about the Sons of Heaven to know that offending any of them was a bad idea. When I was afraid they’d torture me, I had no idea they could be so insidious. Or so damned thorough.

‘I need a piss,’ she growled. ‘Do you know how to make them stop the coach? Otherwise I’m just going to have to pee all over the floor.’

That shut her up, the miserable bitch. Niessa felt better already. If only they could have discussed things openly at the start, she could have pointed out that the homely woman-to-woman-chat approach was going to be counterproductive in her case; they could have chosen something far less tiresome from the woman’s repertoire of personas, and it might even have been mildly entertaining.

‘I’m afraid not,’ the spy replied in a little muted voice that barely rose above a shriek. ‘It’s dreadful, the way they just don’t think about such things. I mean, it wouldn’t kill them to have a jerry or even just an old jar or something. I think I’ll get my son to do something about it.’

In spite of herself, Niessa couldn’t help admiring the fluency of her recovery. Maybe they did have something in common, professional to professional. Now if only they could talk on that level, one woman of the world to another, it might be quite interesting.

‘So tell me,’ Niessa said. ‘How long have you been a spy?’

The woman stared at her, then shook her head. ‘What an extraordinary thing to say-’ she began, but Niessa was gazing straight into her eyes. ‘You must be Niessa Loredan,’ she said. ‘I was told you’d be coming through at some stage.’

‘You know about me, then.’

The woman laughed. ‘The notorious witch of the outlands? I should say so. Not that I believe in all that stuff myself, but there are plenty who do. Outlanders, of course,’ she added quickly. ‘You’re much older than I’d expected; I suppose that’s what put me off.’

‘Thank you very much,’ Niessa replied. ‘And for the record, I’m not a witch, I’m a banker. There’s no such thing as witchcraft, as you well know.’

The coach went over a particularly deep pothole, and Niessa felt her teeth crash together. ‘You must have offended somebody, to be given this job,’ she said. ‘Getting shaken to bits like this has got to be some kind of punishment.’

The woman shrugged. ‘You’re not that far off the mark, actually,’ she said. ‘Promoted sideways, at any rate. And to answer your question, five years. Before that I was an office manager in the prefecture at Ap’ Escatoy. That was a good job, I didn’t mind it at all, but I’d been in it too long; wouldn’t do for a Daughter of Heaven with my seniority to be in a job where I might have an outlander for a superior. So here I am.’

‘My sympathy,’ Niessa replied. ‘Now then, since you’ve been straight with me, was there anything specific you wanted to know? I don’t suppose there was, since you say you didn’t know who I was until just now. Or were you given a set of mission objectives for as and when you came across Niessa Loredan?’

‘Only very vague ones,’ the spy answered. ‘And they’re mostly to do with your daughter’s escape – was it prearranged, did she have any help from any of our people, that sort of thing. If you’d care to tell me anything about that, I’d be grateful.’

Niessa wriggled her back into a crack between two barrels. ‘By all means,’ she said, ‘but there isn’t anything much I can tell you, or at least there’s nothing you can corroborate, which is much the same thing. No, it wasn’t prearranged – at least, not that I’m aware. You see, my daughter and I aren’t exactly friends. In fact, we hate each other. Really and truly. Do you have any children?’

The spy shook her head.

‘You’re better off,’ Niessa said. ‘Anyway, it’s just possible that Iseutz knew what was going on and cooked up some scheme behind my back, but I doubt it. Have you caught her yet?’

‘I don’t believe we have. The last I heard was that she was with her uncle in the Mesoge; but you’ll appreciate that I haven’t got any special clearances for restricted information; that’s just the rumour that’s going around.’

‘I understand,’ Niessa said. ‘How’s the war going, do you know? Where I’ve been they haven’t told me anything. ’

The woman narrowed her eyes. ‘Presumably you know about your brother Bardas being in command of the field army.’

Niessa shook her head. ‘Joint command,’ she said. ‘Meaning he’s only there for show.’

‘Not any more. Colonel Estar was killed; your brother’s really in charge now. It’s a strange thought, an outlander in command of four battalions. No offence, but I’m not sure I like the idea.’

‘Given his track record, neither would I,’ Niessa grunted. ‘They’ve beaten him once; twice, really, since all he managed to do when he took over from Uncle Maxen was get the army out of there and back home again. He’s a competent enough subordinate, our Bardas, but I wouldn’t say he had what it takes to be a leader. The same’s true of my brother Gorgas, to a lesser extent; he’s a good soldier, but he has problems dealing with the larger issues. Basically that’s what went wrong on Scona; he couldn’t see that the game had stopped being worth the candle. Mind you, Gorgas has never known when to quit; it’s his biggest problem, really.’

The coach lurched again, even more fiercely this time, and came to a sudden halt. A barrel of fancy biscuits was dislodged from the top of the stack and fell down, nearly hitting Niessa on the head. ‘If I were you, I’d get this driver replaced,’ she said; and then noticed that the spy was dead. There was an arrow right through the exact middle of her throat, pinning her to the barrel she’d been sitting against. As Niessa watched, the spy’s head toppled sideways and flopped down on her right shoulder, eyes still open.

Now what? Niessa thought angrily, and she looked round to see where the arrow had come from. And what’s the point of having an Empire if you can’t keep the roads safe? Nothing seemed to be happening; but wherever they were, it was depressingly open and exposed. Trying to run would be suicide, if the bandits were inclined to kill witnesses, whereas staying put wasn’t any better. No point trying to hide if they were going to steal the cargo; they’d find her sooner or later while they were unloading. So that’s it, then, she thought. All this way for nothing. What a waste of time and energy.

A helmet appeared above the side-rail. Here at least was something she could vent her anger on; she picked up the barrel of biscuits and slammed it down on the apex of the helmet, where the straps that held the plates together met. The result was satisfying, if not downright comic; there was a sigh, and the helmet vanished in a shower of broken slats and biscuits. That’s what you get for tangling with one of the Fighting Loredans, Niessa said to herself, grinning. Just because I’m a girl doesn’t mean I can’t play rough games too.

‘Niessa Loredan?’ The voice was behind her, and as she spun round she caught her ankle in a niche between two boxes. It hurt.

‘Ouch,’ she said. ‘Yes, who wants to know?’

‘We’re here to rescue you.’ Another damned helmet, with some sort of visor contraption that covered the man’s face completely. Was it too much to ask to be allowed to talk to a human being, instead of all this ironmongery?

‘What are you talking about?’ Niessa said.

‘Your brother’s orders,’ the helmet said. ‘We’ve come to rescue you and take you home.’

Niessa scowled. ‘Which brother?’ she said.

The helmet looked bewildered; a difficult trick for a piece of iron. ‘Gorgas Loredan,’ it replied.

‘Oh.’ Niessa sighed. ‘Well, you can jolly well go back and tell Gorgas that I don’t need to be rescued, I don’t want to be rescued and, if I did, the last person I’d want rescuing me is him. Have you got that, or shall I write it down for you?’

Now the helmet was looking utterly wretched. ‘You don’t understand,’ it said. ‘We’re taking you back to the Mesoge. There’s a ship waiting for us. But we’ve got to hurry, because there’ll be a cavalry column along here in an hour, and-’

‘It’s all right,’ Niessa said, ‘I won’t tell them which way you went, provided you leave now. Just do me a favour and steal some of this junk; try to make it look like an ordinary hold-up.’

Poor helmet, she thought as she said this. She could hear other voices of other helmets – they all had a booming, resonant quality, like a man down a well, or the way her late husband Gallas had sounded once when he got his head stuck in the whey bucket. The other helmets sounded agitated, which was reasonable enough. ‘I’m sorry,’ the helmet said, ‘but I’ve got my orders. You’re coming with me. Anything between you and your brother is no concern-’

‘Hang on,’ Niessa said. ‘You’re a Scona man, aren’t you? Well, of course you are. Are you really going to use force to kidnap me? You do know who I am, don’t you? Apart from being Gorgas’ sister, I mean.’

‘Yes,’ said the helmet, rather panic-stricken, ‘but it’s not up to me. I’ve got to do what I’m told. Now stand up and I’ll help you down off the cart.’

‘Go to hell,’ Niessa replied. ‘In fact, you go back to Gorgas and you tell him I said to stop being such a bloody fool, because I’ve had enough of him and his ridiculous heroics. Go on, he won’t bite you. Not if you tell him I said-’

At which point, the man who’d climbed up silently behind her dropped a sack over her head, flipped her carefully off her feet and knelt down beside her to do up the rope. ‘About time,’ the helmet said. ‘Get all this junk off the cart, we’ll use it to lay a false trail.’ Inside the sack, Niessa was making the most extraordinary noises. Between them, they hoisted her off the cart without banging her about too much, while another man looked after the soldier Niessa had brained with the biscuit-barrel, and another finished off the driver, who’d been trying to crawl away in spite of two arrows in almost the same hole through his chest. They cut the guy-ropes and pulled off the barrels and boxes, letting them smash and roll; spices and perfumes and herbs and fine wine and scented oils for dressing salad – all mixed together, the smell was extraordinary, abstruse and exotic enough that even a Son of Heaven would have been hard put to it to identify all the ingredients.

‘That’ll do,’ said the helmet, pulling up his visor to wipe his forehead. Under the metal he was a round-faced man with a little bobble for a nose. ‘You two, take the coach, we’ll meet you back at the ship.’

An hour or so after they’d gone, the cavalry column came through, just as the helmet had said. They found two bodies, one male and one female, stripped naked, and a large heap of smashed biscuits. No barrels or boxes – a bunch of opportunists had appeared out of the sand-dunes and dismantled them in a matter of minutes, prising out the nails to be straightened later, carefully lifting off the steel bands from the barrels and collecting the staves (unbroken ones in one bundle, to be used again; broken ones separate, for firewood) – and all the cargo had been looted, apart from the cinnamon and wild rose honey biscuits so highly prized by the prefect of Ap’ Escatoy. Apparently the looters had tried a few of them, spat them out and jumped up and down on the rest, just in case any foolhardy souls might be tempted to eat them.

‘That’s the lot,’ sighed Habsurai, gang-boss of the logging contingent, as the last lumber wagon rolled to a halt. ‘I hereby certify that there’s nothing bigger than a dandelion left standing between here and the Pigeon River. And if you want us to go further out than that,’ he added, before Temrai could say anything, ‘you’re going to have to give us an armed escort, because from where we were felling yesterday we could see Loredan’s scouts fooling about on the other side of North Reach ford. If you want any more timber, you’re going to have to fight for it.’

Another hot day; there was a constant relay of weary-looking children struggling up and down the steep path with buckets, and the stonemasons had all but given up. Not that they were proper stonemasons; the clans didn’t have any, never having had a use for large blocks of stone before now. Anybody who didn’t have a hat was improvising furiously – a sack draped over the head and shoulders, secured with a piece of twine around the temples; the broad, flat wicker baskets the bakers carried their bread in; the gonfalon standard of the late City Prefect of Perimadeia, looted on general principles at the Fall and now at last coming in handy for something, wrapped round its new owner’s head like a turban. Temrai was wearing his arming cap, the detachable liner that had come with the fine and completely unwearable barbute helmet he’d bought from an Island merchant before the civil war. The cap was made of thick, matted grey felt and was the only part of the ensemble that even remotely fitted. He wiped sweat out of his eyes and shook his head. ‘Which would defeat the object of the exercise,’ he said. ‘Well, if that’s it, that’s it; we’ll just have to make do with what we’ve got. Thanks; you’ve done a good job.’

Habsurai’s men had brought in a lot of timber – the stacks of trimmed logs looked like a small city in their own right – but it probably wasn’t going to be enough. The lower and middle palisades were finished, the head of each stake dramatically sharpened to a point, and the swing-bridge, causeways and catwalks were nearly done, but the upper stockade wasn’t a practical proposition any more, not if they wanted any lumber for all the other works that still had to be done. Temrai sat down on an upturned bucket and tried to think of an alternative. A simple ditch and mound – well, it’d be better than nothing, but not good enough, not if Bardas Loredan had taken to heart the valuable lessons he’d been given in the sustained use of trebuchets against a fortified position. Without timber, they had a choice between turf and stone; both labour-intensive, time-consuming, inefficient. It would take a lot of people a long time to cut enough turves to build a wall high enough and thick enough to be of any defensive value, but at least there was enough turf for the job. Stone – well, there were a few outcrops of weatherbeaten granite dotted about, enough at a pinch for a few towers and gateways, but if they wanted more than that they were going to have to dig for it and quarry it out.

Sitting still wasn’t going to solve anything. He stood up (since when did my knees hurt so much? I’m getting old) and hobbled rather self-consciously across to the timber stack, where Habsurai’s people were hoisting up the last few logs on the big crane. For all his weary, jaundiced mood he couldn’t help stopping and gazing at the spectacle, a hundred-year-old oak trunk whisked up and flown through the air like a child’s toy. We can do this sort of thing now; how did we ever learn to do this? If only we had a future, what a future we’d have…

Then the crane broke. Later, when the engineers examined it, they found that the strut that supported the beam that the counterweight hung from had been cut from wet, star-shaken wood, and the stresses of the crane had torn it apart; a real novice’s mistake, if ever there was one. As the counterweight plummeted to the ground, the magnificent flying oak that Temrai had been admiring dropped sharply, slipped one of the two loops of its cradle and swung wildly, out of control on the remaining loop. It was coming straight at him and for some reason he was too astonished to move -

– Until someone jumped at him, like a cat pouncing, and pushed him off his feet just as the butt end of the log whirled above him, pushing aside the air in more or less the exact spot where he’d been standing. He tried to lift his head, but a hand thrust it down, grinding his nose into the dirt while the log lurched back again on its return swing; it crashed into the side of the crane, expending the last of its force.

‘Are you all right?’ The voice sounded anxious, and familiar. ‘Temrai? Are you all right?’

‘Mmm.’ Using his arms, Temrai pushed himself up off the ground. His mouth was full of mud. ‘Thank you,’ he said, just as he was in the act of remembering who the man was. ‘Dassascai? Is that you?’

‘Yes,’ Dassascai replied. ‘I think I’ve put my shoulder out. That’d be a real nuisance; I’ve got a couple of hunded ducks to kill and pluck.’

Very cautiously, Temrai stood up. There were people running towards him from all directions. ‘It’s all right,’ he told them, ‘no real harm done-’

‘Speak for yourself,’ Dassascai muttered.

Temrai held out a hand and helped him up. ‘That’s twice,’ he said. ‘You seem to have a knack of showing up just when I’m about to get myself killed.’

‘Really?’ Dassascai wriggled his shoulders and cried out in pain. ‘Well, you can show your appreciation by sending along a couple of men to kill my ducks. And a doctor wouldn’t come amiss, either. Sorry, did I just say something funny?’

Temrai shook his head. ‘You lived in Ap’ Escatoy for years, didn’t you?’

‘That’s right,’ Dassascai replied. ‘Most of my adult life, as it happens.’

‘Thought so. I think you might find your idea of a doctor isn’t the same as ours. I thought I’d better warn you, that’s all.’

Dassascai grunted. ‘Even your pig-ignorant medicine men ought to know how to put back a wrenched shoulder, ’ he said. ‘If they want to slit open a few ducks while they’re at it, it won’t bother me.’

‘That’s all right, then. Just so long as you know what you’re letting yourself in for.’

In the event, all it took was a sharp, controlled twist, enough to make Dassascai yell with pain but over in a moment. ‘You’ll live,’ the sawbones said cheerfully. ‘Get some rest if you can,’ and, to Temrai, ‘See to it he’s excused duty for a day or two. What does he do?’

‘Kills ducks,’ Temrai replied.

The doctor nodded. ‘Repetitive arm and shoulder movements, not a good idea. Put someone else on it, give this one a break.’

‘Certainly,’ Temrai replied. ‘It’s the least I can do.’

For some reason he found it difficult to raise a volunteer for duck-slaying duty; in the end he had to take a work detail off ditch-digging, and even then they complained about it. Then he went back to his tent, where he’d left Dassascai lying on the bed. (Tilden was away supervising the felt-makers). ‘How’s it now?’ he asked.

‘Evil,’ Dassascai replied with a grin. ‘Well, you wouldn’t expect me to say, it’s fine, really; not when I’ve got a chance of a lifetime to milk a genuine obligation on the part of the head of state.’

Temrai smiled. ‘Be my guest,’ he said. ‘Like I said, that’s twice now. Anybody’d think you were my guardian angel.’

‘Enlightened self-interest. How else was I going to get out of doing those goddamn ducks?’

It was cool and pleasant in the tent, and hot and unpleasant outside; and Temrai remembered that he hadn’t stopped for a rest for almost thirty-six hours. ‘Have a drink with me,’ he said. ‘There’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you.’

‘Oh yes?’

Temrai nodded as he unstoppered the jug. ‘Pancakes, ’ he said. ‘You haven’t inherited your uncle’s recipe, by any chance?’

Dassascai laughed. ‘Oh, the recipe’s plain enough – eggs, flour, water and a little goose-fat to lubricate the pan. He told me so himself, many times. Problem is, he never actually followed it himself.’

‘Oh.’

‘He was that sort of man,’ Dassascai went on, taking the cup from Temrai’s hand. ‘He never could bear the thought of anybody being able to do the one thing he was better at than anybody else. Can’t say I blame him, really; if you’re the undisputed master of a popular skill, what reason would you ever have for teaching people how to replace you?’

‘I suppose so,’ Temrai said. ‘But if I’d been him, I wouldn’t have wanted my discovery to die with me.’

‘That’s because you’re not my uncle,’ Dassascai replied. ‘I’m sure that’s exactly what he wanted, so that in years to come people would shake their heads and say, Nobody makes pancakes like the ones Dondai the fletcher used to make. People tend to remember things like that, you see; it’s a shot at immortality, like being a great poet, only more so. After all, how many people really care about poetry, as against the number who really care about pancakes?’

‘I see,’ Temrai said gravely. ‘So if I want to be remembered for ever, instead of conquering Perimadeia I should have learned to fry batter.’

Dassascai yawned. ‘Quite possibly. For one thing, it’s far less uncertain. No offence, but it’s quite possible that you’ll be remembered as the man who got comprehensively beaten by Bardas Loredan and the Empire; that’s immortality, but not a very nice sort. Whereas if they remember you for your pancakes, it’ll only be because they were the best there ever were.’ He frowned slightly. ‘Is that what you want?’ he asked. ‘To be immortal? ’

‘Not really,’ Temrai replied. ‘Oh, I’m not saying the thought hasn’t crossed my mind; like it did just now, when I was watching people working. If a hundred years from now people remember me as the man who turned our nation into craftsmen and engineers, that’d be quite pleasing, if I were here to see it. But I won’t be, of course. I’ll be dead, and past caring.’

Dassascai yawned again, and winced. ‘Very sensible attitude,’ he said, ‘in the circumstances. I wonder if Bardas Loredan thinks the same way. At the moment, he’s down as the man who lost Perimadeia; do you think he’s hell-bent on fixing that, or doesn’t he care, either?’

‘That’s twice you’ve mentioned him,’ Temrai said calmly. ‘Why?’

‘No reason.’

Temrai scratched the back of his neck. ‘You’re not trying to needle me, or anything like that?’

‘Why should I want to do that?’

‘No idea,’ Temrai replied. ‘Well, I suppose you could be probing me for weak spots, or trying to find out if I turn pale and shiver at the mention of his name – that’s the sort of thing a spy might be interested in.’

‘Not really.’ Dassascai held out his cup for a refill. ‘As far as I know, and I’m speculating here, all spies want are hard facts – you know, troop movements, disposition of forces, ground plans of the city defences, where the blind spots are in the field of fire. I can’t see that the getting-to-know-you stuff ever won any battles.’

‘That’s all right, then. Are you a spy, by the way? Really?’

‘No.’›

‘Fair enough. I’ll take your word for it.’

Dassascai dipped his head. ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘Just out of interest, have you got any spies in the enemy army?’

‘Not really,’ Temrai replied.

‘And if you did, you wouldn’t tell me. In case I mention it in my next report.’

‘Precisely. My turn: what made you come here, after Ap’ Escatoy? It’s obvious you don’t fit in here.’

‘Only because people won’t accept me, because they think I’m a spy.’

Temrai pursed his lips. ‘That’s partly it,’ he said. ‘But it’s true, you don’t act like you belong here. You could have gone anywhere – the Island, Colleon, Ausira; you could’ve gone east, or stayed around Ap’ Escatoy until they rebuild it. Wouldn’t you have found a city a bit more congenial?’

Dassascai laughed. ‘I don’t know where you get this could-have-gone-anywhere notion from. For a start, I lost everything in the fall of Ap’ Escatoy. I spent my last few quarters getting here, and even then I had a long walk because I couldn’t afford the fare for the last leg of the journey.’

‘All right,’ Temrai conceded. ‘But since by your reckoning getting anywhere at all was a real achievement, couldn’t you have made your way – overcoming difficulties of heroic proportions, granted – to a city; somewhere you could get a bath and a shave without having had to carry the water in a goatskin bag for two days’ march across the wilderness? What I mean is, you had to pass by several perfectly good cities to get from there to here. What was the big attraction?’

‘Ducks,’ Dassascai replied. ‘All my life I’ve secretly yearned to spend my days up to the elbows in duckshit and blood.’

Temrai nodded gravely. ‘That I can understand,’ he said. ‘This is no good. I should be out there working, setting an example. But it’s too hot.’

‘Take it easy while you’ve got the chance,’ Dassascai agreed. ‘But since you raised the subject, you should understand, because you made the same choice.’

‘Did I?’

‘Of course. You lived and worked in Perimadeia for a while; don’t tell me you hated every minute of it and couldn’t wait to finish the job and get out of there, because I don’t believe you. I mean, if you’d hated it, how come you’ve spent so much time and effort since then trying to turn our people into replica Perimadeians?’

Temrai sat still and quiet for a while before answering. ‘Do you know,’ he said, ‘I’m not sure. To begin with, it was just a side-effect – we had to learn how to build siege engines in order to take the City, so we taught ourselves the basics. Once we’d done that, though, it seemed a pity to stop there and go back to chivvying goats across the plains. And no, you’re right; I didn’t hate my time in the City, far from it. I enjoyed it, and by and large I liked the City people a lot.’

‘And then you wiped them out? No offence, just asking.’

‘It’s a fair point. I suppose it’s inevitable; if you want to harm your enemies, you’ll always end up harming your friends as well. You can’t keep war and destruction stoppered up in a little bottle, like vitriol or nitre; if you want to use them, you’ve got to slop them about.’

Dassascai shifted slightly and lay on his back. ‘True enough,’ he said. ‘But this business of imitating the people you destroyed, what about that? Is it guilt, do you think? Or did you supplant them because you wanted to take their place?’

Temrai frowned. ‘I don’t think it was anything so deliberate,’ he said. ‘I think it’s just the way things are; the more you hate an enemy, the more you come to resemble him. It’s an extremely intimate relationship, hatred; it makes you very close to the person you hate. I sometimes think you can’t really hate somebody unless you really understand them. Harming, yes; killing, even – you can do that with detachment, cold-bloodedly. But you don’t hate ducks, quite likely you don’t understand them.’

Dassascai smiled. ‘What’s to understand?’

‘Ah, well, there you are. Now, when I was a kid and my father and uncle took me out hunting the first time, they told me that a true hunter has to understand what he kills; and I honestly believe that they loved the deer and the boar we used to hunt. When they used to talk about them, it was all affection, as if they were talking about family. I suppose it’s because they’d studied and observed them for so long they’d grown attached to them. They always made a point of saying thank you to anything we killed. Once when I was quite small, I asked my father if it bothered him, killing animals like that; and he said yes, it bothered him a lot, because every time he felt he’d just lost a friend. Now I never could make any sense out of that until I went to live in the City; I still can’t explain it, but now at least I know what he meant.’

‘It doesn’t make sense,’ Dassascai said. ‘But then, neither does friendship, or love for that matter. I suppose it must be like those terrible family feuds that you hear about from time to time; they couldn’t hate each other so much if they didn’t love each other too. Like the Loredan brothers, for example.’

‘Three times.’

‘What? Oh, yes, sorry. But it’s a good example.’

‘You’re right,’ Temrai said, ‘it is. Now there was a time when I hated Bardas Loredan, more than anybody else in the world. I can’t say the same now. Maybe that’s because he’s hunting me, rather than the other way round.’

Dassascai looked at him. ‘If he does kill you, will you forgive him?’

Temrai smiled. ‘I already have.’

The first they knew of it was after breakfast, when they went out to do business; and even then, it took some time for them to notice.

There were Imperial soldiers in the streets; half-platoons standing about on street corners looking embarrassed more than anything else, like young men stood up by their girls. Venart was aware that something was different, but it was too early in the morning for him to consider the implications. Besides, groups of people standing aimlessly on street corners were a common enough sight on the Island. There was bound to be a simple, rational explanation; at least, Venart was prepared to take it on trust that there was one.

It was when they reached the Market Square that they all started to feel uncomfortable, because there was a full company of soldiers there when they arrived, drawn up in parade order but with their weapons uncovered and drawn.

‘Don’t say somebody’s tried to break into their treasury,’ Eseutz said. ‘Not tactful.’

‘That man’s pinning a notice on the Market Hall door,’ Athli pointed out. ‘Is he one of them?’

‘No idea. Well, come on. Let’s go and see what it says.’

The provincial office house style was brief, clear and businesslike; as from dawn on the seventeenth day of Butrepidon (‘When’s that?’ Eseutz asked. ‘Today,’ Venart replied. ‘Quiet.’) the prefect of Ap’ Escatoy, by the powers vested in him et cetera, had annexed the Island to the outer western province of the Empire. All property belonging to citizens of the Island would henceforth legally vest in the said prefect, in accordance with the practice of the Empire. There followed a list of regulations governing the transitional period leading up to full incorporation: nobody to enter or leave the territory without permission; no citizen to purport to make a binding contract with a foreigner; no public assembly or gathering to exceed ten people without previous consent; all arms and munitions of war to be surrendered immediately; all non-citizens to report to the commissioner for aliens forthwith; all buildings to be left unlocked to facilitate entry and inventory; sundry public order provisions; announcements of a census and interim taxation -

‘But they can’t,’ Eseutz said. Nobody else spoke. The man who’d pinned up the notice put his hammer back in his satchel and walked away, exchanging a few words with the captain of the guard.

‘It’s all right,’ said Venart, after a quick count. ‘There’s only four of us.’

‘Shut up, Ven.’ Vetriz was reading the notice for the third time. ‘That’s it, then. You and your bloody ShipOwners’ Association.’

‘What?’

‘That’s what’s done it,’ she said, quietly and angrily. ‘You thought you could pull their tails and stiff them for more money, and now look.’

Eseutz was pulling at her sleeve. ‘Come on,’ she said, ‘let’s move away. Those soldiers look very tense, if you ask me.’

‘What? Oh.’ Vetriz and the others followed her to one of the small colonnades behind the Market Hall, where there were already quite a few groups of up to nine agitated-looking citizens.

‘Here’s what we do,’ Eseutz was saying, in a loud whisper. ‘We go home, pack up as much money and valuable stuff as we can comfortably carry, and try and get to the ships. If only we can get off the Island, they can’t follow us or anything, they haven’t got any ships of their own. That’s why they can never make this thing stick.’

Venart scowled at her. ‘And how do you propose we deal with all the soldiers who’re already on the damn ships? Or had you forgotten, they’re going to invade Perimadeia with them. Athli, what about you? I can’t remember, are you a citizen or a foreigner?’

Athli thought for a moment. ‘That’s a good point,’ she said. ‘Yes, I’m a citizen, because I own property here; but I might be able to kid them into thinking I’m Shastel. But how’s that going to help you?’

‘Well, somebody’s got to go and get help,’ Venart said. ‘Raise an army, throw these bastards into the sea. That’s why you’ve got to go and raise the alarm-’

Athli looked at him. ‘Don’t be silly,’ she said. ‘Who on earth is going to come and rescue us?’

Venart hadn’t thought of that, obviously. ‘Mercenaries,’ said Eseutz. ‘We could hire mercenaries – the hell with how much it costs, we’ve got to get them off the Island. Once we’ve done that, we’ll be safe.’

Athli shook her head. ‘You’re dreaming,’ she said. ‘There must be – what, fifty thousand men in the expeditionary force? You’d need at least three times that for a disputed landing. Where are we going to find-?’

‘No,’ Eseutz interrupted, ‘you’re wrong. Right now there’s fifty thousand; but when they’ve gone off to attack Temrai there’ll only be a little garrison. That’s when we get them.’

Athli closed her eyes and opened them again. ‘When they’ve got our ships,’ she said. ‘Not a very sensible suggestion, is it? As soon as they hear what we’ve done, they’ll come storming back and we won’t stand a chance. Have you any idea what they do to rebels?’

‘There has to be something -’ Eseutz stopped in mid-sentence; five soldiers and an NCO were heading towards them. Venart looked as if he was about to run away, but his sister grabbed his arm. ‘If you run, they’ll kill you,’ she whispered.

The soldiers came nearer, stopped. ‘Venart Auzeil,’ the NCO said. ‘Eseutz Mesatges.’

Venart took a deep breath. ‘I’m Venart Auzeil,’ he said. ‘What-?’

‘Eseutz Mesatges.’

Athli, Vetriz and Eseutz stayed perfectly still. The NCO waited for a few seconds, then nodded. ‘All right,’ he said, ‘we’ll take them all and sort it out later. You’re under arrest,’ he added, as an afterthought. ‘This way.’