The Proof House

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

‘I hate getting arrested,’ Eseutz said. ‘It’s so boring. You sit around for hours in cells and interview rooms and waiting rooms and anterooms, with nothing to do and nothing to read, and it’s always either too cold or too hot, and the food-’

That morning, it had been the guild secretary’s office, tucked away discreetly at the end of a corridor leading off the gallery that ran round three sides of the Merchant Venturers’ guild house. That morning, it had been a place you dreamed of being invited to; a big, fat office hidden down a little, thin passageway, a monument to the fusion of discretion and conspicuous display. Secretary Aloet Cor was known to be a fanatical collector of furniture, in particular the delicate, expensive and entirely impractical bone and ivory chairs and tables made by the Arrazin family of Perimadeia for six generations; she didn’t like them much, so they said, but she collected them because they were rare and horrendously overpriced, and likely to appreciate in value considerably now that the supply had been made finite following the death of all the Arrazins in the Fall. It was worth sitting on the hard marble bench outside for an hour or so, they said, just for a glimpse of the bizarre and rather grotesque lampstand carved by Leucas Arrazin a hundred and fifty years ago out of a single piece of whalebone.

‘Get arrested often, do you?’ Venart asked. ‘Sorry; I’m just curious.’

Eseutz shrugged. ‘It depends where you go,’ she said. ‘In some places it’s accepted, like their way of saying hello, welcome to our fair city. There was a time when I used to go to Burzouth a lot, I was on first-name terms with all the warders at the excise guardhouse. We used to play chess or I’d sew buttons on for them-’

‘You?’ Vetriz interrupted. ‘Since when have you been able to sew on a button?’

Tonight it had become the office of Major Javec, the newly appointed sub-prefect of the Island; and somehow the corridor was darker and colder, the marble bench was harder, and seeing the famous Arrazins wasn’t quite the priority it would have been a few hours earlier. In fact, Vetriz had a horrible feeling that she had just been added to a collection, and had been dumped in a stockroom waiting to be catalogued, stamped and put in a cabinet. She’d known a man once who collected the skulls of birds; he’d described to her the method of skinning them, boiling out the brains and flesh, bleaching the bone and mounting the finished exhibit; she’d actually found it rather fascinating, in a disgusting sort of way.

‘The point I was trying to make,’ Eseutz said, ‘is that different people mean different things by arresting you. For all we know, it could just be a getting-to-know-you thing, nothing more sinister than that.’

Venart sighed. ‘Then how would you account for the fact that we’re the only ones here?’ he said. ‘Do you think that, as far as they’re concerned, we’re the only people worth getting to know on the whole island?’

Eseutz made an exasperated gesture with her long, thin hands. ‘All right,’ she said, ‘be miserable, see if I care. Personally, I don’t see the point. After all, it’s not going to make things any better, you sitting there worrying yourself to death. But if that’s your idea of a good attitude, then you go ahead-’

‘Eseutz.’ Athli lifted her head and looked her in the eye. ‘Shut up. And you, Ven. I know it’s only because you’re scared, and bickering makes it easier, but you’re starting to annoy me. All right?’

‘Speak for yourself,’ Eseutz snapped. ‘I’m not in the least scared-’

The door opened and the two guards who’d been standing like architectural features behind them, blocking their way back down the corridor, motioned to them to get up and go in. ‘It’ll be all right, you’ll see,’ Eseutz whispered. The others ignored her.

Sub-Prefect Javec was a round man, short for a Son of Heaven, bald as an egg on top but fringed round his multiple chins with a little curtain of woolly beard. He looked neither threatening nor friendly; mostly, in fact, he looked very tired, which was of course perfectly understandable. Annexing a whole country is hard work.

‘Names,’ he said; not to the four Islanders but to his clerk, a young outlander with curly brown hair. The clerk read the names off a list. His pronunciation was awful; Eseutz Mesatges became Ee-soo Muzzertgees, while Venart and Vetriz both found that their family name was now Orzle. He was rather better at Perimadeian names, because apart from putting the stress on the wrong syllable of Zeuxis, he managed it quite competently.

‘Thank you,’ the sub-prefect said, and the clerk sat down and started to sort through a tray full of wax tablets, the sort that Imperial NCOs were issued with for filing reports. ‘And thank you,’ the sub-prefect continued, apparently noticing the Islanders for the first time. ‘I hope this isn’t too inconvenient for you, but these things have to be done. You are all friends of Captain Bardas Loredan-’

‘Excuse me,’ Eseutz interrupted. ‘I’m not.’

Javec moved his head a little so that he could see her without getting a crick in his neck.

‘Oh,’ he said. ‘Is that right?’ he went on, facing Athli, who nodded. ‘You two, is that right?’

Venart took a deep breath. ‘Yes, sir,’ he said. ‘I don’t think she’s even met him once.’

‘I see,’ Javec said. ‘Well, can’t be helped; you’ll have to stay with these three until the war’s over. Now,’ he went on, ‘you’re Vetriz Auzeil.’

‘That’s right.’ She was impressed; Javec’s pronunciation was flawless.

‘And about seven years ago you had an affair with Gorgas Loredan.’

Vetriz sighed. ‘That’s right,’ she said, before Venart could deny the statement on her behalf. Pity; she’d managed to keep it from him this long. ‘Though affair is probably an overstatement. I believe the usual expression is one-night stand.’

Javec nodded. ‘I stand corrected,’ he said. ‘That is what it says in the file. Well, I’m sorry about this but I’m going to have to put the four of you under house arrest for the time being – I’m sure you’re all harmless enough, but as long as Captain Loredan’s in command of a major field army, anybody who could be used against him as a hostage – well, we’ll feel happier if we know you’re out of the way and safe. I’m sure you’ll see the logic behind it if you think about it for a moment.’

Nobody said anything.

‘We’ll try to make this as painless as possible. You’ll be confined to the Auzeil house – that’s number sixteen in the fourth transverse alley, yes? I’ll be posting a guard, obviously; they’ll have their own bivouac and wash-house and cook and everything, so you won’t have to fetch and carry or feed them. You can receive visitors for an hour a day, but of course there’ll have to be soldiers present. Any questions?’

Out of the corner of her eye, Vetriz caught sight of what had to be the notorious lampstand. She turned her head a little for a better view; it was every bit as hideous as she’d imagined.

‘Overrated, if you ask me,’ the sub-prefect said. ‘Of course, I’m not an expert by any means, but I find the late-period Arrazins are almost like parodies of the products of the classic period. There’s this unfortunate tendency to try to do things on a massive scale that are better suited to small work. Take the big two-handed cup, for instance; over there, look.’

They looked in the direction he was pointing, and saw what looked unpleasantly like a human skull, mounted on a small ivory pedestal. The top had been sawn off, turning the brain cavity into a cup, and two handles, made of cunningly spliced finger-bones, had been inserted into the ear hollows. ‘That’s an interesting piece, isn’t it?’ Javec went on. ‘I believe it was originally the head of a rebel prince of the plains tribes; he lost a civil war about a century ago, and his victorious rival sent it to the City to be mounted. It was part of the loot brought back by Captain Loredan, when he was a young man. Probably a unique example, although I have a stag’s head that’s generically similar in my own collection at home; Suidas Arrazin, quite early.’

Vetriz felt slightly sick.

‘Is it valuable?’ Eseutz asked. ‘Only, I know where there’s one just like it, if you’re interested.’

(That’s Eseutz, Vetriz thought.)

‘Really?’ Sub-Prefect Javec leaned forward a little. ‘A genuine Arrazin? With a provenance?’

Eseutz frowned. ‘I think so. I’d have to check, obviously. If it is genuine, roughly how much are we talking about?’

‘Money isn’t really an issue,’ Javec replied. ‘If you’d care to give me the name of the person who has this thing, I’ll follow it up; thank you.’

‘Jolay Caic; he’s got a stall down by the long quay, anybody’ll tell you how to find it.’ As she spoke, Eseutz realised just what Javec had meant by, Money isn’t really an issue. A pity; she’d known Caic for a good few years, and he’d never done her any harm. ‘But it’s been a while,’ she added quickly. ‘For all I know, he may not have it any more.’

Javec shrugged. ‘I’m sure I’ll be able to track it down, if it does turn out to be a genuine piece. But that’s by the way.’ He moved his head slightly and fixed his eyes on Athli. ‘Now then,’ he said, ‘I imagine that you’re about to point out that I have no jurisdiction over you because you’re a Shastel citizen, and by detaining you I’m risking a diplomatic incident. Well, for a start I think that at best you’ve got dual nationality and in all likelihood you’re just as much of an Islander as these three; but I’m not going to get involved in that, because I just don’t have the time or the energy. Let me put it this way: I’d suggest to you that staying put where we can keep an eye on you and protect you is very much in your best interests, just as it’s in the best interests of your ward, Theudas Morosin. You two are probably closer to Captain Loredan than anybody else outside his family, and naturally that puts you at risk. If you accept what I’m saying – and you’re a sensible young woman, so I’m sure you do – these tiresome issues of citizenship and jurisdiction simply don’t arise, and we won’t have to waste time on them. Do you agree?’

Athli looked at him; it was like looking at her own reflection in the polished visor of a helmet, for all the good it did her. ‘I suppose so,’ she said quietly. ‘After all, I don’t imagine I’d be doing any business even if you let me go.’

Javec smiled. ‘Thank you for reminding me. For what it’s worth, the provincial office has taken over the Shastel Bank franchise here – we’ve written to the Order to regularise the position, and I’m sure there won’t be any difficulties. I should congratulate you on the clarity and thoroughness of your records, by the way. When things have settled down a bit, I’m sure they’ll be glad to have you back as chief clerk.’

Athli looked at him for a long moment, and nodded. ‘That’s very kind,’ she said.

‘Unless,’ Javec went on – he was watching her very closely – ‘unless you feel you might be interested in joining Captain Loredan’s staff, wherever his next posting happens to be. It’d be just like old times, don’t you think?’

‘I don’t think so,’ Athli replied. ‘I don’t know a thing about military administration, I’m afraid.’

‘Well, you don’t have to make your mind up right away,’ Javec said. ‘We’ll see how things turn out, shall we? And now, if you’ll excuse me – thank you for your time; and for the tip about that possible Arrazin headpiece. I’ll most certainly follow that up.’

The two guards took a step forwards, and the Islanders stood up quickly. ‘Just one thing,’ Athli asked.

‘Yes?’

‘You mentioned Theudas – Theudas Morosin? What’s going to happen to him?’

Javec smiled. ‘Once again, thank you for reminding me. I’ve already talked to him; he’s going to join Captain Loredan. Interestingly, it sounds as if he might have some really rather useful local knowledge, following his recent detention by the plainspeople. I’m sure he sends you his best wishes.’

Athli frowned. ‘He’s already left, then?’

‘Either that or he’s on his way.’

‘I see. It’s just that I’ve got something that belongs to Bardas – to Captain Loredan; a sword, as it happens, rather a fine one, and I was wondering if Theudas could take it to him when he goes.’

Javec nodded. ‘The Guelan,’ he said. ‘Superb example, isn’t it? And the sentimental value as well, being a gift from his brother. It’s all right, we’ve already seen to that. But thank you for raising the matter.’

He nodded to the guards, and a moment later the four Islanders found themselves back in the corridor, having to walk faster than they’d have liked just to keep up. In due course they arrived at the Auzeil house, hot and out of breath. The front door was open, with a soldier standing on either side of it.

‘Excuse me,’ Eseutz started to say, but a hand in the small of her back propelled her into the house, and the door closed behind her. There were two more soldiers in the hall, and a further three in the courtyard. One of them, a long, skinny man in his early fifties, declared that he was Sergeant Corlo, and provided they didn’t give him any trouble, everybody was bound to get along just fine.

‘I don’t think I like him very much,’ Eseutz whispered, as she went with Vetriz into the south back bedroom. ‘In fact, I don’t think I like any of them.’

Vetriz didn’t answer; she’d been very quiet, in fact, for some time.

‘I don’t know,’ Eseutz went on. ‘I can’t see how this is going to work out. I mean, what about our ships? Or the rest of our property? They can’t just take it; what’re we supposed to live on, for gods’ sakes? And what are we supposed to do? Really I’d prefer it if they looted the place, so long as they went away afterwards and left us in peace. Being robbed is one thing, but-’

‘Eseutz,’ Vetriz interrupted, dropping heavily on to the bed, ‘please. I’ve got the most dreadful headache and I need to lie down for a while.’

‘What? Oh, all right. I’ll go and see if I can at least get them to bring me some clothes; assuming they haven’t confiscated them all.’

Has she gone?

Vetriz closed her eyes and nodded. ‘Yes, thank goodness. She’s a nice enough person, I do actually like her a lot, but the thought of being cooped up with her indefinitely is fairly horrifying.’

I can imagine.

Vetriz smiled. ‘Being cooped up with anybody’s bad enough, I suppose,’ she said. ‘But I’m sure that’s going to be the least of our problems. What’s going to happen, do you think? Seriously.’

I wish I knew.

‘Oh.’ She sighed. ‘When that horrible man mentioned Gorgas Loredan, I thought I was going to die. I suppose I’ll have to talk to Ven about it, and he’ll be all pompous and aggravating. When I think of some of the specimens he’s got mixed up with-’

Perhaps you should have told him. But I can see why you didn’t.

‘Oh, I can handle Ven. Alexius, what do you think’s going to happen? It looks like a ghastly mess to me, and it’s all our own fault. We shouldn’t have provoked them like that.’

Well, it’s done now. Once they’ve finished with this war, I expect they’ll go away. Then it’ll be up to you to try to make the best of it. Of course, they’ll keep the ships, and the crews too, until they can train crews of their own. If I were you, I’d be thinking about where you can go.

‘Oh,’ Vetriz repeated. ‘Leave the Island for good, you mean? I’ve never… Oh, this is awful. They can’t do this to us, surely.’

Don’t count on it. They don’t need you. They’ll probably want the Island itself as a naval base, so there’ll be a need for inns, shops, things like that. But they tend to prefer their own people, in which case they might well evacuate all of you and send you somewhere else inside the Empire. It’s one of the things they do; it’s a very good way of keeping control.

Vetriz lay quiet for a while. ‘So where do you think we should go? Colleon, maybe – but it’s so hot there, I don’t think I’d be able to cope. And what would we do for a living? I suppose it depends on whether we’re able to take anything with us. I think we’d be all right running a shop, especially if Athli comes in with us – now there’s a born survivor, if ever there was one. I think Ven has friends in Colleon who’d help us out.’

Possibly. Of course, it won’t be long before the Empire annexes Colleon. Personally, if I were you, I’d be looking to go a long way further out than that.

She shook her head. ‘Now you’re really starting to depress me,’ she said. ‘Not that I’m saying you’re wrong. I just wish I knew how all this happened so quickly.’

Simple. It’s because Bardas Loredan made it possible for them to take Ap’ Escatoy. They’d been stuck there for ten years; there was no reason to assume they’d ever succeed. Arguably, if it hadn’t been for Bardas they never would. Ap’ Escatoy was impregnable, there was no way round it, and the Empire doesn’t have a fleet. Now Ap’ Escatoy’s fallen and they’ve got a fleet. As a study in how one man can affect the whole direction of the flow of the Principle, it’s absolutely fascinating. If only I were still alive, I could write a book about it.

For a long time, nobody spoke.

‘What the hell-’ Iseutz finally broke the silence. ‘What the hell is she doing here?’

Gorgas frowned. ‘That’s no way to talk about your own mother,’ he said. ‘Come on, this is a historic occasion, our first proper family reunion in – what, how long is it now, Niessa? Must be over twenty years.’ He thought for a moment, then clicked his tongue. ‘Of course, we know exactly how long it’s been. How old are you now, Iseutz? Twenty-three?’

In the exact middle of the table was a cup, which Clefas had put there to catch the drips from the roof. Their father had dished it out of a piece of plate steel cut from a helmet his father had picked up on the site of the last major battle fought in the Mesoge, over a hundred years ago. As the raindrops fell into it they made a plinking noise, like a light hammer bouncing off an anvil.

‘Twenty-three,’ Gorgas repeated, when it was obvious that nobody else was going to contribute to the conversation. ‘Which makes it nearly twenty-four years since the last time we were all together around this table. Well, nothing much seems to have changed around here, I’m glad to say.’

Clefas and Zonaras were sitting perfectly still, like mechanical iron figures in a clock-tower that haven’t been wound up. Niessa was sulking, her arms folded, her chin jutting as she stared out of the window at the driving rain. Iseutz was pulling a piece of cloth into strips, one end gripped between her teeth. Nobody had bothered to clear away the cups and plates from the last three meals, though Clefas had at least taken the time to squash a couple of cockroaches. Gorgas was sitting at the head of the table. He’d put on a new shirt and trousers for the occasion – Colleon silk with brocade – and he was wearing his father’s ring, which had been in the family for generations.

‘You’ll find your room’s pretty much the way it was,’ he told his sister. ‘Same old linen-chest, same old bed. Of course, you and Iseutz are going to have to share, but that shouldn’t be a problem. Maybe we should think about turning the old apple store into another bedroom, though; it’s going to get a bit cosy otherwise.’

‘Where are you sleeping?’ Niessa asked, without moving her head.

‘In father’s room, of course,’ Gorgas replied.

‘I thought so.’

Iseutz had finished tearing her bit of rag into strips; now she started tearing the strips into squares. ‘Go on, then,’ she said, ‘say it, and let’s get it over with.’

‘Say what?’

She rested her hands on the table. ‘Any minute now,’ she said, ‘you’re going to say something like, It’s just a pity Bardas isn’t here, then we’d all be together again. Well, aren’t you?’

Gorgas frowned a little. ‘All right, yes, it would be nice if Bardas was here, but he’s not. He’s got a life of his own now, he’s making something of himself. He knows this house will always be here for him, as and when he needs it.’

‘Oh, for gods’ sakes.’ Iseutz banged the table with her mutilated hand. ‘Uncle Gorgas, why did you have to bring her here? Well, I’m not sharing a room with her, and that’s that. I’d rather sleep in the trap-house.’

‘Fine,’ Niessa muttered. ‘You do that.’

‘Niessa!’

Dear gods, Niessa thought, he sounds just like Father. Now that’s… worrying. Gorgas was glowering round the table, his arms folded ominously. Any minute now he’s going to tell me to eat up my porridge.

‘And the rest of you, for pity’s sake. We’ve had our differences, gods know – and yes, before anybody else says it, yes, a hell of a lot of them were my fault, I’m not trying to pretend they weren’t. But that was then and this is now; and let’s be absolutely straight with each other, none of us is exactly perfect.’ He stopped, glowered again, and went on, ‘I didn’t want to have to do it this way, but I think it’s necessary. Let’s start with you, Niessa; you’re self-centred, completely amoral, you’ve never really cared about anything or anybody but yourself; when things got too hot for you on Scona you just walked away, leaving for dead all the people who depended on you – I was the only one who even tried to do anything; I managed to get some of them out and I brought them here, but you didn’t give a damn. You betrayed a city – a whole city, all those hundreds of thousands of people you practically sentenced to death, just so you wouldn’t have to pay your debts.

‘And the way you’ve treated your own daughter is little short of abominable. When I brought her home to Scona, what did you do? You threw her in jail, for pity’s sake. And don’t you start looking all smug and self-righteous, Iseutz, you’re the last person – you tried to kill your own uncle – no, you be quiet and let me finish. You tried to kill Bardas for something that wasn’t his fault. He was only doing his job, he had no way of knowing that man was your uncle, he didn’t even know you existed. I’m sorry for what you’ve been through, but really, you’re just going to have to come to terms with it and start acting like a sane, normal human being while you can still remember how.

‘And as for you two,’ he went on, swinging round and scowling at Clefas and Zonaras, ‘you’re every bit as bad, if not worse. You had everything; you had the farm, dammit, you had Bardas sending you all that money, every quarter he could scrape together by risking his life, and what did you do? You squandered it, threw it all away. Dear gods, when I think what I’d have given to have what you had; to be here, at home, doing what we were all meant to do, instead of wandering around the world fighting and cheating and screwing other people just to make a living – you know, I don’t get angry easily, but that really does annoy me.’ It was very quiet now; even the rain seemed to have stopped dripping into the steel cup. ‘About the only one of us who can honestly say he’s always tried to do the right thing, always put other people before himself, is Bardas – and he’s the one who can’t come home, because of what we’ve done to him. Isn’t that right, Clefas? Zonaras? He came here, when he needed somewhere clean and safe to go to, and as soon as he saw what you two had done, he was so disgusted he couldn’t bear to stay here, so he went off again – and now look where he is, practically an exile; and it’s you two who’re to blame for that, and I’m really finding it hard to forgive you for it – although I do forgive you, because we’re family, we’ve got to stick together no matter what we’ve all done. But for heaven’s sake, why can’t you all just make a bit of an effort and stop bickering with each other like a lot of spoiled kids? That’s not so much to ask, is it?’

For a long time, nobody spoke. Then Iseutz giggled. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, ‘but it’s comical, honestly. All those terrible things we’ve all done, and it’s supposed to make us all one happy family. Uncle Gorgas, you’re one of a kind, you really are.’

Gorgas turned and stared at her, making her shiver. ‘And what’s that supposed to mean?’ he said.

‘Oh, come on. Listen to yourself. And just out of interest, has it slipped your mind that Uncle Bardas murdered your son and made his body into a-’

‘Quiet.’ Gorgas took a deep breath, making himself stay calm. ‘If we keep on bashing ourselves, bashing each other, over what we’ve all done, then we might as well all give up now. It’s not what we’ve done that matters, it’s what we’re going to do – just so long as we all try. At last we’ve got everything we need – we’ve got the farm, we’ve got each other, there aren’t any landlords or outsiders breathing down our necks-’

‘What about the provincial office?’ Niessa interrupted, still staring out of the window. ‘I suppose they just melted away into thin air.’

‘I can handle them,’ Gorgas replied. ‘They’re nothing to worry about. Really and truly, there isn’t anything to worry about any more, just so long as we’re together, as a family. We’ve done the hard part, we’ve all been through the bad times; it’s been a long haul, we’ve all had to go miles out of our way just to get back here again, but it’s all right now, we’re home. And if you could all just understand that-’

Clefas stood up and walked towards the door.

‘Where are you going?’ Gorgas demanded.

‘To see to the pigs,’ Clefas said.

‘Oh.’ He breathed out, as if in relief. ‘Tell you what, why don’t we all go and see to the pigs? Do some useful and constructive work for a change, instead of sitting round here moping like a lot of owls?’

His tone of voice suggested that participation wasn’t optional.

Outside, it was beginning to get dark. The rain had turned the bottom end of the yard into a swamp; the drainage ditch was blocked with cow-parsley again, and nobody had got around to clearing it out yet. Niessa, who only had the sandals she’d been wearing in the desert, could feel the mud between her toes.

‘How much longer do you think we’ll have to put up with this?’ It was Iseutz, whispering in her ear. ‘Does he really think we’re going to stay here and play let’s-pretend-nothing-happened for the rest of our lives?’

Niessa turned her head away. ‘I don’t care what he thinks,’ she said out loud, ‘or what you think, for that matter. This is obviously ridiculous. Now go away and leave me alone.’

Iseutz grinned. ‘You think you’ll be able to snap him out of it,’ she said. ‘Pull rank on him, as if you were both still on Scona. Well, I don’t think it’s going to work, he’s way too far gone for that. Still, look on the bright side; as I understand it he’s practically given this horrid country to the Empire; sooner or later they’ll round him up and put him out of his misery, and then we can get on with what we’re supposed to be doing.’

The pig house smelt bad. Nobody had got around to mucking it out for a week and the rain was pouring through a hole in the roof and flushing a stream of slurry under the door and out into the yard. Gorgas didn’t seem to mind the rain; his new silk shirt was probably ruined already, but he hadn’t noticed, or he didn’t care. He’s like a young kid, all excited at being allowed to help, Iseutz thought. Too bad. On balance, it would be fun to have Uncle Bardas here as well. He and Uncle Gorgas could bash each other to death, knee-deep in pigshit.

‘Come on, Zonaras, get me the rake,’ Gorgas was saying. ‘Niessa, you get the shovel.’ (Niessa stayed exactly where she was.) ‘Clefas, where’s the wheelbarrow? Oh, for crying out loud, don’t say you haven’t mended it yet, I thought I told you to do that last week. Doesn’t anybody else do any work around here, except me?

‘Family reunion,’ said Bardas Loredan, staying where he was. ‘I suppose I ought to say haven’t you grown, or something like that.’

Theudas Morosin stopped dead in the doorway of the tent. ‘I thought you’d be pleased to see me,’ he said.

Bardas closed his eyes and let his head loll back. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I didn’t mean it like that. I just wish you hadn’t come here.’

Theudas stiffened. ‘Oh?’

‘If I said I hoped you were out of my life for good,’ Bardas went on, ‘you’d think I was being horrible. What you probably wouldn’t understand is, I hoped it for your sake.’ He opened his eyes and stood up, but didn’t approach the boy. ‘I’m really pleased that you’re safe and well,’ he went on, ‘you’ve got to believe me when I say that; but you shouldn’t be here, not getting mixed up in this war. You should have stayed on the Island, you’ve got a future there.’

Theudas was about to say something, but changed his mind. He looks different, he thought. I was expecting he’d look different, probably older, thinner, I don’t know, but he doesn’t. If anything, he looks younger. ‘I want to be here,’ he replied instead. ‘I want to see you defeat Temrai, pay him back for what he did. I know you can do it, and I want to be here when you do. Is there anything terrible in that?’

Bardas smiled. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘but don’t let it worry you. You’re here now, we’re together again; I suppose you might as well make yourself useful.’

Theudas grinned with relief; it was the tone of voice when he said make yourself useful, just like the old times. He should have known there wouldn’t have been any show of emotion, no hugs or tears; he wouldn’t have wanted that anyhow. What he really wanted was for things to pick up where they’d left off, that day when the Shastel soldiers broke into their house and everything changed. ‘All right,’ he said. ‘What do you want me to do?’

Bardas yawned; now he did look tired. ‘Let’s see what Athli’s taught you about keeping books,’ he said. ‘If you’ve been paying attention, you could come in quite handy. And nobody could ever make sense of paperwork like Athli. How is she, by the way?’

There was something in the way he’d said that – he hasn’t heard yet. Why? Why haven’t they told him? ‘She was fine,’ Theudas said cautiously, ‘the last time I saw her.’

‘That’s good. And what about Alexius? How’s he doing? Have you seen him lately?’

This time Theudas didn’t know what to say. He really didn’t want to be the one to tell him – not if he also had to break the news about what had happened on the Island. But he’d have to do it sooner or later, and he didn’t want to have to lie… ‘Alexius,’ he repeated. ‘You haven’t heard.’

Bardas looked up sharply. ‘Haven’t heard what? He’s not ill or anything, is he?’

‘He’s dead,’ Theudas said.

Bardas sat very still. ‘Both of them,’ he said.

‘What?’

Bardas shook his head. ‘Nothing,’ he said, ‘sorry. I just heard yesterday, another friend of mine’s died, a man I used to work with at the proof house. When did he die?’

Theudas’ mouth was dry. ‘Quite some time ago,’ he said. ‘I’m really sorry, I thought you must have known.’

‘It’s all right,’ Bardas said (it’s customary to die first after all, even if there are exceptions). ‘He was an old man, these things happen. It’s just – well, odd. I’d have thought I’d have known, if you see what I mean.’

‘You were quite close at one time, weren’t you?’ Theudas said, knowing as he said it that he couldn’t have put it much worse if he’d really tried.

‘Yes,’ Bardas replied. ‘But I haven’t seen him for years. If you remember exactly when he died, I’d be interested. Now then, let’s find something for you to do; or do you want to have a rest? I suppose you’ve been travelling all day.’

‘That’s all right,’ Theudas said. ‘Did you say you wanted me to do the accounts or something? I suppose there’s a lot of paperwork and stuff, running an army.’

Bardas smiled. ‘You wouldn’t believe it,’ he said. ‘Or at least, there is with this army; somehow we never seemed to bother with it when I was with Maxen’s crowd. These people, though, they need dockets and requisitions and reports and gods know what else, or nothing gets done.’

Theudas sat down behind the small, rickety folding desk, the top of which was covered with bits of paper and wax tablets. He hadn’t served any formal apprenticeship or term of articles while he’d been on the Island, but he knew enough about clerkship to recognise a pig’s ear when he saw one. ‘I can make a start on reconciling your sun-and-moon ledger if you like,’ he said. ‘Have you got any counters?’

‘In the wooden box,’ Bardas replied. ‘What’s a sun-and-moon ledger?’

Theudas smiled. ‘Sorry,’ he said, ‘it’s what they call standard double-entry format where I come from – I mean, on the Island.’ The smile was still there on his face, like the visor of a bascinet, a false steel face. ‘You know, receipts and expenditures. We draw a little sun on the left-hand side and a little moon on the right.’

‘Ah. Well, yes, by all means. That’d be a great help.’

Theudas opened the box; it was cedarwood, sweet-smelling, pale with a faint green tinge. Inside was a little velvet bag, drawn tight at the neck with silk braid. He loosened the knot and shook out a handful of the most exquisite counters he’d ever seen – butter-yellow gold, Imperial fine, with allegorical figures in high relief on both the obverse and reverse. Neither the figures nor the legends in the exergues meant anything to him, of course; these were Imperial make, illustrating scenes from the literature of the Sons of Heaven and inscribed in their script.

‘They belonged to a man called Estar,’ Bardas said. ‘I inherited them, along with this army. You can keep them if you like; I hate doing exchequer work.’

‘Thank you,’ Theudas said. In the box with the counters was a small piece of chalk, which he used to draw his lines – full lines for full tens, broken lines for the intermediate fives. ‘But are you sure? They look as if they’re pretty valuable.’

‘Never given it any thought, to be honest with you,’ Bardas replied. ‘Once you’ve spent time with these people, you start assessing value in a different way, if you see what I mean.’

Theudas didn’t see at all, but he nodded anyway. ‘If you’re sure,’ he said. ‘It’s a pleasure to use them.’

Bardas smiled. ‘I think that’s the general idea,’ he said. ‘Look, we’re getting ready to move on – we’ve been stuck here for far longer than we’d expected, and we’re horribly behind schedule. I’ve got to go and see to a few things. Will you be all right here on your own for a bit?’

‘I should think so,’ Theudas replied, setting out counters on the lines. ‘I’ve got plenty here to keep me busy for a while.’

For an hour or so the work more or less filled his mind, as he wrestled with divisors, quotients and multiplicands, traced misplaced entries, struggled to make sense of Bardas’ handwriting. It was enough to feel the textile-soft texture of the counters between the tips of his fingers, or hear the gentle click they made as he dropped one back into the bag. But as he was drawn deeper into the calculations, so the images embossed on the counters began to assert themselves in the back of his mind, like splinters of metal thrown off the grindstone embedding themselves in your hand. There was an army marching to war; in the foreground a Son of Heaven on a tall, thin horse, behind him a sea of heads and bodies, each one no more than a few cursory strokes of the die-engraver’s cutter. There was a trophy of captured arms, set up on a battlefield to celebrate a victory – swords and spears, helmets and breastplates and arms and legs heaped up, and at the summit, like a beacon on a mountain, the radiate-sun standard of the Empire. There was a city under siege; high towers and bastions in the background, and at the front of the field, engineers digging the mouth of a sap, sheltered from the arrows and missiles of the defenders by tall wicker shields. There was an armoury, where two men raised a helmet over a stake while a third watched. Because he couldn’t understand the words, Theudas didn’t know which wars and sieges and cities were being commemorated here, but it didn’t really matter; they could be any war, any siege or city you wanted them to be (since all wars and sieges and cities are pretty much alike, seen from a distance, from outside the field). For all Theudas knew, it might have been deliberate; since the Empire is eternally at war, eternally celebrating some new victory, it was sound practical sense to keep the celebrations of victory vague and generic, whether they be the images on counters or the marching-songs of the army.

He remembered that he’d forgotten something; on the floor, where he’d dumped it, was his luggage – one small kitbag and a long parcel wrapped in oiled cloth. Fortuitously, that was when Bardas walked in.

‘I’ve just remembered something,’ Theudas said. ‘I’m sorry, it slipped my mind. I’ve brought something for you.’

Bardas raised his eyebrows. ‘Really? That’s nice. What is it?’

Theudas knelt down, picked up the parcel and handed it to him. Maybe his face changed a little while he was picking at the knots in the twine; it was completely free of any sort of expression when he pulled out the Guelan broadsword.

‘I see,’ was all he said; then he put it back. ‘How are the books coming along? Made any sense of them yet?’

‘Of course you’re perfectly at liberty to leave at any time,’ the man in the department of aliens had told him. ‘As a citizen of Shastel, you’re unaffected by what’s happened here.’ Then he’d gone on to point out that there weren’t any ships leaving for Shastel, now or in the foreseeable future – in other words, if he wanted to exercise his undisputed right to leave the Island, he was going to have to walk home across the sea to Shastel.

So he went back to Athli’s house, which was empty. They’d come and collected all the files and papers, not to mention the ten massive cast-iron strongboxes in which she kept the Bank deposits; they’d cut the chains and bolts with cold chisels and big hammers, leaving behind them scars in the walls and floors like the cavities left behind when teeth have been pulled. They hadn’t touched anything else, however; this was an annexation, not a fall or a sack. Much more polite than either of those, and for obvious reasons; after all, where’s the point of stealing your own property?

But they hadn’t taken the food; so he cut himself a thick slice out of the new loaf, and a big square of cheese, and took them over to the window where it was pleasantly cool but he could still see the sunlight. From where he was sitting he could just make out the tops of the masts of ships, riding at anchor in the Drutz. Any day now, they’d be going where he’d just come from, to take the war to Temrai and avenge Perimadeia. Or something of the kind.

He closed his eyes; and then he was somehow underneath the town, directly under Athli’s house, in a tunnel, the usual tunnel, that reeked of coriander and wet clay. ‘Look, is this really…? he started to protest, but the floor of the tunnel was giving way under his feet, and he was falling -

– Down into another tunnel (the usual tunnel), where they were scooping up the spoil and loading it on to the dolly-trucks; and mixed in with the spoil he could see all manner of artefacts and curios from a time several hundred years ago. Some of the pieces were familiar; others weren’t, and some of the unfamiliar ones were a very strange shape indeed – parts of suits of armour for creatures that were far from human, or part human, part something else.

You again.

Gannadius looked round. There wasn’t anybody there that he could see, just helmets and pieces of armour -

Over here. That’s it, you’re looking straight at me.

An elegant, if somewhat battered, barbute sallet, the sort of helmet that covers the face completely apart from narrow slits for the eyes and mouth. ‘Is that you?’ Gannadius asked. ‘You remind me of someone I used to work with, but I can’t quite…’

Well, of course I do. It’s me. Here inside this blasted tin hat.

No great mystery; they’d run the tunnel through the middle of a burial ground, a mass grave for the losers of some battle long ago; or else they’d reopened a tunnel from some previous siege, where a cave-in had buried an assault party. ‘Just a minute,’ Gannadius said, ‘you aren’t Alexius, you don’t sound a bit like him. Who are you?’

Does it matter?

‘It matters to me,’ Gannadius replied, turning the helmet over. It was empty.

Alexius couldn’t make it, so he sent me instead. I’m a friend of Bardas Loredan’s, if it actually matters at all. And you’re Gannadius, right? The wizard?

‘No, I… Yes, the wizard.’ Gannadius couldn’t sit down, there wasn’t room, so he leaned his back against the curved, damp wall of the tunnel. ‘Is there actually a point to this, or is it just that big hunk of cheese I ate?’

You wound me.

‘I’m sorry,’ Gannadius replied, feeling rather self-conscious about apologising to a hallucination. ‘So I take it there is a reason for this?’

Of course. Welcome to the proof house.

Gannadius frowned. ‘The what house?’

This is where you come to be bashed and buried, though it’s considered good form to die first. Still, you weren’t to know that; we can make allowances. Now then, let’s see. If asked to identify the Principle with one of the following, a river or a wheel, which would you choose?

‘I’m not sure,’ Gannadius replied. ‘To be honest with you, I don’t think either comparison is a perfect fit. Besides, why are you asking me this?’

Answer the question. River, wheel; which?

‘Oh…’ Gannadius shrugged. ‘All right, on balance I’d say the Principle is more like a river than a wheel. Satisfied?’

Explain your reasoning.

Gannadius scowled. ‘If I treated my students like that, I’d be out of a job.’

Explain your reasoning.

‘If I do, can I wake up?’

Explain your reasoning.

Gannadius sighed. ‘All right,’ he said. ‘I hold that the Principle flows like a river along a bed of circumstance and context; it goes where it goes because the landscape takes it there. I hold that it flows from a beginning to an end, and as and when it reaches that end, it’ll stop. I hold that the course of the Principle can be deflected, but only by diverting it from one set of circumstance and context into another; further, that only the future course can be diverted – it’s impossible to change the past. How am I doing?’

Now explain why the Principle resembles a wheel. In your own words.

‘If you insist. I hold that the Principle revolves, like a wheel, around an event; but, like a wheel, as it turns on firm ground it pulls itself forward, thereby moving its own axis forward with it – which explains why we don’t live the same day over and over again. The analogy breaks down because the events that form the axis, or do I mean axle, are constantly changing, but the wheel continues to revolve around them without loss of continuity – which is why it’s better to think of the events as the bed and banks of a river, in my opinion. I’ll admit, though, that the wheel analogy is preferable because it brings out the repetitive aspect of the Principle, something which is rather understated in the river image; it’s still there, of course, because a water-course only comes into being after hundreds of years, when countless cycles of rain and flood have eroded a channel for it to run down. Actually, both images are misleading; the Principle doesn’t repeat itself, it just tends to make the same sort of thing happen over and over again. Anyway, to get back to the wheel, you can’t divert the wheel itself – it can only go round – but by shifting the axle you can steer those revolutions on to a different road. In theory, that is. In practice, anybody fool enough to try interfering will probably get run over – or drowned, if you prefer. There, will that do?’

It’s adequate.

‘Adequate,’ Gannadius repeated. ‘Well, thank you ever so much.’

Adequate isn’t good enough; you’re our man on the spot at a crucial turning point in history. Adequate won’t make head or tail of this -

– And the roof caved in, and the town came crashing down through it, and after that the whole world; but not enough to fill the tunnel. For a moment Gannadius could see it all – cities and roads and towns and fortresses, villages and fields and forests, tumbling into the hole like milk through a tin funnel and soaking away into the black clay. There was a rich stench of garlic, and all around him Gannadius could see the Sons of Heaven, watching in silent, detached appreciation, as if this was a ballet or a lecture. He could see ships, vast fleets of them spilling infinite numbers of steel men on to all the beaches and headlands in the world, until the steel men covered the face of the earth -

‘As if the world was wearing armour,’ he said aloud. ‘Nice touch.’

– and under every city and town and village he could see tunnels and galleries and saps, where steel men burrowed and hammered and bashed steel limbs and heads over anvils, until all the cities and towns were undermined and fell down into the camouflets, and the skin of steel closed over where they’d stood. In the mines, the steel men skinned the steel off the bodies of the dead, cutting the straps with thin-bladed knives, peeling away the steel plate to reach the flesh beneath; the steel went into the scrap, the trash, piled up in pyramids that touched the roof, while the hammers bashed and pounded the flesh, breaking up the fibres to make it easier to cook. And all the flesh went into the mouths of the Children of Heaven, and all the steel went back into the melt, to be drawn off in blooms, hammered into billets, hammered again into plates, hammered again into the shapes of limbs, hammered again by the sword and the axe and the mace and the flail and the morningstar and the halberd and the long-shafted war-hammer, at every stage put to proof (proof, if proof were needed) and hammered to the point of failure, which is the point at which the chrysalis fails at the seams and bursts open, releasing the butterfly.

‘That’s an interesting hypothesis,’ Gannadius murmured.

Then the images merged, as all the cities became one city, all the countries one country, all the steel one suit of proof, all the people one man; and he was standing over his anvil swinging his hammer, letting it fall in its own weight, pinching the metal between the hammer and the anvil so that it flowed like a sluggish river, or the stream of lava from a volcano.

‘Alexius?’ Gannadius asked.

But the man shook his head. ‘Close,’ he replied, ‘but no grapefruit. Alexius is dead, I’m afraid – we just couldn’t make an exception for him any longer – and so is Anax, Bardas Loredan’s friend, and a lot of others too. They went in the scrap, and the scrap went into the melt, and the melt became billets, and the billets become me. You’re seeing me as Alexius because of your basic human need for a reassuringly friendly face.’

‘Ah,’ Gannadius said.

‘Which is misleading, of course,’ he went on, ‘because I’m not reassuring and I’m sure as hell not friendly. You see, the Principle is the Empire; it’s the melt and the anvil; it’s a river that drowns you, or a wheel that runs you over. The lava stream is a good image too, as far as it goes. But personally, I like the idea of the Principle being the proof house, because for every inch of development there has to be a crumpled and wrecked yard of destruction; otherwise, how do you ever get on to the next stage?’

‘I’m not sure I follow,’ Gannadius said.

‘Fair enough,’ he replied, as his hammer distorted the metal. ‘It’s because you can’t see the beginning, the points it started from. You see, every act of destruction begins with a first small moment of failure – the first point where the metal stresses and tears, the first crack, the first place where the material is beaten thin. Once you have that, everything around it fails and everything falls in – it’s like the one prop you pull out to set off a camouflet, and then the city falls through the hole. Gorgas Loredan was a point of failure, where the stress became too much; there were others – centuries ago, some of them, like the moment when the Sons of Heaven first broke through, or very recent, like the Empire getting its hands on a fleet of ships, which is the failure that’ll pull down the cities across the sea. There was a moment of failure when Alexius stupidly agreed to place the curse on Bardas, and that ripped open a whole seam. You could say it was like splitting a log – one wedge opens a crack to put the next wedge in. That’s the progressive element of the Principle.’ He laughed. ‘Definitely not reassuring,’ he said with a smile. ‘And definitely not friendly. Another really major failure was the moment when you agreed to carry the duck from Perimadeia to the Island; that was a disaster from which the world may never recover. But try not to feel guilty about it; you weren’t to know. Quite probably, you were only trying to be helpful.’

‘That’s right,’ Gannadius said. ‘I was.’

He nodded. ‘Comic,’ he said, ‘in a grotesque sort of a way; destruction and ruin swoop down on the west, sewn up in the crop of a duck. Well, that ought to have given you plenty to think about. Thanks for watching.’

– And his eyes were open again, as the plate toppled off his knees and the crusty end of the bread rolled under the chair. Damn, he thought. But I’m not sure I’m convinced. It’s a specious enough theory, but I’d like to see some hard proof.

Someone was hammering at the door; he stood up, brushing away crumbs, and answered it. There were two soldiers standing in the doorway, and a clerk.

‘Doctor Gannadius?’

‘That’s me.’

‘The sub-prefect’s compliments,’ the clerk said, ‘and he thought you might be interested to know there’s been an unscheduled arrival, a ship from Shastel. It was blown off-course and put in here. The sub-prefect has asked them to hold over until tomorrow morning so they can carry some letters for him, and he thought you might like a berth on it.’

‘That’s very thoughtful of him,’ Gannadius said. ‘I’d like that very much. What’s the ship called?’

‘The Poverty and Forbearance; the master’s name is Hido Elan, and it’s down on the Drutz. They’ve agreed to take you home for free, as a gesture of goodwill.’

‘Goodwill,’ Gannadius repeated. ‘Well, isn’t everybody being kind to me today.’