The Tyranny of the Night

21. Brothe, in the Gathering of the War

Brothe was in a ferment. Neither a Patriarchal nor a Collegium delegation came out to greet Principatй Doneto. Sublime's limited forces were desperately trying to keep order, busy as a three-legged cat in a room full of mice.

The Five Families hurled accusations and pointed fingers. Their young men found excuses to duel. Every duelist who came in second added fuel to the emotional holocaust The law forbid family forces larger than a personal guard. In the past they had shown themselves unable to refrain from throwing swords at every little problem. Now they sought ways to get around the law.

The Brotherhood of War was mad at everybody.

Word of the troubles, with mystic swiftness, reached the Calziran pirates. A small fleet tried to come up the Teragi River but was driven back by the Collegium.

Then there was the Brothen mob, which had behaved itself for far too long. Riots and looting broke out most every day. Luckily, the civil disorders remained small and localized.

The Devedian and Dainshaukin minorities, working together, resisted the madness. Though they did incense the Episcopal mob by kicking the snot out of would-be looters.

Their situation never grew as bad as had that of the Deves of Sonsa.

The worst was over by the time Bronte Doneto's band reached the city. Today's Brothens couldn't live up to the standards of bad behavior shown by their forbears.

The party's passage through the streets was uncomfortable, though the day itself was clear, cool, and crisp and recent heavy rains had swept away most of the offal usually lending piquancy to the city air. Doneto moved as fast as he could. He wanted to be off the streets before his return became common knowledge.

Everyone who really cared had, of course, been aware of his approach for days.

THE PRINCIPATЙ GAVE HIS PEOPLE JUST TIME ENOUGH TO EAT, clean up, change clothing, and take a few minutes to relax. Then he summoned them to the central hall of his home. That structure was a minor fortress constructed of dirty old limestone less than a bow shot from the larger Benedocto citadel. The Benedocto home was a true castle.

The Five Families all had their true fortresses within the city – despite being denied the forces to defend them. The Benedocto castle was the biggest family stronghold.

Else arrived to discover that Doneto had wasted no time on his own comfort. He wore what he had worn on the road. He was as dirty as he had been when he entered the city. He carried a wooden bowl containing olives, pickled garlic, and onions, plus bite-size chunks of sausage and cheese. He ate as

he moved around.

Else presumed that the people he did not recognize – everyone but Doneto and Pinkus Ghort – were Doneto's own people who had stayed behind when their master had gone off to salvage the Connec.

The Principatй's staff had done a superb job of keeping the household ready for its master's return.

"Or somebody warned them that he was on his way home," Ghort said. "Like maybe the guy who paid his ransom. Meantime, it looks like we've lost a friend and gained a boss."

"Must you always be cynical?"

That process – the one where Doneto returned to old form – had begun before their exit from Plemenza.

"Look out," Ghort cautioned.

Doneto was headed their way. He said, "Affairs here are tailor-made for us, Hecht. There's so much confusion that nobody really knows what's going on or who is who. Originally, I planned to set you up inside the Arniena family, so we could keep them steering close to the Patriarch's course after they revealed themselves by voting with us in the Collegium. But with Rodrigo Cologni dead there'll be one less vote against Sublime to negate so we won't have to leverage the Arniena into backing him. They can go on pretending to be against us. So we can employ you even more daringly. You are, by the way, in Arniena service now, have been for months, and don't even know me."

Else asked Ghort, "Who is this handsome stranger, Pinkus?"

Doneto showed a flash of irritation, then a moment of amusement.

Else said, "But I do know who you are. Anybody who got out of the Connec will know that. And that includes all those Brotherhood types who ran away to Brothe. And everyone who knows about our stay in Plemenza. Hansel can trip us up anytime he wants. Remember, I'm supposed to be an imperial spy, now."

Doneto scowled. "I suppose you're right. So here's what I'm thinking now. Because of the disaster that hit the Bruglioni they're desperate for competent help. If Inigo Arniena tells Paludan Bruglioni that he can give him a couple of his best men…"

Else nodded and smiled but also rolled his eyes. "This is getting hard to follow. I'll be writing reports and sending them to me keeping track of what I've been doing and offering suggestions on how I can influence me to behave in ways that I'll find more useful toward accomplishing my goals where spying on

me is concerned."

Doneto smiled thinly. "There's a country folksong about a man who was his own uncle and brother-in-law. Hecht, I want to seize this opportunity before people have time to think. Come with me. There's somebody I need you to meet."

Else went, reluctantly. "You're the boss." He had hoped to ease into the Brothen scene gradually, quietly. But if he could get inside one of the Five Families …

Bronte Doneto led him to a shadowed corner. There they found an old man in a wheeled chair, alertly watching the Principatй's guests. Doneto said, "Piper Hecht, this is Salny Sayag. And his son, Rogoz. They represent the Arniena family. You might have run into Rogoz before. He worked in your line for a while, in the north."

Else considered the younger man who stood behind the wheeled chair. "I don't think so. Not that I recall, anyway." He offered his hand. "Have you seen me before, Rogoz?”

"No."

Rogoz was definite. And a man of few words. His grip was firm and confident. His coloring and appearance were not local. He was darker and uglier than was common in Firaldia. Else asked, "You aren't Brothen either, are you?"

"My father came over from Obrizok."

"I don't know Obrizok."

"It's a town in Creveldia. Creveldia is famous for its horses. He was an exile. This isn't the time for personal histories. Collect your possessions."

Else sighed. He was glad he was used to living on his own.

The Plemenzan captivity had been his longest settled passage in the past ten years.

"Where're you headed?" Pinkus Ghort wanted to know.

"New job. The Principatй wants me on it right now." He shrugged. "I'll see you on the streets."

"Don't smack me too hard."

“Take care of Bo and Joe. Keep Bo out of the brothels. He'll catch his death."

Else feared he would miss Pinkus Ghort as much as he did Bone and the others from the Andelesqueluzan adventure. Which now seemed like a story he had heard a long time ago instead of something he had lived himself.

THE SAYAGS EXITED BRONTE DONETO'S ESTABLISHMENT through a tradesmen's postern. Rogoz Sayag pushed his father's chair. A blanket covered the elder Sayag's lower body. It might have concealed tools or weapons. Two armed men joined them outside the gate. Rogoz Sayag explained, "Brothe is a dangerous city. There are a lot of hungry people on the streets."

Else carried everything he wanted to take along. He was accustomed to carrying his whole life and fortune on his back. Like he was some nomadic desert tortoise.

Else talked and pretended not to examine his companions or the surrounding city. It took the efforts of both Sayags and their escorts to generate enough return chin noise to qualify as a conversation.

At one point, Else protested, "I need to know something about this city. I've never been here before,."

"I understand," Rogoz replied. "But you aren't going to be part of our house. You don't need to know anything about us."

Else understood. Rogoz did not want him picking up anything he might pass along when he moved on to the Bruglioni citadel. "On the other hand, if I don't know anything about the Arniena, after supposedly having been with them for several months, the Bruglioni will wonder why."

Salny Sayag agreed. “Talk to him, Rogoz. All of you, talk to him. Don't hold back. Fill in the details. Let him take something with him when he goes. You. Doneto man. The one thing you aren't going to tell anyone is that the Arniena have an understanding with Principatй Doneto."

"Of course not."

ELSE SPENT NINE DAYS WITH THE ARNIENA FAMILY, LEARNING what they were willing to be let known, and about the Mother City. They gave him work to do. It was not overwhelming. He had several opportunities to go out and get the feel of the city.

The essence of Brothe was elusive. It seemed to be more than one city. In one sense it was almost parochial, with the intense focus of the native-born on family politics, petty feuding, and Colors. On the other hand, Brothe was cosmopolitan in the extreme. It swarmed with foreigners. Else heard dozens of unfamiliar languages. People from all across the world came to immerse themselves in the recollections of what once was the heart of the civilized world.

The glories of yesterday lay in ruins, some looted for building stone, overgrown, haunted by the poor and fugitives or, some said, by a thousand lingering recollections of the Instrumentalities of the Night. There were great sorcerers in Brothe everybody knew. And not just the tame Principatйs of the Collegium.

Foreigners came seeking their fortunes. Many of them had been villains in their own climes. And Brothe boasted a vigorous religion and pilgrim industry. Else found that amazing. Thousands came every month just to see the Church's central physical institutions, and in hopes of glimpsing the Patriarch.

During his stay with the Arniena, Else participated in two minor adventures with Rogoz Sayag and other family retainers. Salny Sayag said the orders came from Don Inigo Arniena himself. Don Inigo was the family chieftain. Neither mission amounted to much. Punishing a servant who had stolen from the Arniena. Avenging an insult flung at one of the don's granddaughters by a gang of street kids who had been stupid enough to open their mouths outside their hideout.

Those jobs did give Else a chance to be seen in the company of other Arniena goons.

“This all you do?" Else asked Rogoz.

"Don Inigo isn't big on squabbling. Unlike everyone else in Brothe."

"Uhm?”

"It seems the more chaotic things get, the more some people use that to cover their own mischief. Which only makes the chaos worse. The don would rather do it the sneaky, sinister way."

Else went along and showed he could be part of the team. He needed only be mildly evasive about his past. Rogoz Sayag was not eager to reveal his own background. Possibly Rogoz had not spent much time in the countries where he was supposed to have learned his trade. In lands where he might have crossed paths with a freelancer from Duarnenia, that little state on the eastern shore of the Shallow Sea.

Few mercenaries talked about their pasts. Somewhere behind them, in most cases, were people with grudges. Bad choices made at an early age were why freelancers left home in the first place.

While public order in Brothe deteriorated, the broader, world situation lent the Patriarch no comfort, either. Calziran pirates grew more numerous and bolder by the day. A sort of mob madness had taken possession of them. Their worst raids fell on Church or Benedocto family holdings, always within the bounds of the Episcopal States. There was hardly a rumor of piracy along the coasts of Alameddine. That kingdom, beholden to the Grail Empire, lay between Calzir and the Episcopal States. Nor did raiders appear anywhere else protected by the Grail Emperor or the mercantile republics.

Even dimwits who cared little about distant events began to think there was a conspiracy. Johannes Blackboots must be behind it all.

In Brothe everything was part of a plot. In Brothe nothing was what it seemed, or even what it purported to be. Whatever went wrong did so because of an inimical conspiracy.

Else suspected that any plot involving Praman pirates would be orchestrated from al-Qarn rather than the Grail Empire.

Anything that distracted Sublime from a crusade into me Holy Lands would be a good thing, from the Dreangerean point of view. Any delay moved the man that many weeks, months, or years closer to his blessed elevation into the Chaldarean heaven. Whereupon the beleaguered and long-suffering Collegium would, undoubtedly, replace him with someone less controversial, bellicose, and ambitious.

On Else's ninth day with the Arniena, Rogoz Sayag appeared as he was teaching three Arniena boys exercises that would improve their stamina against the day they got involved in a duel. "Remember. When two fighters of equal skill meet, the one whose strength lasts longest will be the survivor." He used "survivor" rather man "victor" deliberately.

"Good lesson for them to learn, Hecht." Sayag got it.

"When they're young they think only the other guy is mortal. These boys listen, though. That's good."

Rogoz said, "You've done this before. They do pay attention."

"They're good kids. The main thing I want to get through to them is that half the people who get into duels lose."

"Definitely a difficult lesson. My father wants you. The Don has arranged a meeting with Paludan Bruglioni."

Else grunted. "Soon?"

“Tonight, I think. Not thrilled?"

"Not only am I old enough to know that half the people who get into duels lose, I'm old enough to know that, no matter how good you are, there's always somebody better." Else told the Arniena boys to knock off for the day.

"I'm not sure I follow all of that but I'll take your word for it."

Salny Sayag suggested, "Take a chair, Hecht." Else no longer found that western affectation awkward. The old man said, "I've talked you up to Paludan Bruglioni. He'll put on a show of reluctance but he's eager to take on someone like you. Which should work out well for you. All you have to do is look like you're what he wants you to be."

Else grunted, then said, "There's been a couple things bothering me. One is, why would a family the size of the Bruglioni need to bring in outside help? They lost a couple of important sons but I can't see that weakening them to the point where…"

"But it did. You're correct. There're a lot of Bruglionis. And every Bruglioni gets away from Brothe as soon as he can. Paludan is a difficult man. He's consumed by hatred. He keeps it hidden most of the time, though. His brother, and their father, were also miserable souls."

That sounded like a good emotional handle.

Sayag continued, "Last century there was a fad where the Brothen rich considered themselves too good to soil their own hands with war or commerce. The more hirelings a family had, the higher its status. The Bruglioni took that too much to heart. They never really got over it. After a parade of uninspired chieftains, they've pretty much lost their ability to do anything useful themselves."

"I see." He did not.

"The Bruglioni who died in Madhur Plaza were their best young men. Only their reputation for savagery and brutality protects them now. But the wolves smell weakness. The vultures are circling. Paludan's hired swords have all deserted. The Brotherhood of War has him marked. They're convinced that he was behind the killing of their men the night he lost his sons. A Bruglioni servant says he saw the missing heads inside the Bruglioni citadel the next day. And rumor says Paludan himself tortured Father Obilade to death. Sylvie Obilade being the Bruglioni household priest and Paludan's personal confessor, but also a spy. He arranged the ambush in the plaza. Not expecting a bloodbath."

"I see. Convolution in the Brothen tradition. And Paludan Bruglioni isn't a good employer."

"Correct. Don Inigo and I both cautioned him to restrain himself in your case. First, because he needs you desperately. Second, because we consider you more a loan man a pass along, his to do with as he pleases."

"Really?" Now what? He had met Inigo Arniena only in passing. The Don was a wizened little character vain enough to dye his hair black. Yet he enjoyed a joke, even at his own expense. He was less formal and stuffy than Salny Sayag.

Else could see no reason for Don Inigo to extend special protection to a passing rogue he meant to plant on an enemy as part of a larger scheme.

"The Don asked me to see if you won't make that a literal truth."

"You're going to have to be more direct."

"Long ago, when they were boys, Freido Bruglioni, Paludan's father, disrespected Don Draco Arniena in a way that Paludan doesn't know Don Inigo knows about. Don Inigo also knows the Bruglioni consider it a great joke. I'm not privy to the details myself. I do know that Don Draco swore to avenge the insult Don Inigo promised his father on his deathbed that he would finish it. Last summer, when Don Inigo's heart almost betrayed him, he settled on a scheme where the Arniena vote in the Collegium would undercut the Bruglioni at some critical point. Meantime, publicly, Don Inigo remains Paludan's staunch ally."

"I think I begin to see."

"No doubt already being in a similar position on behalf of the Benedocto."

"Not them. Bronte Doneto."

"Who is an extension of the Patriarch, if you ask most people. No matter. The Don doesn't want much from you that you won't do anyway."

"So. This was why it was so easy for Principatй Doneto arrange to slide me in through the Bruglioni back door?"

"Yes."

"What do you want?"

"Any information you can acquire that will give the Don a chance to do the Bruglioni a bigger hurt in the public eye,"

"Bigger?"

"Bigger than backstabbing them in a vote in the Collegium. Best would be to discover something that would make the mob want to tear them apart."

"What a city. Of course. Since my Principatй tells me that you don't expect to reveal yourselves any time soon. Because until Rodrigo Cologni is replaced the Arniena vote isn't crucial."

"The Patriarch will have to move quickly, just to forestall the idea that he might have been behind the murder."

"I thought the murderer was supposed to be a huge blond foreigner. If he wasn't a Bruglioni."

"Either way, somebody killed a whole troop of Brotherhood veterans to get to Rodrigo Cologni. That's a hard sell, Hecht. God Himself wouldn't be interested enough to work that hard."

Else shrugged. "It seems nothing is unlikely here."

"It's just bigger and more complex than what you're used to. I was lost when I first got here. But it's just people being people, only with a lot more enthusiasm. Well, that's settled. Let's get you ready to go."

ELSE WAS AMUSED. HERE HE WAS, ENTERING THE GREAT REARing ugly limestone Bruglioni stronghold through the front gate. Rogoz left him there. "You want me to wait, Hecht?"

"Be a waste of your time, wouldn't it? I can find my way home."

“Take care, then. Some of these Bruglioni are creepy people." Sayag did not mind the Bruglioni sentry overhearing.

"You get used to creepy people."

Rogoz sneered and went away.

Else followed the sentry into the Bruglioni citadel. That man turned him over to a nervous, skinny, short, shaggy little man who told him, "My name is Polo. I'm supposed to assist you as long as you're here. You shouldn't ever forget that I work for Paludan Bruglioni. You'll see him in a minute."

Else considered his surroundings. Seedy described it in one quick, all-encapsulating word. No effort was being made to keep the place up. It felt creepy, as though the last fugitive tendrils of the night had not been harried out of this one corner of Brothe.

"Is the Don a sorcerer?"

Polo squeaked in surprise.

"He's not?"

"No. If you mean Paludan. But that isn't it. Nobody calls him the Don. Much as he'd love that"

"Really? Why not?"

Polo looked around for something lurking in the shadows. "You aren't Brothen, are you?"

"Not even Firaldian. Why?"

"Don is a title of respect. Given only to those who earn it. From here," smacking his chest over his heart. “To the one who leads. By those who follow. Do you understand that?"

"Yes." A similar tradition existed among the tribesmen of Peqaa and other remote regions of the Realm of Truth. Polo meant that the Bruglioni household did not consider Paludan Bruglioni a man who deserved to be called Don. "I do. Do I need to make a special effort with my appearance?"

"Nobody would notice. You're just another tradesman. One who uses a sword instead of a trowel or a hammer."

This half-ghostly Polo was nursing a grudge against his employers.

What Else had learned about the Bruglioni while serving the Arniena had not impressed him. But he had not drawn as bleak a picture as Polo and the Bruglioni headquarters suggested.

Was Polo some sort of provocateur?

This was no life a man ought to live, every waking moment spent wrestling paranoia about the motives of everyone around you. Yet paranoia was bedrock beneath this mission. He could not survive without it.

Later, Else said, “Tell me something, Polo. You said Paludan Bruglioni isn't a sorcerer. Is anyone else? I feel the darkness. Like there's an aspect of the Instrumentalities close to us."

"Others have said the same, sir. Possibly because the Bruglioni are so devoutly determined to have nothing to do with dark powers. They try to ignore their existence. Divino Bruglioni had to leave home when he chose the path that led him to become a member of the Collegium. They say they refuse to surrender to the Will of the Night."

The world could be confusing when the only truth available was the certainty that people would lie to you.

"Time to see the man," Polo announced.

Else narrowed his focus. He became Piper Hecht, wanderer from the farthest marches of the Chaldarean world, an experienced soldier eager to find service in one of the great houses of Brothe.

ELSE MADE A STRONG EFFORT TO SOUND HONEST. “THIS WASN'T my idea. Don Inigo convinced me. He says he owes you, that you've suffered cruel reverses, and he wants to help. Also, he said that I have a better chance of getting ahead with the Bruglioni than with the Arniena." Rogoz Sayag had advised him to appeal to the natural Bruglioni arrogance.

Paludan Bruglioni muttered, "That makes sense."

Paludan Bruglioni was a handsome, darkly complexioned man with a heavy black mustache. He had begun to lose his hair. He was heavy without being fat. His eyes seemed lifeless, though that could be due to the emotional beating he had taken lately. His head was egg-shaped, with the thin end down. His ears lay close. His overall appearance suggested a man in his middle fifties.

Paludan Bruglioni was a decade younger. The lamplight did not betray the floridity caused by prolonged, excessive drinking, or the scars left by the pustules from a disease picked up in Brothe's sporting houses. He had a reputation for vanity and, supposedly, wore a mask when he went out.

By lamplight he was a handsome, wealthy gentleman who was slightly tipsy. He might be in a bad mood for no immediately obvious reason.

"You're saying you want to step into my nephew Saldi's boots as a favor to Inigo Arniena?"

"The Don was good to me. He took me in when my prospects seemed bleak and he couldn't afford to pay what I'm worth. By sending me here he feels he's doing favors for you and me both."

Paludan scowled. Was there any chance that the man was as shallow and dull as he appeared?

Bruglioni glanced at the two men there with him, neither of whom had been introduced. One, though, had to be an uncle or older first cousin. He looked like an older Paludan. The other was pale, had graying ginger hair and a pallid, lantern-jawed death's-head face more ravaged than Paludan's.

Neither man spoke.

Else assumed the death's-head to be Gervase Saluda, Paludan's lifelong friend and reputed right hand.

Else said, "I would've been happy where I was. Don Inigo is the sort of master men in my line dream about. But I had higher ambitions when I left Tusnet. In Duarnenia the future is fixed. Sooner or later, you'll die in the Grand Marshes. Slowly and in great pain if the Sheard get hold of you. The pagans proclaim the tyranny of the night in the daytime. They celebrate their surrender to the will of the night."

Paludan smiled. Death's-head consulted something in front of him. "You were with Grade Drocker and the Brotherhood during the Church's adventure in the Connec last year?"

"Yes. I was on my way to Brothe when I encountered a Brotherhood band recruiting mercenaries near Ralli."

"Where they quarry the marble."

"Yes. A Brotherhood captain named Veld Arnvolker was in charge. I'd accumulated some traveling companions on the road, mostly boys and runaways. They thought they wanted to be soldiers. It would be all romance and adventure. The Brotherhood offered good training, good pay, and what looked like a chance to show them the truth without them having to get killed finding it out. So when the kids wanted to sign on, I went-along."

"And it was all too good to be true."

"Yes. Because fate jumped in right away."

"It'll do that. Especially if things start going good.”

"We got sent to the Connec. Idiot orders from the Patriarch and a brain-dead local bishop got my kids all killed. Only a few of us got out alive. Mostly Brotherhood guys, of course. You'd figure, wouldn't you? And the bigwigs, naturally.

"That's how life works."

"It does. But it's not right. Anyway, there I was, on my own again. For a whole damned month before I even heard that Grade Drocker, who was supposed to be in charge. You know, I never saw that asshole once. Him and his Brotherhood buddies ran downriver, grabbed a ship and escaped by sea. Leaving the rest of us to look out for ourselves."

The skull-faced man said, "Several survivors of the Connecten adventure were involved the night we lost Gildeo, Acato, Saldi, and me others. Did you know that?"

"No. I don't know much about that. Just rumors. I never knew for sure which Brothers made it back. I don't want anything to do with those people. One exposure was enough."

"Why wouldn't you be interested in the incident? If you wanted to work here?"

"I didn't want to. Not then. And it didn't affect the Arniena until Don Inigo saw the Bruglioni in tough circumstances and decided to show his regard for them."

Paludan asked, "You admit you're a mercenary? That what you're interested in is personal advancement?"

"Sure. Why wouldn't I? The way I'll get ahead is to be dedicated and loyal and do the best job I can. Don Inigo had my complete devotion. The Bruglioni will get it if you hire me. If Don Inigo had released me I might have left Brothe. Vondera Koterba is recruiting in Alameddine. He's offering particularly good terms. But Don Inigo asked me to come here. So here I am. I'll serve you till you release me or send me elsewhere."

What Else said encapsulated the supposed philosophy of the mercenary brotherhood in Firaldia. But it was just talk. Mercenaries and employers alike acknowledged the ideals only when it was convenient.

It was not a time when large, permanent bands, captained by famous professionals, contracted as units. The last notorious company ended with the destruction of Adolf Black's regiment in the Black Mountain Massacre.

"Why should we trust you?"

"You shouldn't. I'm no different than any other prospective employee. You have to ask yourself, how can I hurt you?" According to Pinkus Ghort and others who had soldiered in Firaldia, Else understood that he had to conduct this interview on the paranoid edge. Firaldians who hired people to fight for them were often naive. Many fighters for hire were naive, too. And no one trusted anyone.

Fortunes, loyalties, allegiances, all shifted quickly in modern Firaldia. Treachery was a fact of life. For some, it was a way of life.

Insofar as Else Tage could see, the Firaldian Peninsula was where insanity went to retire. Nothing there made sense except at the most shallow level.

Paludan Bruglioni said, "Gervase?"

"Inigo Arniena and Salny Sayag recommend him so highly, you'd almost have to suspect them of wanting to get rid of him."

The third man said, "The Arniena have been having trouble meeting financial obligations because of the pirate raids."

Paludan grunted. "Those have hurt everybody."

"Them worse than anybody but the Benedocto. They aren't getting their rents or fees."

"Is that true, Hecht? Are they trying to reduce their expenses?"

"I don't know. There was talk that things aren't going well. But nothing concrete. Oh. There was something about selling an island. In the Vieran Sea. To the Sonsans. The Scoveletti family, I think. There's some kind of marital connection."

That got some attention. "Sogyal?" Paludan asked. "They're considering turning loose of Sogyal? Ha-ha!"

Rogoz had said that a mention of selling that island might seal the deal. Else did not know why. "I don't know. They didn't talk about it when I was around. I overheard by accident I think it's a big secret that's supposed to stay secret even after the deal is done. There's a lot of worry about Dateon and Aparion finding out too soon."

"Ha! Sogyal. Those fools never have understood how valuable that island is."

Paludan Bruglioni launched a long, rambling tale of treachery, marriages of convenience, more treachery, dowries, and even more treachery, that put a particularly well-located and easily defended island into the hands of the Arniena halfway through the previous century. Sogyal was so strategically located that the Patriarch, both Emperors, all three mercantile republics, and several lesser kings and dukes had tried to buy it. The Arniena would not sell. Their intransigence had led to unsuccessful attempts to take the island by force as Dateon and Aparion strove toward supremacy on the Vieran Sea.

Else just nodded, tried to look wise, and observed, "All Firaldian stories are long on treachery."

"This's wonderful news," Paludan said. "We can profit from knowing this. Gervase, Hecht looks like the man we want. Work out the details and get him set up. Let him have Polo permanently."

ELSE SPENT A DAY ROAMING THE BRUGLIONI CITADEL. NOTHing was off limits. "You don't want to go down there, though," Polo told Else when he considered a descent into the cellars.

"Thought I could go anywhere."

"You can. I'm just hoping you won't."

"Why not? What's down there?"

"Dirt and cobwebs and bad smells. Maybe a haunt or two. Nothing you'd want to find. Then a long climb back up."

"You're sure about that, Polo?"

"There're childhood fears, too. The boogerman lives down there."

"The boogerman is real, Polo. If you're in the wrong place, at the wrong time, and you're not ready for the boogerman, you can find yourself in a world of trouble. It happens all the time where I come from."

"This is Brothe, sir. This city exists because the Instrumentalities of the Night are real. You don't have to convince Brothens."

Else did descend the long stair.

The Bruglioni cellars could have come straight out of a spooky story. They had cobwebs, vermin, slime in places, puddles of seepage, and an impressive range of unpleasant odors.

And a few minor, unhappy spirits, hidden in the reservoirs of darkness.

Else soon understood Polo's reluctance to face the return climb.

Polo puffed and told him, "In olden times the whole city had cellars under it Still does, actually. Some way down deeper than this. Every ten or fifteen years there's a cave-in somewhere when part of the underground collapses because of what all has been piled on top since."

"Bet some interesting antiquities turn up when that happens."

"The antiquities were all looted in antiquity. They never find anything but dead people. Some of them old-timers but mostly ones that haven't been dead long at all."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning there's a class of Brothen who use the old catacombs. For shelter. And to hide bodies they don't want to turn up in the Teragi or an alley somewhere. Any loot down there will be something stolen in the last few days that is cooling off."

First glimpse of another side of the city, Else thought. A side that was always there, in every city, though always more so where the state was weaker. A side that had to exist so that there would be men to condemn to the galleys or the mines.

PALUDAN BRUGLIONI SUMMONED ELSE TO AN EVENING MEETing four days after his arrival. Bruglioni's quarters were austere enough for a monk.

Several Bruglioni youngsters, with bodyguards, were there to meet the new man, whose as yet ill-defined duties included teaching them how not to end up like their kinsmen in the Madhur Plaza. The bodyguards did not look comfortable. Only a glance was needed to see that they were not what they pretended.

Paludan and Gervase Saluda made no introductions. The senior Bruglioni asked, "Have you been using your time wisely, Hecht?"

"That's a subjective question, but I think so. I've been getting to know this place and the people who make it work."

"I've seem him," one of the young Bruglioni sneered. "Always with the cooks and servants. There's a valuable pastime for a warrior."

"If you'd known your staff you might have recognized Father Obilade's inconsistent behavior beforehand. In which case, those who perished in the Madhur Plaza wouldn't have been there in the first place. The man you discount, overlook, or take for granted will be the man who brings you down."

"Be quiet," Paludan told his youngsters. "You're here to learn, nothing more." The rage that drove him was close to the surface tonight.

The kid who had mouthed off was not yet sixteen. Dugo Bruglioni was a grandson of Soneral Bruglioni and the son of the oldest Bruglioni slain in the Madhur Plaza. Dugo bullied the staff. And did not do much else.

The help dared not fight back. Jobs were scarce and precious.

Paludan continued, "I don't want to hear anybody talk. Hecht. How well do you know the city?"

"Not well at all, sir. The Arniena gave me no chance to explore. My role in their scheme was defense and instruction."

"Learn your way around. Without attracting attention."

"Yes, sir." He was being told to go live his secret dreams, with pay.

"You worked with the Brotherhood in the Connec. Did you develop a passion for their ways?"

"None whatsoever. They're arrogant, self-important fools. They deserved what they got Though they were executing orders from the Patriarch. Which got modified every five minutes by the Bishop of Antieux. Serifs was such an idiot that nobody who didn't know him will believe the truth. I hear Principatй Doneto had him thrown off a cliff because he was such a miserable excuse for a priest."

"I've heard that rumor myself," Gervase said. "But it isn't true. Bishop Serifs did die in a fall, but while trying to escape from a Braunsknechts officer after he'd been captured by the Emperor's men. His death really was an accident"

"Really?" Else said. "That is interesting."

"Rumors make everything more exciting."

Paludan asked, "So you have no love for the Brotherhood of War?"

"None. As an organization. There were individuals I found likable. Why?"

"The Brotherhood murdered six Bruglioni. Including my only sons, Acato and Gildeo. And several nephews, one of them the family's hope for the future. If I fall down dead right now, Dugo will take over. And would ignore you and Gervase. And would put the family down the shitter in a year. Unless one of our country cousins has sense enough to cut his throat"

Else said, "It may not fit the Bruglioni way but I have a suggestion."

Paludan brightened dramatically. He did entertain genuine worries about the Bruglioni future. “Tell me."

"Change the rules. Call in the best Bruglioni who've left the city."

Paludan grunted, gave Else a dark look.

Else said, "See who's doing the job out there. Bring them back where their competence can do the most good."

Paludan and Gervase stared at Else like he was a genius talking with the mouth of a fool. Because there was a tacit understanding that Bruglioni who left the city freed themselves from their Brothen obligations.

Paludan said, "That has possibilities, Hecht. I'll consider it." With condescension. “Tell us how to avenge ourselves on the Brotherhood."

"What? Revenge? The men responsible are dead."

Paludan scowled at Else, possibly wondering why he was ignorant one moment and well informed the next. Was he not supposed to know? What about the heads? How about what the priest went through before he fell into the Teragi a half mile upstream from Castella dollas Pontellas? Everyone in the Bruglioni citadel knew all that. Which meant the details would be common knowledge outside the citadel, too.

Else said, "In your place, I'd worry more about protecting myself from the Brotherhood."

"That's a good point, Paludan," Gervase said. "We don't want to get into a war with them."

Else suggested, "Give them the men who did the killing. Say they exceeded their orders."

"That's what they did do. They were just supposed to grab Rodrigo Cologni. So my boys could rescue Rodrigo from them. But the Brotherhood turned up. And Obilade's patsies had minds of their own. They were like supernatural monsters. Anyway, I couldn't give them up if I wanted. Obilade was the only one who knew how to get in touch."

Gervase said, "We're not going to have any choice about bringing family in from the country, Paludan. We need more people here with a stake in keeping family secrets."

Paludan whined, "What happened? Ten minutes ago I was busting with plans. I was going to make Sublime ache. Now I'm facing a potential siege. I'm surrounded by people I can't trust."

Gordimer the Lion's predecessor had used similar words to describe his own situation before his fall. Else said, "Don't change your goals. Just change your plans to reflect your strengths and weaknesses."

Gervase observed, "We have more weaknesses than strengths. We haven't kept our swords sharp."

Else said, “To plan, we need to know what our adversaries might be thinking. We need to know who our potential adversaries are. We need an honest assessment of our own strength. And firmly established goals."

"Meaning?"

"We need to find out what the Brotherhood, the Cologni, the Patriarch, and the Collegium are up to. We need to know how they see the Bruglioni. You have an uncle in the Collegium. He has friends. The Bruglioni have a tradition of being major players on the Brothen stage. You have vast resources. Get them catalogued. Imagine what can be done with them."

Else sensed that Paludan had received no training for the position he held. He was faking it and hoping for the best.

Paludan said, "Gervase, follow up on what Hecht's saying. Real life seems to be closing in. Dugo, boys, come with me." Paludan rose.

Dugo protested, "We were going out to …"

"Be quiet. Weren't you listening? People who have a grudge against us are probably planning to do something about it. I don't want you out where they can get you. Come along."

Dugo pouted. It looked like he would have to survive a harsh, close call before he started listening.

GERVASE SALUDA SAID, "IF MY CHIN KEEPS HITTING MY CHEST it's because I just witnessed the longest run of intelligent, responsible thinking ever seen from Paludan Bruglioni."

"Oh?" Else said.

"Until Acato and Gildeo were killed he spouted the same nonsense as Dugo. Which is why Dugo was all confused."

"How did he keep the family going, then?"

"Inertia. And he hasn't. Not well. He never really had to be responsible, growing up. He's always let things ride while he had a good time. He got away with it until the disaster in the Madhur Plaza."

"The world caught up?"

"It didn't change who he is but it did make him realize that there're challenges beyond just seeing if he can't bed more women than his father did. Even so, he passed the work on to us. He has no faith in himself."

"And?"

"You have to understand. Besides his character shortcomings, Paludan just isn't very bright. He isn't subtle. His preferred solution to any problem is to hit it with a hammer."

"The way Dugo would."

"The way Dugo would. Though now it seems he's started to catch on. He knows that he has to start doing the right thing. For the family's sake. Meantime, his major adviser, which would be me, might not be any smarter or subtler."

"Really?"

"My genius and my gullibility got us into this. Sylvie Obilade manipulated me. I sold Paludan on the priest. Like his ideas were mine. I thought Obilade wanted the best for the Bruglioni."

"Maybe he did."

"Sure, he did. He was a good priest. But he wanted to be something more. He wanted to make the Church all-powerful, temporally as well as spiritually."

"That doesn't sound exciting." Dreanger was not terrible but there were smaller principalities within the Realm of Peace where religious rule smothered everything.

"We need to make peace with the Church over Father Obilade."

"Being a country boy from the far frontiers I'm obviously missing some critical local angle. Six members of the Bruglioni household were killed. The priest caused that. The men who murdered them were killed themselves."

"So you think the scales are balanced?"

"Yes, actually."

"The Church wouldn't agree. If Church people screw you you're supposed to take it with a smile and beg for more because it feels so good."

"This will take getting used to." It might be the sort of thing he could use to stir confusion and distract the Patriarch from organizing a new crusade. "I need to know Brothe better. Like Paludan said. Even taking into account the natural arrogance of people who believe God speaks with their mouths, there's a lot of flawed thinking in this city."

"Going out there could be dangerous."

"How? Even if word is out that I've been hired nobody knows what I look like except a few Arniena. And they're on our side."

"I don't know."

"Uhm?"

"I'm not sure we should trust anybody out there, right now. I'm not sure why Paludan and I decided Rodrigo Cologni would defect. Father Obilade probably sold us. We know that wasn't true, now. Rodrigo kept faith."

“Treachery is the most popular sport in town. I'll learn what I can, outside. You get Paludan to decide what he wants to accomplish so we can start planning. Find out if he wants to hire real swords. Those bodyguards were make-believe."

"I don't think he'll stand for the extra expense. Right now we're completely clear on who to blame if anything goes wrong."

"I'll do my utmost to ensure that your faith in me is justified."

Else parted with Saluda still unsure of the man. Was he bright or dim? Was he manipulating Paludan Bruglioni? Was he Paludan's dedicated friend?

BROTHE WAS UNIQUE AMONG CITIES ELSE HAD KNOWN. IT showed its age much more than did even the oldest pities of Dreanger. There were ruins everywhere. In Dreanger they cleared the old away in favor of the new. In Dreanger the surviving ruins were not inside cities, they were out in the deserts and mountains and, as it had been from the most archaic times, they were occupied only by the dead.

The priests who had tended them had been massacred by Josephus Alegiant a thousand years ago. Alegiant's successors had been massacred in turn by warriors of the Praman Conquest five hundred years later.

Reminders of the glory days of the Old Empire were everywhere, usually overgrown by creeping vines and brush. Remnants of triumphal arches still spanned the streets. Weeds and brush grew atop them. Else wondered where the soil came from.

Today's Brothe stood on ground ten to twenty feet higher than it had been in antiquity. In places the old low ground lay buried even deeper.

In Brothe the past was as omnipresent and intrusive as the Instrumentalities of the Night in the Holy Lands. It meant more here than elsewhere. Brothe's yesterdays defined its todays.

Sublime enjoyed local popular support because people thought he might resurrect the ancient glories.

In Brothe even the poorest of the native poor worshipped the city's past glories. And seemed indifferent to its present.

Yesterday's toppled memorials loomed large in the lives of squatters and drifters.

Poverty was ubiquitous, too. But that did not touch Else. Poverty and misery were the natural state of humanity wherever he went.

ELSE STROLLED AROUND IN WHAT HE HOPED LOOKED LIKE random rambles. He noticed no obvious tail. Which might mean that someone with superb skills had been assigned to track him. Or someone with a supernatural assist.

He did not count on his new employer not to spy on him. He would never allow a stranger deep into his world as easily as he had gotten into that of the Bruglioni.

Else drew dark looks wherever he went. He did not understand. He did note that other foreigners drew equally malignant attention, though.

He had been on his own a long time. Had he forgotten a critical detail of his contact regime? Could life's vicissitudes have claimed Gordimer's local agents? He knew no names, just places to visit. The embassy of the Kaif of al-Minphet was to be approached only in extreme circumstance. A sailor's tavern on the riverfront, as far downstream as you could go and still be inside the wall, was just too far away. The only convenient contact resided inside the Devedian quarter.

Brothe was a vast sprawl south of the Teragi. It seemed to go on forever.

"Hey, Pipe! Piper Hecht! How the hell you doing, asshole?"

Pinkus Ghort jogged across the street, dodging between donkeys and camels, oxcarts, dog carts, and goat carts. Brothe's streets were busier than those of al-Qarn. And twice as ripe. Little effort was made to clean up after the animals. Else had seen some amazing shit drifts.

"Ghort! You been following me?"

"No. Shit Man. It's pure coincidence. I was just heading over to the … How the hell are you doing?"

"As good as could be hoped, I guess."

"They get you in over there yet?"

"In?"

"The Bruglioni thing."

Curious. "They don't keep you in the know?"

"I've been out of town. There was a problem up the road that Doneto needed handled. I got back last night. So are you in?"

"I think. I'm worried about how easy it was, though. I can't believe anybody is as dimwitted as those people let on."

"Believe it. This is the town where dumb comes to stay. Two-thirds of them still think they rule the world. Basically, the whole damn town has their heads up their asses.”

"I'll take your word for that."

"We need to work out a way to communicate."

"I know where the Principatй lives."

"How do we get a message to you?"

Else considered briefly. "I can't imagine an instance where you'd need to. Can you?"

"Uh … Maybe you're right. But you'll have to make contact sometime. Just so we can keep each other posted."

Ghort had a point. Ghort was supposed to be his eyes inside Doneto's establishment. "That shouldn't be hard. I don't suffer from excessive supervision. My job hasn't been defined yet. Paludan wants to hurt the Brotherhood because he thinks they killed his sons. Gervase is afraid the Brotherhood might come after the Bruglioni because of what happened to their men."

Ghort eyed Else's head. "You going to do something about your hair?"

"What? Why? Like what?"

"Half the nasty folks in Brothe are looking for big foreigners with long blond hair. Two were involved in the debacle you just mentioned. If they get close and bother to think, they'll know you aren't who they're looking for. But suppose you run into idiots?"

"Well. Now I know why I keep getting those evil looks."

"Those are probably just because you're you."

"No doubt. I have work to do. I'll see you sometime."

For a moment Ghort looked hurt. "Yeah. Later."

"Say hi to Bo and Joe. And Pig Iron."

"Yeah."

Else got away before Ghort could delay him. Principatй Doneto was not going to be pleased. He had given Ghort very little about the Bruglioni and nothing about the Arniena.

Let the man stew.

Else wandered aimlessly. Just in case. No point leading Ghort to one of his contacts. He listened to people. He heard little but everyday arguments, whining, complaints and indifference to squabbles on high. The politics that mattered at street level involved next meals. And Colors.

There was a great deal of anticipation of something called the Summer Invitational Games, when chariot racing teams from throughout Chaldarean Firaldia would participate in a huge elimination contest. The Colors would be out in strength, then.

Else's ramble took him to the south bank of the Teragi River, half a mile above the place where Father Obilade had been introduced to the Sacred Flood. In pre-Chaldarean times the river had been considered a goddess in its own right, harboring within her bosom a host of spirits, some quite wicked, all of which had to be appeased. The goddess was gone, now, but not so all of the dark sprites and nymphs and water horses who had attended her.

The Brothen ancients had done well, coming to terms with the Instrumentalities of the Night. The entire waterfront had been built up in a way that revealed ages of complete confidence that the river would not get out of control. Embankments constructed of huge blocks of dressed stone rose high enough that the water level could rise another twenty-five feet before there was a need to worry.

Else strolled downriver, along the top of the embankment, admiring the work of the ancient engineers. He was confident today's Brothens couldn't manage anything like this, if only for lack of will and energy. He had sensed a paucity of those commodities in the modern tribe.

He was impressed by the bridges, both in their number and their engineering. Each was a monument likely to last forever. And there was nowhere one had to walk more than a third of a mile to make a crossing. Above Castella dollas Pontellas, as it turned out.

The whole would have been immensely picturesque. Without the swarms of people and animals and vehicles clattering the picture.

Else settled himself on a stone block atop the embankment, at a point where he could see Krois on its stone-faced island, the Castella dollas Pontellas and its six little bridges arching over an arm of the Teragi that served as its moat, and farther left, the immense, massive dignity of the Chiaro Palace, the spiritual heart of the Episcopal strain of Chaldareanism. His was a vantage sought by many. When Else sat down he did so amongst a dozen fellow spectators who were besieged by street vendors selling purported holy souvenirs, hot sausages, and sweet cakes.

Sitting there, those three grand structures so close he could make out the streaks of pigeon droppings down their dun flanks, Else first felt some awe of western civilization. What were these buildings but the greatest ghosts of the glory that had been?

The fortress Krois, out in the midst of the flood, had stood there for twelve centuries. It began construction before the birth of the oldest of the Chaldarean founders. It had been decreed by a Brothen emperor uninterested in becoming the victim of the mob, after that had befallen several of his most immediate predecessors. A later emperor, in the end days of the Old Empire, bequeathed Krois to me Church.

It was the first legacy of the thousands responsible for creating the mad hodgepodge of states constituting today's Firaldia.

Else watched the boats and barges go up and down, enjoying the subtle changes in the view as the sun limped westward and the light altered, growing more golden.

"Piper Hecht?"

Else started, spun toward the unexpected voice, noting that the other sightseers had disappeared.

"Sainted Eis," somebody growled. “This asshole is jumpy."

Else faced four armed men, one of whom he recognized. "Sergeant Bechter? You scared the shit out of me, sneaking up like that. So. You were lucky. You got out with Drocker?"

"I'm a survivor. Evidently, you are, too."

"I got out with Principatй Doneto. Frying pan to the fire kind of thing. We got snapped up by Hansel's men in Ormienden, somewhere up there. They kept us locked up in Plemenza until Sublime decided to ransom his cousin. What's up?"

"Reports came in about a blond foreigner watching the Castella. They sent us to check it out."

"I was just enjoying the view. I mean, look at that. What's going on? Why the paranoia?"

"How long have you been here? In Brothe, not on the rock."

“Ten, twelve days. It kind of runs together. Today was my first chance to get out on my own. I was just relaxing and watching the barges go by and feeling homesick. What's up?"

"Did you hear about the Brothers getting murdered a while back?"

Else lifted himself back up onto the block of stone. "Join me in my parlor, here. Swap lies with me about all the fun we had putting down the heretics in the Connec."

Bechter got the idea. He came and sat. "You do know what's going on, don't you?"

"Not really. Local politics are too twisted. I don't see much that makes sense."

"Here's one for old time's sake, Hecht. Let's don't bullshit each other."

"Ouch! This doesn't sound good at all."

"Oh, it's gooder for you than it would've been if you were the guy we were hoping you'd be."

Else glanced back. "Do they have to hover? Can't we talk, just you and me?"

After consideration, Bechter said, "I'll take a chance on you, Hecht."

ELSE GOT PALUDAN BRUGLIONI AND GERVASE SALUDA TO SEE him when he returned to the Bruglioni citadel. "I think I've managed a coup. I hope you weren't so set on a war that you'll be angry with me."

“Talk to me," Paludan said. He was in a foul mood, his supposed natural state.

"I ran into somebody I knew from the Connecten campaign. He belongs to the Brotherhood of War. We talked. I made him understand what the Bruglioni think happened the night Rodrigo Cologni was kidnapped."

Paludan seemed puzzled, Gervase, amazed. "Go on, miracle worker." Was he sarcastic or serious?

"Here's the thing." Else explained what he had done in boring detail, without mentioning Pinkus Ghort "Bechter is a good man, despite his affiliation. He's trustworthy. I told him the truth as seen from here. He told me theirs. Turns out the big question troubling his bunch is how to lay hands on some mysterious blond foreigners. They thought the Bruglioni might be hiding the outlanders. I set Becker straight. He believed me because he knew me from the Connec."

Both Paludan and Gervase scowled.

Else told them, "You'll recall that I suggested giving up the men you'd hired."

Gervase snarled, "The point, Hecht."

"The Brotherhood just wants those two men. If you could tell them more about those two, there'd be peace between the Brotherhood and the Bruglioni."

"And the Lord God Himself shall step down from Heaven and kiss each of us upon the lips – before he rolls us over and gives us a good old buttfucking," Gervase said.

"No doubt. But not today. Look, It's a way out."

"Awful convenient, though. Your first walk through the city, you run into an old pal from the wars."

"You religious, Gervase?"

"As religious as I need to be to get by."

"I thought so. Pretty much my attitude, too. But I've found that you can't go wrong by assuming that life is tainted by the Will of the Night."

"You saying supernatural forces are at work?"

"Always. But, in this case, yes, especially. Otherwise, why can't the Brotherhood find those men? Bechter said they get sighting reports all the time but when they check them out there's no further trace. Where I come from we'd think that means they're protected by the Instrumentalities of the Night. The Collegium itself might not be able to ferret them out"

"But the Collegium doesn't care. Not right now. Are you suggesting that we try to reach an accommodation with the Brotherhood?"

Else thought he had made that clear. "You've got nothing to lose."

ELSE FELT GOOD. IT HAD BEEN A PRODUCTIVE DAY. HE HAD MADE himself useful, though Paludan was not yet ready to see that.

In an ideal world he would get everyone thinking he was doing great things. Which would get him established. But an outbreak of peace amongst Brothe's factions would not serve the needs of Dreanger.

Else's quarters consisted of one large room subdivided into three by hanging quilts. He slept in a space no grander than a monk's cell. Polo slept in an even smaller area beyond their common area. That constituted half the total space. The dividers were old and ragged and did little to provide any privacy. They did keep heat from a little charcoal burner confined to the center room. Else stepped in from the passageway. "Polo? You here?" Someone groaned behind Polo's quilts. "Yes, sir. What time is it? What do you need?"

"Were you away from here while I was out?"

"I went out to get charcoal, candles, an ink stone, pens, inks, and such. As you instructed. I couldn't find any paper. The papermaker in Naftali Square is out of stock." Polo slipped his head through an overlap between quilts.

"You don't need to get up. I asked because somebody's gone through my things. I don't think anything is missing."

After a noise like a mouse's squeak, Polo joked, "They wasted their time, didn't they?"

"Yes. I'm going to bed."

Else lay back on his rough mattress, a canvas bag filled with wheat and oat husks. He pondered Polo's response.

It did not seem appropriate, assuming the news was a surprise.

PALUDAN AND GERVASE SALUDAN DID NOT KNOW WMT THEY wanted Else to do. They had felt a need to do something. Hiring him had presented itself. But there was no way he could replace all the hired swords who had deserted.

Else asked to have his duties defined. He was told to protect the house. Without being given specifics. All by bis lonesome.

He prowled the citadel, putting on a show. The place was in poor repair and dirty. The staff were slothful and sloppy.

Polo remained close by, most of the time. Else had him pinch paper from the Bruglioni business office. They created a chart of who was responsible for what Of who was in charge where. Else was an energetic administrator, though he disliked that side of soldiering. He let himself go, now.

The Bruglioni citadel was vast. And poorly designed for its fortress function. Though what could be seen from beyond the perimeter wall was forbidding. Where the gargoyles and whatnot had not fallen off. There were other buildings inside the wall. Stables and tool sheds and so forth. The main structure included one hundred and twenty rooms on four floors. Few, off the ground floor, were of much size or magnificence. The current Bruglioni were not into ostentatious display. The family could no longer afford it.

The family proceeded entirely on past momentum under Paludan. He was not stupid. He lacked drive. He was content to let life slide by. Unless his anger broke through. Then he might do something unwise. Like trying to stage a kidnapping and rescue.

Following two days of review, from which he took time off only to drill the younger Bruglioni in the use of arms, Else summoned the senior household staff to a meeting in the kitchen. Nine deigned to appear, along with a few gawkers.

One of the nine was the chief of the four men who guarded the two gates used to get into and out of the citadel. Else told him, "Mr. Caniglia, you and your men are not to allow Mr. Copria, Mr. Grazia, or Mr. Verga to enter the citadel tomorrow." Only a handful of staff lived on the premises. Paludan did not want to feed and house and pay them, too. “They no longer work here. The rest of you, think about who should take over. Let me know tomorrow. Mr. Natta? You want to volunteer to test the jobs market yourself? No? Mr. Montale. I understand that you find new staff when they're needed."

"Uh… Yes, sir. For the household. Not for the people on the business side. Not for anything to do with weapons or body guarding."

"New staff will be needed soon. We're about to shed our nonproducers. How many here now are your relatives? Do any of them actually do anything?"

Montale hemmed and hawed and talked around the edges. Else interrupted. "They won't lose their jobs. If they do them. Would any of you argue that this place isn't a slum? We're going to change that. We have enough people. We start today. Anyone who's been getting a free ride and doesn't want to give it up can take the option pioneered by Mr. Copria, Mr. Grazia, and Mr. Verga. Name a devil. Here's Mr. Grazia."

Grazia was a short, fat man with fat lips and a natural tonsure. The little hair that he did retain was red, lightly touched with gray. Humorists wondered whether his hair would all disappear before the remnants grayed.

Grazia puffed, "Sorry I'm late. There was a crisis."

Some eavesdropper had brought warning.

"Better late than never." The foreigner expected to separate Grazia from his job anyway, in time. "We'll look at your books when we're done here. We haven't been getting the most out of our budget"

Grazia turned a pasty gray.

"Mr. Negrone. Mr. Pagani. General cleaning and upkeep seem to fall within your purview. Brainstorm me some ideas on how to get this place cleaned up, fixed up, and painted, employing a tribe used to taking paid naps and putting in ten-hour shifts playing cards. Madam Ristoti?"

The cook's kitchen was the one bright spot Else had found. She said, "Call me Carina. I have some ideas."

"Excellent, Madam Ristoti. One and all. We're going to be more formal with one another. That will put our work on a businesslike footing. Now. Madam. Your ideas, please."

In the area of managing the backstairs Madam Ristoti possessed a field marshal's mind.

Else gave her three minutes. "Excellent. You're in charge of everything. You can manage that and the kitchen both? Mr. Negrone? You want to take issue?"

Else gave Negrone equal time. Then, "In other words, you have no suggestions. You just object to Madam Ristoti's proposals because she's a woman.”

"That's putting it baldly …"

"There won't be any beating around the bush anymore. Mr. Grazia, I assume you know what everyone gets paid. How much will Mr. Negrone not be taking home if he finds himself unemployed?"

Negrone mumbled something before Grazia could respond.

Else said, "There isn't going to be any debate. If you think there's a better way to do things, tell me. Convince me. If people won't cooperate, tell me. I'll break arms and kick butts. Or instruct Mr. Caniglia not to let them in. So. Let's start. Go figure out how to make this ruin fit for human habitation. Not you, Mr. Grazia. You stay here with me."

Mr. Grazia was not happy.

Later, Else said, "Mr. Grazia, I'm pretty sure you've heard all about Father Obilade."

"Yes."

"You're aware that Paludan Bruglioni tends to overreact when he gets angry?"

"Yes, sir."

"Find a way to put the money back. In the meantime, you'll be my number-one guy around here. Because I have your stones in a vice."

"Yes, sir."

"I hope the others will be as reasonable. Go to work, Mr. Grazia." Else headed for the kitchens. Polo was there, listening to the Ristoti woman.

Caniglia and another man intercepted him. Their expressions were so dark he feared they planned something stupid. But Caniglia said, "A runner left a message for you with Diano."

The other man extended a folded letter. Else said, "I see the seal fell off."

Caniglia grunted.

Else asked, "Why so grim?"

"Some people you told us not to let back in got nasty when I told them. They said they'd be even nastier if I tried to keep them from coming in tomorrow."

"I'll deal with that."

That did not improve Caniglia's mood. That was not the answer he wanted.

"WHO'S THE LETTER FROM?" POLO ASKED. ELSE SAT WITH HIS back against the wall in the common space of their quarters.

"A woman I knew a long time ago. Anna Mozilla. A widow who moved to Brothe a few months ago. She heard I was here. She wants me to know she's here, too. I guess that means she isn't mad at me anymore."

Polo chuckled. "Is this a good story?"

"Not really. She's a widow, but too young to give up the more intimate practices of marriage. At least, she was. And must still be."

"Her turning up mean trouble?"

"I doubt it. Just the opposite, I hope."

"OPEN UP," ELSE TOLD CANIGLIA. "LET'S SEE WHO'S ON TIME for work."

Caniglia opened the servants' postern, which had not been closed and locked for years. Not even after Father Obilade's treason. Paludan was almost willfully blind to anything that he did not want to be true.

Caniglia and young Diano put on a show, allowing the staff in one at a time. Each got a quick visual once-over to see what they were carrying. Which told Else that they had turned a blind eye to that in the past. And, probably, more so when the staff were leaving.

Else wished he understood accounting better. Mr. Grazia's books almost certainly contained more amazing and damning evidence than he could ferret out himself.

What would Paludan's attitude be? He seemed the sort who disdained literacy and ciphering. Though that attitude was less prevalent than Else had expected, based on past encounters with Arnhanders in the Holy Lands. Over there, if you needed something read, written, or calculated, you grabbed a passing Deve.

Where did Gervase Saluda fit? Might he be getting kickbacks? That happened in every palace and large household in Else's end of the world.

"Who is this?" Else asked. A handsome young man carrying a load of tools staggered through the gateway.

Caniglia replied, "Marco Demetrius. A carpenter. Related to the cook. He always turns up when there's carpentry to be done. He's good. And a good worker."

"So Madam Ristoti sent for him." The chief cook seldom left the citadel, though she was not officially a resident.

Copria and Verga tried to get in, one right after the other. Else said, "Mr. Verga, you appear to have forgotten that you don't work here anymore. Don't embarrass yourself. You and Mr. Copria should apologize to the people behind you for holding them up, then leave."

Verga snarled, "Get out of the way. You don't have the authority."

Else hit Verga with a flurry of rib-cracking jabs. Verga fell to his knees, desperately fighting for enough air to remain conscious.

Else told him, "You no longer work here."

Copria was less blustery. He helped Verga get up. They left.

Else hoped that would be lesson enough. He told Caniglia, "I want to know who shows up late. Starting tomorrow, the gate will close ten minutes after starting time. Tardies won't be allowed in and they won't get paid."

ANNA MOZILLA HAD ACQUIRED A SMALL HOME RATHER LIKE the one she had enjoyed in Sonsa. Else climbed the front steps. He used the clapper. Anna responded almost immediately. She looked exactly as she had in Sonsa.

"You were followed."

"Yes. Not competently, either."

"You let them keep track?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"I explained you as a former mistress. Your letter had been read before it got to me."

"She moved up against him, familiarly, as she drew him into her house. "That's why I made the letter general. I thought that would be the best way to explain me."

Though the door was shut and there were now no witnesses, Anna Mozilla did not back off. Nor did Else push her away. It felt good, being close to a woman. Even one who had a decade on him. And who was not his wife.

Anna Mozilla said, "We were completely businesslike before. Completely professional. I teased myself about that afterward. Then they asked me to move down here. It took you so long to get here. That left me too much time to think."

Else did not reply. He knew what he should do but just could not push.

"It wouldn't be a sin, Frain." Else had called himself Frain Dorao in Sonsa. "I'm an unbeliever."

So. She understood that much.

That was an interpretation of Law as stated in The Written. There was no adultery when the woman was not Praman.

Else did not back away. Neither did he take charge, though she had shown him the open gate. He left the initiative entirely in her hands.

Those hands proved capable, if tentative at first.

ELSE TOOK HIS SUPPER IN THE KITCHEN SO HE COULD CONVERSE with Madam Ristoti. "Has there been much obstructionism?"

"Less than I expected. You got them scared. That business at the back gate told them you're serious.”

"What do you think?"

"I think you're deadly serious."

"I am."

"Why?"

"Because I want to keep working. I came to Brothe to be near the center of the excitement. I need a job to stay.”

"My people have been in service to the great families all the way back to Imperial times. According to family legend. One pearl of wisdom plucked out of all that history is that every house mirrors the interior of its master."

"Meaning this place is falling apart and the staff is slovenly because that's how Paludan Bruglioni is?"

"Yes. Paludan doesn't like the house the way it is. But it's' too much trouble to do battle with the night."

"Uh?"

"Oh. I didn't mean that in the supernatural sense. Only spiritually. Like, the night will always be there, no matter how hard you fight it. So why bother? Why suffer all that frustration?"

"I see. Is there anything I can show Paludan and Gervase when they finally decide they have to know what all the racket is about?"

"There will be."

"How do you think this will play with Saluda?"

"What are you asking?"

"Does Saluda have a personal interest in things staying the way they are? Has he been collecting kickbacks? I haven't found any evidence but that's what it feels like."

That notion surprised the cook. "I don't think so. Not that he wouldn't. If he thought of it"

"But he might have an interest?"

"Maybe. But he's also more of a Bruglioni than most of the family who ran off to the country. Who don't want to come back."

Else had heard the same from Polo.

"So it goes. That can be dealt with. Keep on, here. And find me a couple of troublemakers to fire. To remind the others that they can be replaced."

Else found Polo with Mr. Grazia. Polo reported, "There's been some creative accounting here. Paludan Bruglioni is spending thirty thousand ducats a year for half that in results, mostly as payouts to people who don't exist for work that doesn't get done and to vendors for goods that never arrive."

"I see. Mr. Grazia! Did you think nobody would ever notice?"

Grazia shrugged. Like so many caught in his situation, he had no idea why he had not considered possible consequences.

Else asked, "Polo, did you ever get my paper?"

"No. I keep trying the places in Naftali Square. They keep having nothing to sell. I haven't had time to go to the Devedian quarter."

"I'll handle it myself, then. Keep putting Mr. Grazia through his paces." Else patted Grazia's shoulder. "An epic of the imagination, sir. A true epic."

"You won't tell Paludan?"

"Not as long as you're helping me whip this place into shape. You slack off, though, or you dip your beak again, then you can probably count on getting together with Father Obilade."

ELSE TRIED TO SLIP AWAY USING THE SERVANTS' GATE. THAT did not work. He picked up a tail anyway.

He worried who and why for a few minutes, decided that it didn't matter. There were only two of them and they were inept. He shed them near Anna Mozilla's house. Thoughts of Anna distracted him momentarily. But he could reward himself later. He headed for the Devedian quarter.

Brothe's Devedian elders admitted that twenty thousand Deves lived in the city. Rumor suggested there were several times that. If true, then more Deves lived in the seat of the inimical Episcopal faith than in the Holy Lands themselves. But in Suriet the towns could not grow large, except on the coast of the Mother Sea. The coast where western invaders established their crusader principalities and kingdoms.

There were many times more Devedians in their Diaspora than remained resident in the mad country that had given them birth.

Else tried and failed to imagine what it must be like to live in those madlands, in amongst the Wells of Ihrian, where the magic boiled out of the earth incessantly, warping everything around it, birthing malignant new spirits, feeding the Instrumentalities of the Night, and incidentally, unleashing the only power capable of holding the ice at bay.

Even today many Devedian native sons were perfectly willing to leave Suriet and let it become a nesting place of Chaldarean conquerors and Praman liberators alike. Or maybe the reverse.

Let them bash one another's heads amidst the floods from the magical springs. One day He Whose Name Is Legion would cleanse the earth of all but His Chosen.

Aaron, Eis, Kelam, and the other prophets who laid the foundations of Arianism, which evolved into Chaldareanism, departed the Holy Lands themselves as soon as their preaching and witnessing gifted them with donations sufficient to let them travel without having to sleep under bridges. They scattered across the Brothen Empire, carrying their message to those whose lives consisted primarily of despair.

The preaching, the witnessing, the performing of miracles – most of that had taken place far from the Wells of Ihrian, in provinces now part of Lucidia or the Eastern Empire.

As he moved southward Else began to sense a potent electric tension. Something significant had happened. Something bigger was expected to happen. Its threatened scale troubled everyone.

Else could not get an answer when he asked why. There was an immense prejudice against foreigners with blond hair.

His Devedian contact could explain.

There was no threat of rain, but the Deves and Didnshaus scurried about in a jerky hurry, as though trying to get the day's business done before bad weather arrived.

Else entered a tiny papermaker's shop. A sign on the artist's own product proclaimed it the source of the best papers in Brothe. A stereotypical little old Deve, bent, leaning on a cane, his features camouflaged by thickets of wiry gray hair, came from the back in response to the bell that jingled when Else opened the front door. Chemical smells accompanied the shopkeeper.

"How may I be of… ?" the little man asked as he forced his head to turn upward. He did not complete his question.

"I'm here to buy paper, not collect heads. I want an inexpensive, working grade. Twenty sheets. Then I want a better grade, suitable for permanent records and letters expected to survive travel over extended distances. Again, twenty standard sheets. Finally, I want some of that erasable parchment or vellum that students use."

The old man found his tongue. "That's an animal product, not paper, though normally we keep some around. You need a special ink, a treatment sponge, a sanding stone, an ink remover, and Halmas clay. Plus calligraphy brushes."

"I'm in the market for those things, too."

"We don't carry any of that."

"And that isn't a problem. There seems to be a paper shortage in Brothe. I'm prepared to go from shop to shop until I find everything."

"You can pay for all that?"

"Of course. You have a problem with me? You're averse to making a sale?"

"Not at all, sir. This constitutes an excellent sale. My biggest in weeks. It's just that we don't often see men like yourself here in the quarter. Twenty sheets packer grade, twenty choice?"

"Packer?"

The old man shrugged. "Nobody knows why it's called that. Not anymore. It's your working grade. Your most affordable paper."

"I see."

"And how much of the reusable?"

"Six folded to standard-size double exercise sheets. One for me and one for each of my students."

"Students? Uh … Never mind. None of my business. I have three of those in stock. I know where to find the rest. And the supplies to go with."

"Good."

"I'll send my grandsons to bring it all here. That'll save you running from shop to shop."

Else scowled.

"Oh. No, sir. I won't add another layer of markup." The bent little man leaned closer to confide, "They'll pay a commission. Because they know I could send the boys to someone else. It's about the extension of goodwill and favor."

"Go ahead, then," Else said. "I've walked enough for today. And I still have to go back home."

The old man shouted in a locally warped exile Melhaic dialect, well spiced with Firaldian derivatives.

Else spoke some Suriet Melhaic and enough of its cousin Peqaad to get by with those tribesmen. He understood half of what he heard. The old man gave orders to collect Else's merchandise, then directed that someone named Pinan Talab be told that a blond stranger was in Luca Farada's paper shop. While the old man jabbered a parade of boys from the rear of the shop snapped quick bows at Else, then headed out the front door. Each brought a burst of chemical smell, a sulfurous cast that Else had associated with papermakers since childhood. The odor stirred memories of the time before time, before his purchase by the Sha-lug. Though those memories were seldom more than a nostalgic mood.

The old man offered plenty of distracting chatter, speaking Firaldian to Else when not instructing his descendants, sometimes changing languages in midsentence. In a puckish moment, Else asked, "Why would Pinan Talab be interested in what kind of paper a Chaldarean buys?"

For an instant it seemed the superannuated papermaker would expire from horror. Then he just stared at Else in silence, disturbed and frightened.

"My paper? Shouldn't you get that ready while you wait to hear from Talab?"

"These are strange times, sir. For example, much of Brothe is obsessing about foreigners with blond hair. It doesn't affect us here, but it's still a concern – if you're the man who caused the excitement."

Else donned a stupid, baffled expression. "I work for the Bruglioni. Uh. You're all lathered about those guys who were supposed to work for us but really worked for the priest who was planted on us by the Brotherhood of War? Pretty funny, huh? Those guys, after the priest turned them loose, went and killed like eight or ten of me bunch that the priest was spying for."

The old man was not amused. His grandsons began to return. As they surrendered their merchandise they hustled on to the rear of the shop. Each passage loosed another puff of chemical-laden air.

Else remained prepared for treachery – though he could not imagine why these people would bother. But nothing happened. The grandsons came back. The merchandise piled up. Soon everything Else had asked for was ready. "Excellent. I'll recommend you to anyone looking for paper."

"That's kind of you, sir. Tell them to stock up now. Once the fighting starts the soldiers will take all we produce."

"The fighting? What fighting?"

"You haven't heard?"

"Obviously, not. I'm bottled up inside the Bruglioni citadel most of the time. When I do come out people won't talk to me because I have blond hair. What's happened?"

"The pirates. They launched a massive raid yesterday. Against Starplire. They massacred the priests and nuns and scholars and looted everything they could carry off. They even murdered most of the townspeople. A squadron of Imperial cavalry that was headed for Alameddine overran the stragglers. That saved a few people the pirates hadn't yet found." The old man's face darkened as he sketched the disaster.

Starplire, Else thought. Just inland from the coast, south of the mouth of the Teragi. Not fortified. A population in the thousands, mostly monks, nuns, and sacred scholars. Main industries, monasticism and religious education. Starplire boasted Episcopal Chadareanism's principal university. And a tiny Devedian colony, practicing the arts that seemed to come so easily to that race.

"I see."

"They say the Patriarch will convene the Collegium and preach a crusade against Calzir."

"About time, if you ask me." Else accepted his change. The old man put his purchases into a sack that, in a previous incarnation, might have contained rice. "Did you have family there?"

"We're all family."

Else wrestled with mixed emotions as he left. An Episcopal crusade against Calzir would serve Dreanger better than a crusade against the heretics of the Connec. It should occupy Sublime far longer while not profiting him a ducat. Calzir might hold out long enough for nature to catch up with Sublime. Or the crusade might bankrupt him.

But Calzirans were Praman.

And not very bright Pramans. What insanity moved them to do something as stupid as butcher the entire population of Starplire?

Sinister forces were at work.

"Captain."

The soft voice came from a shadow in a foot-wide crack between buildings. Else would not have responded had it not been familiar. A hairy little shape hid in the crack. "Gledius Stewpo? What're you doing here?"

"This is no place to talk. Follow me." Stewpo popped out and hurried along the street, comical in his effort not to appear furtive. What could be more noteworthy than a sneaking dwarf?

Else followed, awash with thoughts and questions. First, war. Now, Gledius Stewpo.

"YOU PEOPLE HAVE AN UNNATURAL PASSION FOR HOLES IN THE ground," Else told Stewpo.

"That's why they talk about a Deve underground."

"Ha! And ha!"

"You're treated like vermin, you adopt vermin's strategies for surviving." Stewpo had led Else down into a warren underneath the Devedian quarter. Which he suggested had been there since early Imperial times. The Deves of those days used to rescue brethren enslaved in the Holy Lands and hide them in the labyrinth. "It isn't just a Devedian thing, though, Captain. Everybody in Brothe has secret cellars and hidden worlds below. The primitive Chaldareans, the Arianists, had a network of tunnels and secret rooms and chapels all over under the city. We know they're still there because they keep caving in."

Four Devedians met them in a hidden place much like the hidden place in Sonsa. Even the odor of the earth was similar. Else recognized two men. Like Gledius Stewpo, they hailed from Sonsa. The others, when introduced, were Pinan Talab and Else's principal contact in Brothe, one Shire Spereo.

Spereo observed, "You've been a hellish long time getting here."

"Such are the mercies of my supposed profession. I got locked up for half a year."

Stewpo said, "Your masters must've been cranky about that."

"They'll feel better when they learn about this war I hear is coming."

"Which will keep the Patriarch preoccupied."

"Are they behind it? What's really going on?"

The Deves exchanged puzzled looks. "What do you mean?" Stewpo asked.

"Somebody has to be putting the Calzirans up to this. They can't possibly be so stupid that they think the Patriarch will tolerate a wholesale plundering of Church property and the Episcopal States."

"Actually, I think they are that stupid. They know the mercantile republics are mad at the Patriarch and won't help him. And the first raiders went home in ships nearly foundering with infidel treasure. Gold fever is sweeping Calzir. Anybody with a boat big enough to haul booty is rounding up friends and old weapons to go get rich. Starplire may leave them bold enough to hit a really large, rich target."

Else reflected, “Too much success could make them forget to concentrate on Sublime and the Benodocto. If they bite Hansel or one of the mercantile republics …"

"They'll suffer," Talab said. "We understand that. But they don't. Calzir is hip-deep in stupidity these days. Not to suggest that bright is common anywhere, nor ever was welcome in Calzir. That realm's biggest problem is a lack of any real central control."

Stewpo said, "This situation has repeated itself every sixty to eighty years since the Praman conquest. Eventually an allied Chaldarean fleet will scour the Calziran coast. Piracy will stop – until the last old man who remembers how things went dies off."

Another Deve said, "They always think they have God on their side. They always think Firaldians are too soft to put up a fight."

Stewpo observed, "Perhaps if they were a more literate society?"

"Stewpo, I haven't heard why you're here in Brothe."

"Sure, you have. Just not from me. Things went to shit in Sonsa. The Brotherhood sent another gang of thugs from Castella dollas Pontellas to avenge that wizard."

"This will amuse you. That wizard led the company I joined. He has almost no powers left"

"Good," Stewpo snarled. "Someday …" He pulled himself together. "The Dainshaukin and Devedian communities decided to abandon Sonsa. After half the Devedian population died."

Else did not suffer a twinge.

Stewpo said, "Al-Qarn isn't happy with you."

"Anyone there who thinks he can do better is welcome to take over."

"They have no concept of the realities here. But that isn't the point Part of your job would be to make them understand. I've been reminded, recently, that you haven't reported yet. They know you're alive only through secondary sources."

"I was told to report when I had something to report. I haven't, yet." Ignoring Stewpo's point about the educational aspect of his mission.

"People in power want to know what's going on. They have decisions to make. They need information. They squeal like wounded swine when they don't have it. I'm not interested in making their lives easier, though."

"I understand," Else said. "The enemy of your enemy is your ally."

"But never a friend. Do you understand?"

"Perfectly. Before we worry about the shape of our end of the world we need to rid it of the threat of the west."

Gledius Stewpo said, "You might be too bright for our kind of work."

"No doubt. And here you are, a hound baying at the behest of a false god. Yet you show no shame."

"I hope these aren't the end times where we have to find out which one of us is the deluded devil-worshipper."

Else replied, "None of that matters. Not now. If Sublime preaches a crusade against Calzir…"

"The Collegium will approve a punitive expedition against the pirate ports because of Starplire, but that's all. Which is too bad. If Sublime bogged down in Calzir he'd be too busy to do any mischief in the Holy Lands."

"As long as I'm here, why don't I do a report that you can pass along?" Else did not mention that he had reported before. "If I can dictate it. It's a long story."

Later, report done, Else said, "I need one more thing. As a Bruglioni henchman. An accountant. A wizard with numbers who can ferret out bookkeeping deceits. The Bruglioni staff have been stealing their masters blind using bookkeeping tricks. I'm trying to make my name with them."

Stewpo nodded. "I'll see what can be done."

POLO SAID, "YOU FOUND PAPER. GOOD."

"In the Deve quarter. But they said, with war possible, the supply won't last. Big price increases are coming."

"War. Yeah. They want to see you about that. Right away."

"Why? They spend all their time hiding out. I can't ever get hold of them when I need something."

"And that's bad? Paludan is happy with you."

"Really? I'm making it up as I go, Polo. They never told me what to do, they just hired me to do something. So I'm doing what obviously needs doing. And wondering why the second richest family in Brothe lives in a dump. How do they stay feared and respected? There's nobody here to respect or fear. Is that a secret? You say they're waiting for me now?"

"Not as such. They're in the private audience. Playing chess."

"What are they up to?"

"Divino was here for a while. It might have to do with the pirate problem."

"Divino? That's the uncle who's in the Collegium?"

"Yes. Principatй Divino Bruglioni. You've probably met him without realizing who he was. He comes around here a lot."

“Take this stuff to our quarters. Then get Madam Ristoti to send me something to eat. In the private audience. I haven't eaten all day."

"You didn't see your lady friend?"

"I was looking for paper. And learning my way around that part of town."

"All business, eh?"

"Always, Polo. That's how you get ahead in the world."

GERVASE SALUDA HAD HIS BACK TO THE DOOR WHEN ELSE ENtered the private audience. The room was twelve feet by sixteen, big by peasant standards but small for a working room in the Bruglioni citadel. There were few furnishings. One chess table. Four chairs, two in use already. A fireplace, not lighted. Paludan Bruglioni sat opposite Gervase, scowling fiercely at the chessboard.

"Yeah, Hecht. You're here. You were out and around today, right?"

"I went to the Devedian quarter to get paper. For the boys' lessons. I took the opportunity to find out more about that part of the city."

"You heard what happened at Starplire?"

"Only the bare bones of the story. I have blond hair. People talk to me only as much as they need to, to separate me from my money. I didn't hear much war talk, though."

"You must not have been listening. There's a lot of war talk. Uncle Divino says the Patriarch may preach a crusade. And the Collegium will let him have it"

That startled Else. "Really?"

"Really. Most of them lost family at Starplire. But there're more pressing problems."

"Yes?"

"The Collegium, according to Divino, began tracking the Calziran pirates after the news from Starplire. The pirates are more numerous, more organized, and more centrally controlled than anybody suspected. The Starplire raid was a rehearsal."

"This is more disturbing by the moment."

Gervase Saluda said, "Indeed. Pull up a chair. Let's talk."

Else did as he was told. "Go ahead."

"The pirates are thinking about attacking Brothe next. They see no reason to expect much resistance. The only soldiers in town are the Brotherhood. There aren't a hundred of them, right now."

"The Calzirans know all that?"

"They do."

"Do they know we know they know? No. I take that back. Are their captains intimate with the Instrumentalities of the Night? Would they think that somebody here knows what they're doing?"

"Their leaders … might. The Collegium is no secret."

Paludan interrupted. "That's not why we're here. We have to worry about family protection and property preservation."

"By which you mean?"

"We have properties all over the city."

"You won't be able to protect everything. You might not be able to protect anything if you don't know what's likely to be attacked. Consolidate here. Everything you don't want stolen or vandalized and anyone you don't want killed. Better yet, move to the country until the raiders go away."

Gervase said, "That wouldn't be the best option, politically."

Paludan added, "We're Bruglioni. We're obligated to defend the city."

"How? Your army is me. Plus four gatekeepers and some kids who haven't figured out which end of a sword you're supposed to grab."

"Everybody has that problem. The nearest Patriarchal garrison is at Bober, four days away. The nearest soldiers could be here in two, but that would be the Imperial garrison from Gage. Which includes the Empire's best – just in case Hansel decides to swoop down on Brothe."

"So we're afraid Imperials might be more trouble than Calziran pirates?"

Gervase snorted. "No. But Sublime might see it that way."

Paludan agreed. "If the pirates do come, Sublime will just hole up on his island and wait them out."

Else said, "I won't live long enough to understand Brothen politics. That looks like a huge opportunity for Sublime's enemies."

"It is. Uncle Divino and his cronies will take advantage if that happens."

"So both parties might just let the rape happen? One out of cowardice and the other for political gain?"

"I don't know. I do want a soldier's professional opinion of the situation."

"I'll see what I can find out. Ah. Madam Ristoti. Thank you. But I think I'm done here now, so I'll just eat in the kitchen."

He looked to Paludan Bruglioni for permission to leave. After a dark scowl, Bruglioni nodded.

ELSE WENT OUT EARLY. NO ONE FOLLOWED. HE VISITED THE Arniena compound first, where he managed a short audience with Rogoz Sayag and his father. Inigo Arniena joined them briefly.

Else moved on to Bronte Doneto's establishment Just Plain Joe was on duty at the gate. He whisked Else inside.

"They got some good food here, Pipe," Joe reported. "An' plenty of it. This's the best job I ever had. Except for having Ghort as my boss. He's a real asshole sometimes."

"That's all us officers, Joe. When we have to get some use out of a guy like Bo, every day, after a while it turns you sour."

Joe laughed. "I got you."

"How's Pig Iron?"

"Livin' in hog heaven, Pipe. He's got it twice as better than I do. This's it. Yo! Here's Captain Hecht."

Pinkus Ghort was serious about being Doneto's number-one man. He had six professional soldiers brainstorming responses to a possible Calziran attack.

"Wow!" Else said. "I have a hundred-year-old man named Vigo Caniglia and three other men, none trained and only one young enough to be of any use. Plus some kids, the oldest being sixteen."

"Way I hear, Pipe, these Five Family types are so damned cheap, you're probably better off. Even though the poorest can afford a whole regiment if they want. We were fools when we thought we could make our fortunes here. Though some of us got lucky."

"Any useful news?" Else asked. "What I've got is, the pirates might be coming to Brothe. And nobody thinks there's much we can do about it. I'm supposed to tell the family what to do."

"You know about as much as I do. The Principatй ain't my pal no more. He's all busy with schemes and conspiracies and not giving the guy who has to do the heavy lifting anything to work with."

"He say what his cousin's going to do?"

"No. But I'd put my money on him hunkering down, waiting out the storm, then using it as an excuse to start a crusade. He wants a crusade, bad. He don't much care who against. Come over here. Check this map. If you were a half-ass mob of plunderers used to fishing for a living, where would you make your landing?" Ghort had a nice map of the city laid out.

"I wouldn't come all the way up here. I'd take fire from the bridges and fortified islands."

"But if you unship down here you'll get hung up in the tenements. Where the streets are narrow and tangled and there's nothing worm stealing."

"What's this here? I haven't been downriver from the Castella yet."

"Monuments. Plazas. Memorials. Mostly over a thousand years old. More plazas. Lots of squatters because there isn't anybody to run them off. It's not a good place for fighting."

"How about the north bank? Would they land there first?"

"Then cross the bridges? I might try that if I knew how feeble we are. It would make for an easy debarkation. But not much plunder. The big churches and family holdings are south of the river."

"These Calzirans are mostly fishermen and coastal traders, right? So they'll just be a mob. They could be panicked."

"We're looking at what might be some pretty big numbers, though. Got any ideas?"

"Sure. But we don't have the people. We'd need experienced soldiers. There's nobody out there but the Brotherhood."

"That we can see, Pipe. Or that enemy spies can see. But how about all those squatters out there? A lot of those guys came to Brothe hoping to join the armies the Patriarch hasn't gotten around to putting together."

"Ho! Pinkus, you aren't half as dumb as you put on. Why don't we take a walk? I know somebody over at the Castella."

"Anybody I'd know?"

"Sure. Redfearn Bechter. He made it out of the Connec. I ran into him the other day. He might listen long enough to think you're on to something."

"Grade Drocker is in charge over there, now. He's tight with Sublime. Sublime might not want the city to be able to defend itself."

"Drocker, eh? I thought Hawley Quirke was number one."

"Sublime got Quirke recalled to Runch. Quirke wouldn't kiss his ass."

"I thought the Brotherhood was big on being its own boss."

"They're big on crusades, too. Sublime says he's gonna give them some. The Special Office is all fired up."

"THERE'S A PLAN IN PLACE, NOW," ELSE TOLD PALUDAN, DIvino Bruglioni, and Gervase Saluda. Divino Bruglioni was the man Else had seen with Gervase and Paludan before. Divino did not seem as old as an uncle ought to be. "I spent all day running hither and yon, seeing men I knew from the Connec. We figured out how to handle a pirate attack. The Bruglioni would have to contribute four thousand, two hundred ducats and any skilled fighters who can work with the Brotherhood. Which would be me. The Madisetti, the Arniena, and Bronte Doneto's subclan of the Benedocto have all agreed already. I'm supposed to enlist the Bruglioni."

Paludan had trouble breathing. The Principatй sat quietly, considering Else. Gervase gasped. "Forty-two-hundred ducats?"

"Forty-two from each of the Five Families. Plus contributions from the Church, the Brotherhood, and the Deves."

"Four thousand two hundred ducats," Paludan murmured. "Tell me the plan."

"That's where it gets a little sticky. Drocker is convinced that the Calzirans have allies and spies here."

Uncle Divino offered, "They do. It was by spying on their spies that we learned that a sorcerer named Masant al-Seyhan controls the pirates. Go ahead, Captain Hecht."

"Because of those spies Drocker doesn't want to discuss his plans. I know you don't like it but that's the way it's got to be. Principatй, he'll explain to you. But only if Paludan isn't willing to take my word that total secrecy is necessary."

Gervase asked, "They don't trust us?”

"No. Grade Drocker is the most cynical man I've ever met. He's sure that, fully informed, one of the Five Families would sell out the rest in exchange for not being plundered. Or some abused and underpaid servant might hear something and sell the information. Looking at the historical record, Drocker may be justified."

Uncle Divino opined, "It would be a huge risk just talking to the Collegium."

"I'm sure he has that angle covered. I don't like him. Not even a little. But he's the man to deal with what might be headed our way."

Paludan wriggled and whimpered for days before he financed his share of the Grand Strategy – once pressured sufficiently by his uncle Divino.

Only Sublime refused to contribute to the defense fund. He did not like the master plan. It did not sufficiently aggrandize him or the Patriarchy.

Else felt boyishly pleased when Grade Drocker announced, "His Holiness will receive no protection since he refuses to participate in the common defense. Eis be blessed, even the heathen Deves are contributing."

Else shivered in secret glee. Everything was going perfectly.

THE CALZIRAN PIRATES DID ATTACK UP THE TERAGI, IN NUMbers far greater than anticipated, a week later than expected. Their sails masked the river for miles.

During the delay week they raided Terea, where the raiders ran into Imperial troops headed south, to take part in whatever adventure Hansel and his local henchmen had afoot in Alameddine.

The Collegium declared the Terea raid a diversion meant to draw defenders away from the city. The Tereans and Imperials were awarded their freedom to twist in the wind.

Rumor said Masant al-Seyhan had secret allies amongst the Five Families. Or the Colors. Or one of Brothe's numerous minorities.

Redfearn Bechter told Else and Pinkus Ghort, "You got to know somebody told them assholes that all we've been doing is trying to fool them into staying away." The occasion was another endless planning meeting where little got decided.

Ghort replied, "I can't believe Drocker counted on them being scared off. I bet he was playing it so maybe he could find out who was friendly with the pirates."

"There's one idea we do need to get spread around," Else said. "The notion that the people in charge know what they're doing."

"This is why I like Hecht," Bechter said. "He's all over fitted up with positive thinking."

Ghort said, "Great idea, Pipe. But a little late." He pointed. A pillar of gray signal smoke leaned southward against the morning sky, way downriver. "Calzirans have entered the river. There's going to be a fight"

This made no sense to Else. How did a mob of fishermen, badly armed peasants, and small-time merchant seamen talk themselves into attacking the seat of an empire in full expectation of looting it? There had to be more to this than was obvious.

Two thousand veterans from amongst the squatters had been recruited and formed into small companies, each commanded by a member of the Brotherhood. Local volunteers and troops the Five Families had brought in from outside added another two thousand men. Else was sure four thousand would not be adequate.

He told Ghort, "These people are insane."

Ghort grunted agreement. "Did you have any idea it would be like this when you decided to come here?"

"No. The stories don't have anything to do with reality."

"No shit. If I'd known what it was really like… These Calziran thugs wouldn't have Pinkus Ghort to bang around on. I didn't get into this racket on account of the opportunities for fighting."

Else did not think many soldiers did like the fighting. Mercenaries ended up where they were, doing what they did, because there was nothing else they could do. They were like prostitutes, that way.

If you chose survival you did what you had to do to survive. Morality, ethics, and charity were luxuries enjoyed only by those rich enough to indulge in them.

"Where the hell are you, Pipe?" Ghort demanded. "Pluck your head out of your ass and let's eyeball the situation."

"You know why we get to stop them in the Memorium?" Else asked.

"Shit, yeah. So that anything that goes wrong will be some dumb mercenary's fault. Meaning you and me, boy. We're carrying the sins of the Patriarch and the Five Families on our shoulders. And we'll be in the wrong whatever the fuck we do."

Gervase Saluda eased up beside Else. "Am I catching all the implications, Hecht? You believe the Patriarch is manipulating things so you and this Ghort creature will take the blame for anything that goes wrong?"

Ghort responded, "And wouldn't you try the same stunt if Pipe didn't work for you? Shit. Pipe. Look. Them pricks are at the boom already."

A log and chain boom had been stretched across the Teragi two miles downriver. It was supposed to fix the pirate fleet for artillery on both banks. Unfortunately, demilitarization left Brothe only a handful of war engines. Most were lightweight and held by people unwilling to surrender them to the corporate good. Just six wheeled ballistae had been collected.

A greasy ball of smoke and fire boiled up over the boom.

Else asked, "What do you think, Sergeant Bechter?"

"I think some major sorcery just happened. I think the bad guys have cut the boom. I think that means we're in trouble."

Arriving news soon suggested that Redfearn Bechter was psychic. Except that his sorcery had been an explosion aboard a boat deliberately driven into the boom.

There might be a thousand vessels in the stampede headed upriver.

Before long a messenger announced, "They've started landing on the north bank, just below the Blendine Bridge."

The Blendine was the first bridge encountered by vessels coming up the Teragi. It stood less than two hundred yards downstream from the Castella dollas Pontellas. Its arches rose high enough that ships could pass below if they unstepped their masts and proceeded under oars. They were wide enough to allow the passage of warships headed for the Castella. Militia armed with javelins, cheap crossbows, boulders, and blocks of building stone, were stationed on that bridge.

But the north shore, below the bridge, was undefended. The pirates attacked the bridge from there. They crossed over against resistance that surprised Else, under withering fire from the Castella. Decimated, sometimes stunned by the horror, the Calzirans plunged into the expanse of monuments, fountains, triumphal arches, and little plazas known as the Memorium, where the earliest and most ferocious fighting was expected to occur. Where the success or failure of the raid might be determined.

Brothe's leading defenders had expected the pirates to come ashore on the south bank, at the downstream end of the Memorium, then attack eastward to isolate Krois and the Castella dollas Pontellas while seizing the bridges over the Teragi to keep help from coming from the north. The pirates could then turn to systematic plunder.

By beaching on the north bank and storming the Blendine Bridge the pirates avoided having to fight through 80 percent of the Memorium, where they would have been treated cruelly in ambushes and cross fires designed to exploit their lack of experience and discipline.

Pinkus Ghort observed, "This isn't no mob gone crazy, Pipe. People on the other side knows what's going on. We're about to get slapped around like a couple teenaged whores."

"There's order and planning, anyway. The pirates may just be here for the plunder but I'm thinking somebody is more ambitious."

Redfearn Bechter generally kept his own counsel. He preferred to do God's work quietly. If you asked the Sergeant, he would tell you God was like a tailor. A gentle entity who preferred to carry on the business of the world with minimal fuss. Bechter observed, "We're screwed if we don't decide right now that this is bigger than just some Praman fishermen trying to steal anything that isn't nailed down. There's an evil genius at work."

Else sighed. "What do you think, Pinkus? Stand tough south and up here, but let them do what they want in between?"

Saluda protested, "That would push them into the heavily populated part of the city."

"Which is where they want to go. Right? So, if we let them, without making them kill us first, we stay alive to fight. Where they aren't. Right?"

Ghort snorted. "Their boats! Shit! Eis and Aaron! You're a fucking evil genius yourself, Pipe."

"Only if they're stupid enough to leave them on the north bank. They do, we only have to fight them on the bridges when they try to get back."

"Heh-heh!" Ghort said. "Let's get the word spread. You know what'll happen, don't you, Pipe? The Brotherhood will harvest the glory."

"That's probably best. They can stand fast against a mob of panicky pirates. Gervase, if you want to make a contribution, how about you run over to Hanbros's Arch, find Godel Joyce, and tell him not to put up a real fight because we want the bad guys headed toward the ruins of the Senate. Don't tell him anything else. Pinkus. Go see Moglia. Tell him to keep them from turning downriver. That's all he's got to do. It shouldn't be hard. Meanwhile, I'll slide over to the Castella. Bechter?"

"Right behind you, sir. How long before the pirates catch on?"

"Long enough to make it too late, I hope." Else was not optimistic, though. So many boats. Far more boats than anyone had imagined the Calzirans would bring.

Paludan Bruglioni and those few bold servants willing to help a Bruglioni followed Else to the Castella dollas Pontellas.

GRADE DROCKER HIMSELF LED A COMPANY ACROSS THE Rustige Bridge, above Krois, then attacked the beached and moored Calziran boats and ships. Drocker exploited his vestigial powers to confuse and panic the guards protecting the fleet – mostly boats so small they could have carried no more than five men. The guards were the Calziran sick and injured and elderly.

During a lull Else stared across the Teragi. He saw no sign of anything happening there. Closer, the Brotherhood began barricading the Blendine Bridge to fix the returning pirates for archers on the Castella battlements.

Sergeant Bechter observed, “They'll be here soon."

"They should be. Yes."

Drocker had not brought enough men to fortify the bridge and overwhelm the boat guards, both. Not quickly enough. Sheer numbers of boats and raiders slowed the attack. Drocker seemed unable to do anything useful once resistance stiffened. Scarcely a hundred of the smaller, beached vessels had been fired or holed when Drocker approached Else.

"We're already having trouble… holding the bridge. I have to go … help. Keep after it here. Concentrate on the… biggest boats. That will bother them… more. They'll do… stupid things. Oh. And keep an eye out… for a woman."

"Sir? A woman?"

"Somewhere in this mess… there's a woman sometimes known… as Starkden. A witch. She's here… with the fleet… amongst the boats. Otherwise, my power… would be adequate. Catch her. Take her alive. She has much… to answer for to… the Brotherhood of War."

"Sir, this isn't a situation I've faced before. How do I catch a witch if she doesn't want to be caught?"

"She will be badly stunned… now. I hit her hard. But that won't… last. Don't waste time. And don't forget to… drag her along if we can't hold… the bridge." Drocker had less trouble talking these days. His health had improved over the last year.

"Yes, sir."

"Catch her and… we'll win this easily, Hecht. Once they know… we control the source of their… good fortune. And know that… the Collegium will be waking up… any minute."

"Yes, sir." Else wondered why the Collegium was not involved already. Had the Calziran sorcerers managed to neutralize them somehow?

Drocker hurried off toward the Blendine Bridge. Else finally relaxed. Although Drocker was unaware that Else was responsible for crippling him, Else never felt comfortable around the man.

Bechter observed, "That ain't a man with much personality, but he's loaded up on willpower."

"Oh, he's got plenty of personality. All snake."

"Hey. That's the Special Office. They recruit people worse than the ones they hunt. So they only sign reptiles."

"Let's find this witch. Anybody know what we're looking for?"

Bechter said, "Amazingly enough, everybody in the Brotherhood does." He described a swarthy woman in her fifties who could have been Paludan Bruglioni's sister or mother – or any fortune-teller on the streets of Brothe.

Else said as much.

"Which explains why she comes and goes as she pleases all around the Mother Sea."

"Who does she work for?" Else was puzzled. He had not heard of Starkden before the events in Runch. She seemed to have a fabulous reputation on this side of the water.

"Interesting question, Captain. She appears to be an independent contractor. Look, we're in the middle of a fight. You want to have a conversation, drop back there with the masked man and his sidekick." Bechter meant Paludan and Gervase, who was back from his mission. They were not inclined to become directly involved in the rough work. "I've got unbelievers to punish."

"And a witch to find." A Praman witch, apparently.

The resistance offered by the boat guards declined as the strongest succumbed. The most easily panicked launched their boats or ran away. Calzirans across the river shrieked at those on me north bank to bring the damned boats over.

Else's wrist began to ache. His amulet had lain dormant for so long that he had forgotten it. Almost.

He dealt with a weak attack by a Calziran trio who appeared to consist of three generations of the same family, all injured in previous fighting. He dispatched them without emotion.

"Good on you," Bechter said. "Now you're getting to work."

"Let's just slash the rigging. I don't think we'll get much chance to start any more fires."

The pirates initiated a spirited effort to clear the Blendine Bridge. Lesser forces rushed the bridges above Krois and the Castella, too.

"We have smoke down there," Bechter said. "Not a good omen in a city."

Else eyed the smoke. Anna Mozilla's house lay in that direction, though farther away.

Else said, "There's a crowd on the towpath by that dhow flying the red pennon." They had damaged the majority of the beached craft now. "Would that mean they think there's something to protect on board?"

"I'd bet Oh, for a company of Aparionese crossbowmen about now. We could rip that crowd apart without getting close."

The ship with the red pennon was one of a hundred larger craft that had not been hauled out of the water. Those were tied up downstream from the majority, side by side, in places forming ranks of as many as eight vessels. The shoreward ships were tied up to the flood wall where it ran along the river's edge, making the bank a set of sheer stone faces stepping back from the water at intervals, providing a narrow towpath and landing, whatever the water level. The south bank was built up similarly starting at the foot of the Blendine Bridge and running upriver. The decision to build that way must have had something to do with the curve of the stream.

Else told Bechter, "We can't break through that mob. There're too many of them. You distract them. I'll go around. Gervase. You and Paludan stick with the sergeant." The Bruglioni group had not scurried away, but they did make a point of hanging way back.

"Around, Hecht? How?" „

Bechter was talking to the air.

Else dodged between fishing craft. That put him out of sight. He shed mail and clothing, slipped down into the fetid brown river. The water was colder than he expected.

Swimming while carrying weapons was not easy. But you learned how in the Sha-lug schools. A soldier had to be able to take the fight anywhere.

He went under, swam with the current, surfaced behind the outermost ship in the first moored rank, then worked his way toward his target, a dingy coastal trader. One of the biggest Calziran ships, it was small compared to war galleys Else had seen crossing over from Dreanger.

He rested against the dhow's hull briefly, listened, heard only the creak of timbers and groan of strained rope.

Boarding proved difficult. Even amidships, where the vessel had the lowest freeboard, the rail was too high to reach. There were no ready handholds, either.

Else pushed his knife into the caulk and tar between strakes, above his head. He drove it deeper with palm blows, then relaxed, focused, surged. In a violent, one-handed pull-up he launched himself high enough to get his other hand over the gunwale. He let his sword fall, grabbed hold, and continued onward.

He rolled over the rail, recovered his weapons, looked for opposition. No one came at him. Redfearn Bechter had everyone's attention ashore.

Else dashed aft, severed the after mooring lines, then scampered forward. The dhow's stern began to swing out into the current.

As Else cut a forward mooring line, he realized that he had not thought this out. He would not be able to steer the ship as it turned end for end, descending the Teragi.

His amulet began to irritate him. It had not while he was in the water.

Pirates started yelling. Some began clambering across me ships moored inshore.

One more line to cut

A Calziran with more courage than brains flung himself across the widening gap between the dhow and its nearest neighbor. He landed on loose rope, fell, broke something. Else heard bone snap. The pirate barked in pain.

Three more heroes followed the first. One leapt and landed successfully. The next came down on the rail and, miraculously, balanced there, arms flailing, for as long as it took the third to fall short and snag his leg as he tried to avoid getting wet.

Sergeant Bechter scattered the distracted pirates on shore. Then he and his men scattered themselves.

The barricade on the Blendine Bridge was leaking desperate pirates.

Else severed that final mooring line, then removed his unwanted shipmates. They were fishermen. They should be able to swim.

The dhow finished its turn end for end. It smashed violently into the flank of a moored ship. Timbers groaned and snapped. Bits of rigging tumbled down. Else hustled around making sure his dhow did not become entangled with the other.

The cycle repeated itself, less violently. Else was no sailor. How was he going to steer this thing? A ship had to have steerage way on in order to be steered. Meaning it had to be moving in relation to the water, not just moving.

There was a more immediate problem, though. The sorceress. Starkden. Who had to know who he was. Because she had tried to kill him in Runch. Which made no sense if she was a true Praman fighter.

The ship was not big enough to have decks and cabins and whatnot, except back aft where there was a platform on which the steersman could ply his trade. There was nothing to cover, anyway. The pirates had brought a lot of empty space they hoped to fill with booty.

There was a sort of hovel under the steersman's platform. Else found the woman hidden there, delirious. He dragged her into the light. She was a stranger. Nevertheless, he thought she seemed familiar.

She was short, stout, unwrinkled, dark, dressed nothing like her pirates. And bald. Her clothing consisted of brightly dyed cotton like clothing favored by fortune-tellers.

Why the shaved head? That had to mean something. He could not recall anyone in the soothsayer racket shaving, then wearing a wig to hide it. For wear a wig she did. Else found it while looking for something to use as a gag and bonds.

It seemed like a good idea to get a sorceress thoroughly restrained while she was too groggy to disagree.

A gaggle of pirates chased the ship along the riverbank. And several boats that had fled earlier had discovered courage enough to join the chase.

Not good. He was alone, cold, and saddled with a dangerous prisoner, with enemies chasing him. Suppose he lured a few in, let them board, disarmed them, and made them work ship?

Daring, yes, but overly optimistic.

His wrist throbbed. The amulet was not responding to Starkden as it had Grade Drocker when the sorcerer tried to kill him. The pain was tolerable. The amulet was responding to presence rather than level of threat. It raised scarcely a tickle around Drocker, nowadays.

The pursuit on shore ended when the pirate rabble collided with a band of militia armed with crossbows they had had little practice rearming. Incompetence battled incompetence. Those able to project their incompetence at longer range seized the advantage by default

The pursuit on the river never closed in tight. Every Calziran wanted someone else to make the first move.

The ship stopped spinning, drifted broadside to the current, bow indicating the south shore. Else recalled the little cargo and passenger boats he had seen on canals in Sonsa, propelled by one man who waggled a long oar back and forth behind the boat Maybe the dhow's big, ugly steering oar could be used the same way. After some experimentation he got the bow pointed downstream – within a point or two. The current pushed the dhow toward the north bank.

It ran into a log boom, an accumulation of driftwood piled up against the upstream face of the ruins of some riverside structure harkening back to imperial times.

Else scrounged up an anchor stone, twenty pounds of rock with a hole through where a line could be bent, and was. He heaved the stone onto the driftwood mountain, hauled the line taut, tied it off, grabbed his dusky prize.

Starkden was heavier than she looked, even stripped of jewelry and anything that might harbor some magical tool. Else strained under her weight as he battled treacherous footing. This had better be worth the trouble. He wanted to learn something before he killed her.

He had no choice, there. She knew too much.