Put like that, it didn’t seem like such a good idea. “More or less.”
“And there were no riots.”
“Actually, there were.”
Marcus covered his eyes with one of his hands. The other was strangling the air around his body. “Do continue.”
“But they happened before we arrived. Honest.”
The hand fell slowly.
“The Swords were there in force. I think they pulled out more people than they do for Festival Season. They were standing between the Tha’alani Quarter and the civilians who just happened to have found crossbows and other pointy weapons.”
“Casualties?”
“Four Tha’alani were injured. I don’t think any of the humans were hurt, more’s the pity.”
“The injuries?”
She hesitated.
“They were not life-threatening,” Severn interjected.
The Leontine sighed and his hand stopped twisting in the air. “The city is balanced on a thin edge,” he said. “The work that Rennick is undertaking is considered necessary. For humans—who comprise most of the Elantran population.”
“I know,” Kaylin replied. “Rennick did talk with the Tha’alani, and with Ybelline. It started out badly, got worse, and then got better. I’m not sure how the last part worked, so don’t ask.”
“Good. If that’s all?”
She knew a dismissal when she heard it, but before she could automatically retreat, she said, “Marcus, that’s not why we came. You are going to have to answer at least a couple of questions or Kayala will rip out my throat.”
At that, he did smile. It was a toothy grin, but all Leontine grins were and, as far as it went, it was genuine.
“Why did you kill your friend?”
“He was trying to kill me,” the Leontine replied.
“Did you happen to mention any of this to the guy outside?”
“Which one?”
“The white one.”
“No.”
“Marcus—why?”
“The man I killed—to use the Elantran word—was a friend. The son of my father’s closest friend. We were not raised in the same Pridlea, of course, but we might as well have been. I trusted him,” he added. “And if it came down to it, I would still trust him.”
“You just said he tried to kill you.”
“Yes.”
“And you were expecting that?”
“No. Had I known, I’m not sure what I would have done.”
“Stayed away?”
His eyes were golden, but the gold was pale and tired. “No, Kaylin, I don’t think I could have stayed away. But the only possible help I could have taken with me was you.”
“What?”
“It would have been a long shot,” he replied. “But there is literally no one else I would give this information to outside of the Quarter.”
“What could I have done?”
“Kaylin—I don’t know.”
“Then why me?”
Severn said, quietly, “You think magery was involved somehow.”
“You really were a Wolf, boy,” Marcus replied. “But you see keenly. I’m glad I took you on—you were wasted on the Wolves. Yes, I think some sort of magery was involved.”
“Marcus—why won’t you take this to the Imperial Courts? Why won’t you come to the Hawks?”
“Because it doesn’t concern them,” he replied. “My friend was clearly not himself.”
“Then tell them that. Tell them that you killed in self-defense.”
“Against what?”
“Against someone who was enspelled against his will.”
“Kaylin—”
“They’re going to put you on trial in the Quarter in five days.”
“Yes.”
“And you’re going to let them.”
“Kaylin, there is more to this than you understand.”
“Then explain it. Explain it. Make me understand. You don’t know who your enemy was? An Imperial Mage could probably tell you if he looked at the corpse for, oh, half a second. I’ve never heard of magic that works quite like this—but if it can make someone do something they’d never do otherwise, it’s probably pretty damn powerful. Mages leave a signature.”
“And I thought you failed magical theory.”
“I did. It came up later.”
He shook his head. “Your teachers would strangle you slowly if they heard you now.”
“And I’d let them, Marcus. I’d let them if they could answer the questions you won’t answer. I don’t think they’re going to find you innocent,” she said.
“No.”
“But you’re not guilty of murder.”
He said nothing for a while.
She took a step toward him and ran into Severn’s arm, which was raised so quickly she didn’t have time to stop gracefully. Or at all, really.
“Marcus,” he said, “who is Adar?”
“Adar? He is the judge, the jury, and possibly the executioner. You would call him the castelord,” Marcus replied.
“Yes. But how was he chosen to be castelord?” Someone else couldn’t have asked that question in Severn’s neutral tone. At least not if that someone was Kaylin. But Severn asked it as if it were the most reasonable question in the world, and concerned something as trivial as the weather at the same time. She was going to have to learn that.
Later.
“He is the son of the son, descended in an unbroken line, from the father of our tribe.”
“The father of your tribe? The first Leontine?”
Marcus said, “The first of our tribe, yes.”
Severn was quiet for a moment, but it was a thoughtful quiet. “In human lands, we grant seniority by birth. The elder children are more senior. This doesn’t happen with Leontines.”
“No.”
“And Adar’s brothers?”
“He has none.”
“None?”
“None.”
“And his father’s brothers?”
“There were none.”
“His sons?”
“One.”
Severn nodded as if this made sense. It didn’t to Kaylin. “He therefore has the authority to make a judgment.”
Marcus nodded.
“And you will abide by it.”
“I will probably die by it.”
“I don’t think he can kill you.”
Marcus laughed. “He can kill,” he said quietly. “When necessary, he can kill. He tests. It is the way of the fathers.”
“Marcus, this has something to do with the cub, doesn’t it? The one I helped birth?” Kaylin interrupted Severn to ask.
Marcus said nothing. Loudly.
Severn came to his rescue. “We have an appointment in less than hour,” he told Kaylin.
“What?”
“Richard Rennick. And before you open your mouth, remember why his work is necessary.”
“Marcus—”
“He’s right, kitling. Go. I have no doubt that I’ll see you again.”
She wanted to hit him. Or hug him. Or something in between. She stood staring at him, stripped of his uniform and his rank and his office, and she almost couldn’t make sense of it.
Severn caught her by the hand and pulled her out of the cage. She didn’t resist.
For once there was silence. Kaylin needed time to digest the information she’d been given, and time to think about the information she hadn’t. Severn watched her, waiting for her to break the silence. She didn’t. The roads were bumpy, and the carriage, not fitted by Imperial cartwrights, was uncomfortable—but complaining wouldn’t have helped; complaining about life’s little miseries was one of the few conversational luxuries people were allowed, and at the moment, Kaylin couldn’t put herself behind complaint.
The streets of the city passed by the carriage windows, people dodging out of the way well before the horses got close. They were coming to and from the market, business as usual clearly marking their faces. S
he saw no crossbows, no angry, frightened crowds—but the ride didn’t take them past the Tha’alani Quarter, and she had no doubt the Swords were still there.
If there was some petty rivalry between the three towers that comprised the Halls of Law—and there was—it only scratched the surface; she knew that if the Swords had taken matters in hand, they were in damn good hands. Better, she thought, with a rueful grimace, than they would have been in hers. People made her angry. Stupid people made her very angry. She wasn’t so patient with frightened, either, if it resulted in mobs.
But people were always frightened. They were afraid of the Barrani—with good cause, especially in the fief of Nightshade. They were afraid of the Leontines. They were afraid of the Arcanists and the Imperial Mages. They were afraid of the Emperor. It didn’t really end, fear. The best you could hope for was cautious fear. The kind that made people politer because it might save their lives.
The worst you could dream of was the fear that now stalked the Tha’alani.
The sad thing was, she understood where the crossbows had come from. When she was terrified, she wanted to do something. It had taken her years of training to understand that she could use that desperate frenzy to do something useful.
Years, damn it. She wasn’t going to throw them away.
“Severn?”
“Hmm?”
“When Marcus said Adar had no brothers, did he mean what I think he meant?”
“I don’t know. What do you think he meant?”
“When there’s already a healthy son, they kill the others.”
“Yes.”
“How did you know?”
“I didn’t, until I spoke with Marcus. He understands you, Kaylin. In some ways, he understands you better than I do—in some ways, not even close. But he knows how you feel about children. About those you consider weaker than yourself.
“If he told you, it wouldn’t have changed anything except your opinion. And in his present condition, he doesn’t actually want, or need, that opinion. And I’m not entirely certain he doesn’t share your opinion. The Leontines, for the most part, don’t live in cities. These ones do, and the city will have its influence.
“Marcus is the only Leontine who has ever served as an officer of the Halls. He’s not the only one to be seconded to Imperial Service, but the others were temporary, and no, before you ask, I don’t think it’s relevant.
“Marcus therefore is a bit of a rebel. A misfit. He governs the Hawks, he oversees investigations into murders and other crimes. Most of the perpetrators are not Leontine so he’s had a long time to get used to the way the city functions.” Severn glanced out the window, his words muted by the breeze of movement.
“Watching humans, investigating Arcanists, commanding Barrani—he’s had to observe some of a culture that isn’t his own. I don’t think that he considers the child of Sarabe’s sister to be a threat—it’s a fangless cub, a litter of one. I do think he feels responsible in some way for Sarabe’s sister. She is his wife’s only surviving kin, and he offered to take her into his Pridlea and protect her.
“I do not think he would have killed her son—but I’m not completely certain. Nor am I entirely certain that Sarabe’s sister told Sarabe that the child was, in fact, a son. From what you’ve said, there’s a good chance she didn’t.”
“And I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“But he’s a baby—”
“Yes. But I didn’t say that. If, as you suspect, the baby is somehow part of this investigation, we need to understand what the baby means to the Leontines—because the Leontines have chosen to keep Marcus’s trial in Caste Court.
“And likewise, with cultural custom, if the Leontines in question don’t ask for Imperial help—it doesn’t matter. They can kill all of their children, quickly or slowly, and it doesn’t break the law. You need to remember that, because if you attempt to stop them, and it goes wrong, you’ll be breaking the Emperor’s law.”
“If I survive.”
Severn nodded. “You’re good at that,” he added. “You always have been.”
“I’ve always had help.”
“Having help, accepting it—that’s a skill as well. Understand that the Leontines don’t value life in the same way that we do. On the plains, in the wastes, it doesn’t matter. And for a city like ours to exist, it can’t matter too much.”
“If Sarabe’s sister were to ask for intervention—”
“Yes,” he said quietly. “That would change everything. For good or ill, it would change everything.”
Kaylin nodded quietly. She only had to get through the day, write a damn report, and then—then she would speak with Sarabe’s sister.
Richard Rennick’s idea of awake was pretty much the same as Kaylin’s idea of awake. He came to the door to his huge rooms in a bathrobe that looked like cats had used it for a scratching post. If he had servants—and this was the Palace, so he must—they’d obviously had the good sense to flee; he wasn’t in what could even charitably be described as a good mood. He also hadn’t shaved, and whatever he’d eaten for breakfast—if he had, as he claimed, been awake for half an hour—was liquid.
“You two took your time,” he said curtly, throwing the doors open.
Severn took it as an invitation, and quietly entered the room. As if dealing with half-dressed lunatics was just business as usual.
Kaylin said “good morning” in a voice that matched Rennick’s for friendly enthusiasm, and followed Severn in.
The large table in the dining room—which didn’t look as if it were ever used for dining—was covered in paper. It looked exactly like Marcus’s desk would look if the Leontine’s desk took up five times the space, and the ever-present piles of hated paperwork had had a chance to topple and spill.
Rennick, clearly not a man for pleasantries at any time of the day, got down to business. “You said the Tha’alani were trying to talk to the tidal wave, didn’t you?”
Kaylin couldn’t remember saying any such thing, but nodded anyway. She probably had.
“In an attempt to convince it not to drown the city?”
She nodded again.
“And was there any objective evidence that the water could hear whatever it was they had to say? Do not stand there trying to come up with something pleasant and mindless to say—I have bureaucrats all over the damn palace who’ll do that just fine. They’re also getting paid for it, I might add, and you’re not.”
She almost laughed. Yes, he was angry, and yes, he looked as if he could murder morning, but still. “Yes and no.”
“Oh, that was helpful.” He tossed whatever he’d been scribbling on onto one of the gentle inclines that formed hillocks on the wood’s surface.
“They don’t speak in words,” she offered. “And they can’t speak to the elements as if they were people.”
“But they can speak to the elements?”
Shaky ground, Kaylin. She grimaced. “That’s the yes and no. I’d say yes, but it’s not that simple—and the yes in this case isn’t likely to make people feel less threatened by the Tha’alani.”
“They’re not famed for their ability to read the mind of every muddy puddle in the city, no,” Rennick said. “Look, yesterday gave me something I can work with. I can work with it now,” he added. “People might become mobs, but in crowds, they also fear a mob. I can use what we saw yesterday.” He continued, in a completely different tone of voice, “What did you do, in the Quarter?”
If she hadn’t been so damn upset about Marcus, this would have been the question she was dreading. Almost self-consciously, she touched her wrist. The bracer was there. “I’d rather not say.”
“Why don’t I tell you what I saw?”
Since she knew she couldn’t stop him anyway, she shrugged. “Why don’t you?”
“I saw four men—Tha’alani, but still men—who might as well be dead. They were carried out of a very smelly, very dark and very crow
ded building on stretchers. They were brought to you, Private.”
She waited.
“You touched them. When you collapsed, they were pretty much whole. Two of them could walk away. One of them looked—before you touched him—like he was missing half his bloody skull.” He sat back in his chair, tipping it up onto its hind legs. It was too much to hope that it would fall over and take him with it. “It looked very much like you’d healed them. I’m aware that there are healers in the Empire. I think there are two or three—they don’t advertise, for obvious reasons. I think they are all also seconded to the Imperial Service.”
“I serve the Emperor,” she replied woodenly.
“You serve the Hawks,” he shot back.
“Who enforce Imperial law, in case it escaped your attention.”
“Pedant.”
Severn lifted his fingers to his temples. “If the two of you are completely finished,” he said quietly.
They both turned to look at him.
“We have matters here that demand attention. What Kaylin did, or did not do, are not those matters.”
“They might be,” Rennick replied.
“Leave Kaylin out of your story,” Severn said, stepping toward the playwright. He walked quietly and slowly.
“She’s obviously part of it, or she wouldn’t be here.”
“She’s here because she has a better understanding of the Tha’alani than you currently have,” Severn replied. He stopped walking six inches short of Rennick and looked down. Rennick remained seated.
“Severn—” Kaylin began.
“She is not part of your play,” Severn continued.
Rennick’s bluster gave way to a voice that was as cold and precise as Severn’s. “She is not part of my mandate,” he said. “But what she did in the Quarter yesterday—”
“She did nothing in the Quarter yesterday.”
“She saved four bloody lives!”
“I think you will find, if you choose to submit a story that contains that information, that it will be summarily rejected. I believe that all versions of your play must, in fact, meet Imperial approval in this particular case.”
“And you speak for her now? I hadn’t noticed she lacked the ability to speak for herself.”
Severn was about two seconds from grabbing Rennick by the throat. Kaylin could see it clearly in the lines of his shoulders and his back. She couldn’t see his face, and she was almost glad of it.