Outside one of Iros’ men stood guard in the rain.
She considered her life as it was to be from now on, and to her humiliation found herself weeping. She had anticipated nothing; it was foolish to mourn because she had been wise.
The man stood brushing water from his cloak.
“Good evening,” Rarmon said, “Biyh.”
“Magnificent gods, Rem, I never thought you’d know me still.”
“And you’re still not thinking, Biyh. I’m no longer called ‘Rem.’”
The soldier from Istris faltered. Resentful, then resigned.
“Yes, you’ve come up in the world. I’m sorry, my lord.”
“Well,” Rarmon said, “you’re here from Kesarh. What does he want?”
“To see you.”
“He saw me at dinner.”
“Privately, Lord Rem—Rarmon.”
“No.”
Biyh goggled at him. He had been another Nine in Kesarh’s secret army. Unlike Rem, he had not particularly gone up in the world, being yet a soldier and a go-between.
“But my lord—” he broke out.
“Your King,” said Rarmon, “is aware how it will look if I’m come on skulking to or from his tent. I’m no longer in his pay. Be so helpful as to remind him.”
Biyh continued for a moment more, unbelieving. Then he went back into the rain.
Rarmon sat in the chair and waited.
There was a chance Kesarh might want to kill him, but assassination was unlikely here. This ground was diplomatic and acute, too brittle to withstand stray murders.
But the intrinsic information had not yet come. It could not be evaded.
He knew what Kesarh would do.
Less than half an hour later, two noisy torches evolved from the splashing night. Shouts were exchanged with Rarmon’s own men outside, one of whom tried to come in and was got from the way. Instead one of Kesarh’s guard strode in, set down a great jar of wine and withdrew. After him, Kesarh entered.
He seemed to fill the tent with an electric darkness. The impression was aphysical but overpowering.
This was how Rarmon had seen him last, at Istris, removing a wet cloak, the focus of the lamps, and the shadows.
“Our approach was well-lit and not quiet,” said Kesarh. “Your King doubtless already knows I’m here, and that he’s been let know it.”
Rarmon indicated the wine jar.
“Doctored? Or do I only merit a knife in the back?”
Kesarh looked at him.
“Stand up,” he said.
Slowly, and without emphasis, Rarmon stood.
Kesarh’s face gave no hint, no clue.
He said: “Now tell me where you left my sister’s child.”
Rarmon gathered himself who he had been, what he might be now, ordered these men and gave them speech.
“In Lan, my lord.”
“Where in Lan?”
“Pirates took Dhol’s ship. You’ll have heard of it. I got her to the shore. The girl went off with her when I slept.”
“You say you failed me, then. Did you search?”
“I searched.”
Kesarh gave him space to go on, and eventually said, “And found what?”
“Wolves.”
Rarmon brought out the word, and the claws of some fateful inexplicable thing closed on him. Why did he mislead? Because the supernatural alternative would not be acceptable? Because he hated Kesarh, or because he was still bound to Kesarh?
Perhaps Kesarh did not care, the child simply a loose end to be tied or cut away, no more. As Rarmon was a loose end to be killed or forgotten. Or killed and forgotten.
“And you didn’t dare come to me and tell me this,” Kesarh said at last.
“As you point out, I’d failed.”
“And then, after all, you discovered your heritage. And were able to convince Raldanash. I’ve heard he isn’t partial to women. Is that it?”
They were in Istris. This could be no other place.
Rarmon said nothing, and presently Kesarh took up one of the gold cups from a side table, and filled it from the wine jar. He drank without interest or thirst.
“Obviously,” he said, “it’s suggested itself to me you may already have known who you were in Karmiss. That you may have been gathering some sort of information to bring as a gift to your Lowlander-Vathcrian King.”
“No,” said Rarmon.
“On the other hand,” said Kesarh, handing him the tasted cup, “you could remain in Dorthar and send information as your gift to me.”
The rain was slackening. A train of thunder wracked the sky and ended twenty hills away.
“Lord Kesarh,” Rarmon said, “I’ve already proven an inadequate servant. Don’t dismiss what else I am. He and I are brothers.”
“Yes, you always were a prince, my Rem. Thief and cutthroat and mercenary. And prince.”
“And the son of Raldnor Am Anackire,” said Rarmon.
Kesarh’s eyes stayed on his, and then Am Karmiss reached out again and took back the cup Rarmon had not drunk from. Deliberately, Kesarh poured the wine on to the rugs. Tossing the cup to the table, he walked out of the tent.
Kesarh, Lord of Karmiss and Protector of Lan, returned across the Dortharian side of the encampment, toward the more modest Karmian bivouac over the river. His torches scrawled smoke behind him. The rain was finished.
The Storm Lord’s pavilion stood near the narrow stone bridge. Close by they had put up the tent of the latest surplus royal bride. The arms of Xarabiss glinted, catching light; the flaps had been pulled back to let in rain-washed coolness. Encased by the dark lamp-shine inside the tent, a woman sat reading.
The silhouetted image momentarily distracted Kesarh. Then was set aside.
In the last hour of that night season the Lowlanders called the Wolf-Watch, Kesarh came out of sleep and lay, his eyes wide on blackness.
He had been dreaming of Val Nardia’s witchcraft baby, or maybe only of the dead Prince-King, Emel. Kesarh could not reassemble the dream. It was already gone. But it had left him strung and tensed as if for violent action.
He rose, and drank from the ewer of wine and water.
While he did so, he painted for himself on the dark the face of a dying blond boy, and observed it, without remorse. Emel had been afraid, and had seemed to guess, even at nine years of age, that he was not expiring of plague but from something more contrived.
Beyond the palace, the crowds were already shouting for Kesarh. When Emel sank in coma, his regent left the death-bed. The next Kesarh saw of the child was the box of spices in which he had been hastily packed. The weather had reached its hottest. Kesarh malignly awarded Suthamun’s son a Vis tomb in the Karmian Hall of Kings, rather than Shansarian cremation. A draped coffin became necessary, the embalmers Raldnor Am Ioli had dispatched declaring a strangely poisonous corruption consumed the body, rendering their work impossible. These mutterings were swiftly quieted. Instead, when Kesarh spoke the funeral oration, the rabble wept. A month later it had shrieked him to the throne of Istris.
Emel’s memory dissolved.
It was the other child which had waylaid his sleep.
When Kesarh left the tent, the first pre-dawn pallor was in the sky. Men were already beginning to move about. At sunrise, the Karmians would depart. Aims were achieved. Dorthar had been assessed, and shown she was prepared to come courting.
Kesarh walked away from both campments, along the bank. Trees grew and tall, thick-stemmed reeds with tasseled heads. Night clung to the earth. The river, swelled a very little by the rain, ran shallowly over its stones.
Kesarh stood among the trees, looking down at the water.
The memory of the child would not go away. It was ironical, he had cared nothing for it. He had taken fewer pains with it than he had taken with Emel, whom he had killed. Even the sorcery had lost its impact, become unimportant. Years back, hearing of Dhol’s wreck, he had thought it dead.