He would have to pray for Hobart Conselline. He would have to pray a very special prayer for the soul of Hobart Conselline . . . and for the soul of Hostite Fieddi, it might be.
In the Boardroom, the Chairman faced his Board, and explained what he had learned.
“So the Familias will be in even more turmoil?”
“And even more acquisitive. I have the Master of Swords looking into the possibilities of a coup d’etat, but we will need a suitable successor.”
“With due respect, Chairman, I thought our policy was to promote addiction—”
“You misunderstood.” A breathless silence, while everyone waited for the Chairman’s next comment. “We promote no vices; we do profit from them where faulty human nature allows them to flourish. But in this case, it was my most earnest hope that they would withdraw the drugs, either voluntarily, from shame, or involuntarily, as the evidence of the danger spread. We did not object to the damage done to their military, of course, but that damage was intended to shift their policy away from that process to a safer, more limited drug which merely prolonged life a decade or so.”
“Our resources—”
“Are unequal to full-scale war with the Familias. Yes. We lost an entire assault group at Xavier, and another such loss would be unprofitable. We need a way to protect ourselves, without risking ourselves.”
“To eliminate Hobart Conselline?”
“That’s one possibility, certainly. Especially if the right man can be found to take his place, someone who understands that unlimited expansion brings explosive decompression in the end.”
His Board looked back at him. He knew what they were thinking, and knew that they knew he knew. A hundred, a thousand stalks of wheat fall before the reapers, and no one knows one from another but the Almighty . . . but the fall of a great tree brings down those around it and shakes the very ground. Perhaps God cared as much for a blade of grass as for a tall cypress . . . but mere humans noticed one more than another. It was his decision, but on them would fall the consequences.
Miranda walked down the hill to the stables in a chill evening drizzle that did nothing to cool her anger at the dapper little man who had been so sure of his welcome.
She had tried to be fair. She had tried to be reasonable. She had told herself that Cecelia often got things wrong, in her hot-headed enthusiasms.
But Pedar Orregiemos seemed determined to push her past her limits. He had written, expressing his delight in his Ministry. He had written again, complaining of her daughter’s “interference” in foreign affairs, when Brun had invited that Texas woman to be her guest at Appledale. He had called by ansible to insist that she be “fair” to Harlis. Because, he explained, she didn’t really need all that property. He could provide for her, and advance her interests himself, as Minister of Foreign Affairs.
And today, he had arrived at Sirialis, smugly certain that he was telling her what she did not already know, when he brought the results of the judgement for Bunny’s will and against Harlis. Smugly certain of his welcome. Smugly certain that he could comfort a widow he was sure needed comforting.
If only he had let her alone. She glanced around, and saw only the grooms busy with the last evening chores. They nodded to her, and she to them, as she ducked into the passage between the stable offices and the vet supply storage. No one would be surprised to see her here; she often came down for evening rounds, or after, with a few sugar cubes for Bunny’s favorite mounts.
If only he had left her alone, she would have done nothing. If only he had not flaunted his power, his connections, and hinted so broadly at his involvement that she could not ignore it. What did he think? That she had always loved him secretly, that she had been hoping to slough off an unwanted husband and take a lover?
Was he really such a fool?
She opened the door of the old smithy where bits and stirrups and buckles waited for repair. Above the long counter with its burners and torch tips, bottles of chemicals in neat racks. A small forge filled the end of the room, which had been built around it when the new smithy—much larger, and suited to a stable with more horses—had been built in the other courtyard.
Brun’s information had been more complete than Cecelia’s. Pedar was linked to the Rejuvenants and to Hobart Conselline . . . but while Hobart had refused to intervene to protect Harlis’s interests, he would not cooperate in his own downfall. Neither Brun nor that Texan Ranger thought that the evidence they had would stand up, since the Speaker could dismiss and appoint Ministers and higher-court justices at will.
“I’m sure Pedar planned it,” Brun had written. “I’m sure he hired the killers, though Cecelia says he could not have done it himself; he was in Zenebra. Kate thinks she’s found a money trail—a tenuous one—but in a hostile court it probably would not hold. But whether he did it on his own, as a way of currying favor with Conselline, or on Hobart’s orders, we can’t determine. The reward seems to indicate a payment for services rendered—why else would anyone appoint Pedar to Foreign Affairs?—but we can’t prove it. Unless you’ve uncovered something in the archives, we’re at a standstill.”
The archives had thoroughly implicated Harlis Thornbuckle and his son Kell in financial chicanery, extortion, and intra-Family power plays—but not in the death of his brother, and not in connection with the Rejuvenants. At least, not that she’d found yet.
She moved about the room, then picked up a broken snaffle and sat down at the workbench. Was she sure, in her own mind, that Pedar had had Bunny killed?
Yes.
Was she sure, in her own mind, that he could not be brought to justice?
As long as Hobart Conselline was Speaker, and Pedar his Minister of Foreign Affairs, yes. Who would believe the hysterical accusations of a grieving widow?
Was she really willing to put herself at such risk, when nothing she did could bring Bunny back to life?
She thought about that, turning the bit over and over. If he would go away and leave her alone . . . no. No. He would not; it was not in his nature. He would wheedle and whine, year after year; he would act against her one way and another, to force her into his bed, as he had maneuvered when she was a young girl in love with someone else. But then she had had Bunny. Now she was alone, with no protection but her own wits.
She could do nothing about Hobart Conselline, the ultimate enemy, the one who, she was sure, had inspired Pedar to his actions, whether or not he had ordered them. But here, in her own house, she could deal with his minion.
She turned on the smaller torch, and played it over the bit in the clamps. She had first learned to work metal as a hobby, when she’d wanted a particular style of guard on her foil. Over the years, she’d learned how to make metal stronger, or weaken it; how to make it look old, how to make it look like something else entirely.
You may not approve, my love, but you will understand.
She hoped her children would.
Finally, she turned the torch off, and left the bit to cool. She had not mended it properly, but she had made a start. That was sometimes the best a person could do.
Neil waited by the outer gate.
“Goodnight, Neil,” she said. “I made rather a mess in the old forge—that broken Simms bit. You were quite right; the little torch isn’t hot enough.”
“It’ll come right in the end,” he said.
She hoped it would. She would do her best to see that it did.
Chapter Fourteen
Beatta Sorin, head teacher for the Little Lambs class of Shepherd’s Glen Primary School of Baskar Station, led the way to the transit station. Every few steps, a quick glance behind showed her the neat crocodile of uniformed students, assistant teachers, and volunteer parent helpers. The adults wore an official tabard with “Shepherd’s Glen Primary School” on the left and a picture of a gamboling lamb on the right; in the pockets were their official IDs, their locator chips, their emergency kits. Around each adult neck, a lanyard and whistle to supplement the earpiece and mic, and the assistant teachers wore—as she did—an adult version of the school uniform, white shirt and plaid slacks. She herself held the braided end of the organizing ribbon, to which each child was supposed to cling. So far, they all had their little hands on it . . . but they were still almost in sight of the school. They could still be sent back, to spend a boring day in the nursery class.