"Spies?"
"Certainly," Shadow said. "Reporting what the prince says, who he favors, spying on each other. Some of the men are spies also, of course."
"I see." She looked very prim and suddenly very young again. "And whose mistress is Feysa?"
"Mine."
Now she truly turned pink. "Nice for you."
"Yes and no," Shadow said. He was deathly tired, and suddenly his bitterness overflowed in a torrent. "I had no say in the matter. I was told that the lady in question was coming and I would service her as required. Very practical--if she were assigned to anyone else, there would be arguments over precedence. Furthermore, I have no time to myself, as the others have--I attend the prince three watches out of three. So the others can find their own entertainment. Vindax was quite blunt--he did not want his bodyguard getting too horny to think straight."
"That's disgusting!" Elosa snapped.
"I agree," Shadow said. "At the palace it works the same way. The countess--whoever she happens to be at the time--comes at third watch to the royal bedroom. She is always attended by a maid, who sleeps in the anteroom--where I sleep. I tried to complain and was told to shut up or I would cause a scandal. Sometimes they're very pretty. I understand that I'm regarded as a great improvement on my predecessor, so now they roll dice for me. Flattering, isn't it?"
Elosa turned very red and said nothing.
"As Shadow I have no life of my own, lady. My body functions are part of palace politics, I'm a naive little country boy, and I don't approve. I rapture the ladies provided, but I don't approve."
"Why are you telling me this?" she demanded angrily.
He took a long draft of coffee, watching her. "Because I think you could benefit from some truths about the court. If you get the choice--stay away from it."
She tossed her head, but before she could speak a voice behind her said, "Leave us, Elosa."
Vindax!Shadow's heart jumped and then sank again. It was only the duke, bristly and sore-eyed like all of them, hair tangled and clothes filthy. He sank down on the stool his daughter had left and nursed a mug of coffee. Vice-Marshal Ninomar materialized at his side. Then a tapping noise sounded behind Shadow, and Ukarres hobbled up. Some days he seemed more crippled than others, and this day he was using two canes. Despite his haggard senility, he alone looked as though he had slept within living memory.
That left only one missing, and in a moment Vak Vonimor, the rubicund eagler, hurried in to join the meeting.
"Rorin's back, Your Grace," he said. "That's the lot."
Shadow's stew bowl was empty, polished, and he thought he could eat more, but it would put him to sleep.
"I suppose the big question," he said, "is whether we extend farther or quarter the same ground yet again."
The others glanced at the duke.
"No," he said. "First we're going to take a break. The men are past their limits; we all are. Why we haven't had accidents, I don't know. Even the birds are exhausted, and I've very rarely seen that in my life. Sleep for men, rest for birds. In another watch we'll start again."
"I have to agree," Ninomar said in his fastidious, military fashion. His close-trimmed mustache was drowning in encroaching stubble.
"And I say we fly one more patrol," Shadow said firmly. "He's been two days out there. If he's lying injured, then every hour counts. While we sleep, he dies. No, we keep going."
"Shadow?" said a voice like leaves blowing over stone.
"Seneschal?"
"Have you ever known a man to survive a batted bird?"
"No," Shadow admitted. "But it can happen, and this is no ordinary man."
"You're looking at one," Ukarres whispered. "It happened to me. I survived. No--half of me survived...sky sickness. They said I was lucky; I have often wondered about that. I have very few parts that work properly. I hurt all the time."
"But," Shadow said, and then stopped.
"It was my fault--I should have noticed. SkyBreaker was his name, appropriately. He went down. Then up. Then down. Then he sauntered back to his roost as though nothing had happened, and they lifted me off and I screamed for three days. Believe me, lad, you may be doing your prince a kindness by not looking anymore."
Shadow was carefully not thinking those thoughts.
"Look at the odds, Shadow," the duke said quietly. "You almost blacked out in the first few minutes. Most likely he died in that cloud, and we don't know which direction WindStriker took out of it. If the prince was alive after the cloud, he almost certainly died in the next hour--up and down as Ukarres says. The bird probably dropped from exhaustion when the batmeat wore off--she's old, remember, and had been thrashing hard. In that case he was killed on impact, or else he's been lying unattended for two days. There are very few places around here where a man could survive that, even if he was uninjured to start with."
Shadow banged his fist on the table, but the stone made no sound. "We have to find him! Dead or alive!"
Foan nodded patiently. "But admit it--we're looking for his body. We can't risk living men to find a body. We must break it off for at least a full watch."
"If someone saw him come down..." Shadow began. But that was a futile thought. The country was almost a desert. Near Ramo no one could fall out of the sky without being seen, but there were few peasants on the Rand, at least not here.
"We've asked at every cottage," the keeper said patiently.
More than half the men in the room were now asleep, slumped on the tables, and some were even stretched out on benches, snoring.
"You will send a second message, then?" Ninomar asked while Shadow was struggling to find words.
The duke nodded. "I reported the accident and warned that there was very little hope. I think now we should say that although we shall continue to search, chances are almost nonexistent and he must be assumed dead. Perhaps you will wish to add your own report?"
"Did you tell them it was murder?" Shadow asked angrily.
He got four very steady, very cold stares.
"No I did not," the duke said. "Have you evidence of that?"
"There were no mutebats in the aerie. I had looked." He turned to Vonimor. "You cleaned them out. What did you do with the bodies?"
The eagler hesitated and then said, "Threw them over. There's a megaday of junk at the dark side of the tower. Go and see."
"Somebody did," Shadow said. "It is possible to get to that junk pile?"
"Yes."
"Then somebody found one and took it up to the aerie. When no one was watching, he threw it past WindStriker. Any bird will snap up a mutebat--we all know that."
The silence was deadly. Then the duke spoke. "It must have been done within minutes of our departure. There were very few of us there. Whom do you accuse?"
Shadow dropped his eyes. "I don't know. But it was one of us."
"I think we might have missed a couple of the bats," Vonimor muttered. "They're hard to see...hard to get every last one..."
"It was murder," Shadow said.
This time Ninomar broke the silence. "If the prince dies by violence, Shadow, or is even injured, then you are automatically guilty of high treason, I believe. Is that not so? Whereas if he had an accident, then I expect a court would be lenient."
And yet another silence. Again Shadow said stubbornly, "It was murder."
Ninomar and the duke exchanged glances.
"You are the civil authority, Your Grace," the vice-marshal said. "You now believe that the crown prince is dead?"