“You fool.” Tolly walked over to him and stared up at the taller Hood, eyes slitted with contempt. “Calm myself? I should have your head for that. You understand nothing. We cannot defeat that pagan bastard. He has ten times the troops we have—more!—and more than twice that at his disposal down in Hierosol. Not to mention what he could muster if he brought another army up from Xis after the winter storms are over. And unlike the fairy folk, the autarch has ships. We will be getting no more food from Marrinswalk or anywhere else.” He picked up the tray he had knocked from the squire’s hands, then let it drop to the floor again with a clatter. “Whether it is tomorrow or next tennight or half a year from now at the very longest, Southmarch will fall to Sulepis.”
Hood stared down at him. The warrior’s face was implacable behind his thick mustache but something in the way he stood at stiff attention suggested he was resisting the urge to strike his lord and master. Despite Hood’s cruel reputation, at that moment Tinwright almost admired him.
“Of course, Lord Tolly,” he said at last, then bowed, turned, and walked out.
Hendon Tolly walked to the door to watch him go. Puzzle crept to his feet with much grimacing at the stiffness of his joints, and hobbled across the room to Tinwright.
“I only came to tell you ...” he began.
“Puzzle!” Tolly shouted from the doorway. “Curse you, you ancient bit of dried jerk-meat! Are you not my royal jester?”
Tinwright surreptitiously put out his hand and braced Puzzle as the old man’s knees buckled and he nearly fell. “Yes, my lord!” Puzzle fluted. “Of course, yes, Lord Tolly!”
“Then make me laugh. Go to—I wish to be cheered!” Tolly stared at him, his face pale, eyes fierce and intent. “Did you hear? Amuse me.”
“M-m-my lord, I am unpor… unpoo… unprepared! I came only to give a message to Master Tinwright… !”
“Very well.” Tolly walked toward him slowly, a feline smile playing on his features. “I shall be just as in need of merriment an hour from now. You will return to me then and make me laugh uproariously or I will cut off your face and make it into a Midsummer mask to scare the ladies. Would you like that, Puzzle? You wouldn’t, would you?”
“N-no! No, my lord!”
“I thought not. Then go and prepare your very best japes and comical songs. Do you see how I am frowning, old man? Well, in an hour, one of us shall have our face changed.”
Puzzle tried to bow and moan and promise his cooperation all at once, but only succeeded in muddling himself so badly Tinwright had to brace the old man again. “Why were you seeking me?” he whispered to the trembling jester.
“Oh, Zosim preserve me!” Puzzle’s red, rheumy eyes were welling with tears. “He will murder me!”
“He will probably forget,” Tinwright tried to assure him. “He is very changeable of late. Just do your best and all will be well. Now, what was your message?”
The jester had to swallow twice before he could speak again. “Your mother is looking for you, Matty. She is looking for you all over the residence, and attracting much attention, little of it favorable.” Message delivered, Puzzle patted his arm. “Farewell, lad. You were a good friend.”
The old man trudged away, legs and arms as thin as pipestems, bells still chiming mournfully.
If only he would not try to be funny, Tinwright thought, he would be the most amusing fellow in the March Kingdoms. If ever a man was perfectly ill suited for his work, there goes such a man.
But he was only thinking about poor Puzzle to avoid considering the horror that was Anamesiya Tinwright loose in the royal residence. If anything could assure Matt Tinwright of being executed even before the doomed jester, it was the presence of his mother, stupid and righteous as a peacock and no more discreet than a feverish child. It would be a miracle straight from Zosim if she had not already told half a dozen people about Elan M’Cory.
The gods, it appeared, had been searching for new ways to amuse themselves at a humble poet’s expense, and now they had found one.
Puzzle survived. In fact, by the time he reappeared, the lord protector had either forgotten all about him or simply lost interest. “Who? The jester?” he asked the guard who had stepped into the room to announce Puzzle’s return. Hendon Tolly did not even raise his eyes from his cup of unwatered wine—perhaps his dozenth of the evening. “Send him away. That moping horse-face is all I need to sour the last of this good Torvian red.” The guard went out. Tolly looked blearily up at Matt Tinwright. “Go on! Make certain that fool of a guard sends him away. Tell him to give the old fool a good kick, too.”
Before Tinwright could get to the door the castellan, Tirnan Havemore, suddenly leaped to his feet. “I will deal with the fool, my lord. Rest yourself.”
Tolly did not look at either of them but only waved his hand.
Neither of the two men was willing to relinquish the chance to get out of their master’s presence, even for a few moments. Both went out the door of the lord protector’s chambers at the same time. Puzzle had already been sent away by the guard and was wandering down the corridor toward the kitchen, his relief combined with confusion.
“Puzzle, wait,” Tinwright called after him.
“I will give him the message,” Havemore hissed. “I am your superior.”
“As you wish, Lord.” Tinwright knew better than to argue.
The castellan swept down the corridor with all the authority he could muster, his long, fur-trimmed robe swinging above his velvet slippers. He was clearly taking as much time as he could, delivering Hendon Tolly’s criticisms in elaborate detail as the old man looked more and more morose.
“But he told me to come back!” Puzzle protested, apparently forgetting that his attendance would likely have ended in his execution. “Look! I prepared a new diversion—the ball floats in the air!”
After Puzzle had at last, and with great effort, chased down the bouncing ball, he was sent on his way. Tinwright waited for the castellan to return to the door so they could go back in together, but to his surprise Tirnan Havemore gestured for Tinwright to walk with him a little distance away from the guards.
“Lord Tolly does not like me to be long away from him. ...”
Havemore scowled. “Yes, yes. Enough of that.” He was a tall man with a round, youthful face, but he had aged in recent months. He was not well shaved today and looked bloated and pink. “I would talk to you, Tinwright. Would you walk away from the lord castellan of Southmarch?”
“No, Lord.”
“You are much in our master’s company lately. If that scarecrow who just left is your rival in entertaining him, then it is little surprise, but still it seems odd the protector should take such pleasure from the company of a mere poet.”
Jealousy? Or something more complicated? “Lord Tolly does what he wishes, Lord Havemore. And gets what he wants.”
The other man studied him carefully. “We have only a moment before Tolly notices our absence, even full of wine. Answer my questions truly and you may find you have a friend you will need one day. What happened to Okros, the physician? I know the story we were told is a lie.”
“I don’t know. He died ...”
The stinging slap came so fast Matt Tinwright did not even have time to raise his hand. “Do not trifle with me, young man. I ask you again—Okros?”
Matt Tinwright rubbed his face. The masters of Southmarch were all terrified, that seemed clear, and none of them trusted Hendon Tolly. Tinwright lowered his voice to a near whisper before answering. “He was killed doing the lord protector’s bidding.” How much did he dare say? “It had something to do with a magic mirror… and the gods. I did not see it happen.” There was no reason to mention that Tolly had made him perform the same ritual—that Tinwright himself had almost suffered Okros’ fate while helping Hendon Tolly reach out to the land of sleeping gods.