Sovereign

The two youths looked at him with disbelief. 'You're not serious,' Wheremer said. Edaytor simply raised his eyebrows. 'I mean, everyone knows who Olio is—'

'Prince Olio,' Edaytor corrected him. 'Or his Highness.'

'And everyone knows his Highness is a witch, just like his sister!'

Edaytor was so astounded he did not know what to say.

'And that they sacrifice children to make their magik!' Leandeon added.

'If this is a joke it's gone far enough,' Edaytor said seriously. 'I resisted my natural inclination to turn you over to the guards, but now I wonder—'

'But everyone knows it's true!' Wheremer said, his voice half pleading. Leandeon nodded frantically. 'Isn't it true that Areava—?'

'Her Majesty!' Edaytor declared. 'Or Queen Areava!'

Wheremer shook his head. 'Damn, Prelate, don't tell me how to speak of these people.' He jabbed in the air with a finger. 'Isn't it true that she murdered her own daughter to make magik? And that same night the fire started in the old city? And Olio was in the old city at the same time to help her?'

'This is ridiculous!' Edaytor cried.

'No, not ridiculous!' Leandeon said. 'These are facts!'

'Facts!' Edaytor sputtered. 'You two have no idea—'

'But that isn't all,' Wheremer said, talking over him. 'She murdered her own brother to win the throne, and blamed poor bloody Lynan for the crime.'

Edaytor sat back, horrified. 'Who told you all of this?'

'Why, it's common knowledge,' Wheremer said. 'Everyone in the city knows.'

'Then everyone in the city knows nothing,' he said. 'Queen Areava loved Berayma. She would never have harmed him. And she desperately wanted a child. Like every ruler, she wants an heir. And why would she want the old city to catch fire? None of it makes sense.'

The two youths glanced at each other over their beers. 'Well, I'm just telling you what everyone knows,' Wheremer insisted.

'Since when have they known this?'

'Ever since God's been punishin' Grenda Lear for Areava's crimes,' Leandeon said. 'The Chetts have turned against us, we who saved 'em from the slavers. And we've lost Hume and Chandra, and at least one army, they say.'

'What crimes?'

'What we've been tellin' you about,' Leandeon said. 'And she sleeps with her poor dead husband's uncle.'

'The chancellor!' Edaytor exclaimed.

'It's all common knowledge. God's punishin' us for her crimes, hers and her brother's.'

Edaytor looked at their faces, their expressions angry and so certain, and did not know what to say. They had showed him a glimpse of a world he had never suspected existed. He found it difficult to comprehend how anyone could believe the lies and fantasies he had just been told, but if Leandeon and Wheremer were being honest, the common population did believe it.

He stood up, dropped a coin on the table. 'Pay for the beers with that.'

'There's change from that,' Wheremer said.

'Keep it,' Edaytor said in a flat voice, and left.

Tomlin was cleaning out the pigeon house, as he did most of every day. He had just finished shovelling the guano from the second level into fertiliser sacks when there was a flurry of wings and the rattling of coops from above. He hurried to the third level and saw that all eight coops reserved for the Great Army's pigeons were now full. He went to each coop and took the message from the leg of each pigeon. He knew this was mighty strange, and he hurried to the chancellor's office. When the secretary saw him rush in he did not hesitate, and went to get Orkid. The chancellor appeared almost straightaway and put out his hand for the message. Tomlin gave him the whole batch.

'Eight messages?'

Tomlin nodded. 'And all eight pigeons came from the Great Army.'

Orkid sat on the edge of his secretary's desk and opened and read one of the messages. Tomlin and the secretary saw him pale. He opened and read a second message, then a third and then all the rest. He breathed out slowly and said to his secretary, 'Tell the queen I must see her immediately.'

The secretary bustled off.

'I'll be goin' then?' Tomlin said.

The chancellor nodded and Tomlin, feeling more uneasy than he could ever remember, returned to the pigeon house.

Left alone, Orkid picked up one of the messages. It did not matter which one he read. They were all the same.

'To the pretender, Areava Rosetheme, and Chancellor Orkid Gravespear. Your army is dispersed like chaff. I am coming. King Lynan Rosetheme.'

The Waveskipper made it into Kendra harbour just before noon. As soon as he disembarked, Dejanus, hung over and befuddled from all the red wine he had drunk on the short voyage, headed straight for the Lost Sailor Tavern. He stumbled into the main room and sat at the first table he came to. Other patrons stared at him, knowing who he was and where he should be. He growled at them and they looked away. A scared waiter came to him and he ordered the best house red and paid a whole gold coin for it.

'But, sir, I cannot change this!'

'Don't worry about it,' Dejanus said. 'Money won't be worth anything this time next week.' The thought struck him as funny and he burst out laughing. The waiter scurried away. While Dejanus waited, the patrons left, one by one, until he was the only guest in the whole tavern. The waiter returned with a large flagon of wine and a mug, then scurried away again.

Dejanus set to with serious intent. He quaffed one mug in three long swallows, waited only long enough for his insides to warm up, then started on the second. By the time he was on his third he was feeling braver than he had since he led the Great Army to relieve Captain Urling.

'What did happen to that man?' he wondered aloud. Probably butchered by the Chetts, just like all the other poor bloody soldiers under his command. 'Not my fault!' he shouted. They were brave but untrained. Nothing he could have done. He did his best under the circumstances.

'Orkid's circumstances,' he grumbled. 'Conspiring against me. I'll gut the bastard.' But first he would have more wine.

'Yes. Today. Do what I should have done a long time ago. I'll cut him, I'll cut him from bow to stern. I'll spill his guts all over his bloody, bloody papers and all over his bloody, bloody signatures.' But what of his friend, the queen? 'I'll cut her too. Slice her open like Orkid. Then I'll be king.' He burped. 'And kings don't have to be afraid of anything.'

Powl could read no more. Some secrets should never be known. He closed the volume he had been translating and pushed it away from him. It felt like he was pushing away temptation. History was more than knowledge, he decided; it was incendiary, it was anathema to stability and order. With this understanding, which had been growing slowly now for several days, came something else, something he referred to as his conscience even when he knew it was not that simple nor that sacred. He had forgotten what it meant to be a priest, which was to honour God.

I have done everything but honour him, he told himself. But it was not too late. He was still primate, and from now on he would shoulder those responsibilities as best he could. And one day I will confess. When the war is over, when the Kingdom is at peace… when I am at peace with myself… then I will confess my crime against Giros Northam and against the Church, and accept whatever punishment is my due.

Having made his decision, he gathered together all the notes and translations he had made on the volumes together with the volume he had been working from, left his office and went straight to the tower of Colanus. He put the volume in its correct place. He considered, for the briefest of moments, destroying the books, but he had no authority to do such a thing, not even as primate. After he left the tower he went to the church library. Six novices were gathered around the fireplace, reading from texts and parchments. When he entered they quickly stood up, but he waved them down and, ignoring their looks of amazement, threw his papers onto the fire. He watched to make sure none of his work escaped the flames, smiled at the novices, and started back to his office. On the way he passed the Book of Days. It was open, as always, to its last entry.