She brought a pendant, gold and amber with inlays of jade and lapis lazuli, presented it to Hecht. “Heavy,” he observed.
The metal portion took the form known as an Ihrian knot, very complex. It had a turban shape at its center and four equal arms surrounding it. The Ihrian knot was one of the earliest symbols of the Chaldarean faith.
“Show him,” Delari said.
“You’re connected to the Construct now. No matter where you are. Use that to touch it back. Tap the inlays in the right order, you can send a message one character at a time. Here. These are the code sheets. I tried to write them down so it isn’t obvious that the code is connected with the pendant. Someone who gets hold of the sheets will look for letters written in the same substitution cipher.”
Hecht examined the pages, considered the inlays on the medallion. “I see it. I can memorize this.”
“Good.”
“Just for fun, why don’t I send my messages in Church Brothen?”
Ignoring that, Delari said, “Be careful, Piper. You’ve never been as vulnerable as you’ll be the next few weeks.” Mainly because of the need to travel in small bands. “Heris has caught whiffs of several potentially unpleasant schemes.”
Heris said, “People you’ve never even met want to get you just because you’re you, Piper.”
“I’ll become caution itself. We’ll disguise ourselves and take a route that stays mostly in the Imperial territories. We’ll be all right once we get to the Remayne Pass.”
“Be wary of false friends. Serenity is wooing weather vanes like Germa fon Dreasser.”
“I know who I can’t let get behind me, Grandfather. And I’ll go armed with all the legal instruments the Penital can provide.”
“So va Still-Patter has developed an affection for you.”
Heris sneered. “He hopes Piper will help him achieve his own ambitions.”
“An understandable basis for an alliance.”
It was not yet light out. Hecht said, “Titus is outside. He’ll be getting impatient. I’d better get gone before Serenity finds me and has me dragged in. What’s his problem, anyway?”
Heris said, “He’s really worried about his falcons and firepowder. Ghort says he can only find a few falcons. Most of those are damaged. Serenity counted on having scores to use against Antieux.”
“He won’t let that go, will he?”
“Not as long as he lives.”
“I couldn’t help him with the falcons. I told him to take a closer look at his own people. There are always crooks around our homegrown Patriarchs. Plenty would sell military stores and equipment to line their own purses.”
Delari said, “I’ll start a rumor, give it a few days, then raise the question in the Collegium. We have the right to insist on an accounting of where the Church’s money is going. That will put him on the defensive.”
“Add a little pressure by insisting on being told where it’s coming from, too.”
“Anne of Menand?”
“She’s always in the mists somewhere, isn’t she?”
Fourteen riders left Brothe with Hecht and Consent, a larger party than Hecht wanted. His men would not let him travel with less protection.
Heris quickly developed a habit of turning up when nobody was looking, like her remote ancestor before her. She kept Hecht posted on wickednesses hatching inside Krois. As had been the case with Sublime V, Serenity had almost no idea what those around him were doing in his name. He might not want to know. He refused to hear what the Collegium had to say. He was almost completely fixated on next spring in the Connec.
“And what would be the plan for today?” Titus Consent asked, the fifth morning. He became more surly and suspicious daily. Hecht was too obviously shutting him out of the secrets.
“Your choice today, Titus. Either road will bring us to the Remayne Pass day after tomorrow.” They were crossing the rich farmlands of the Aco River floodplain, well east of the direct road from Brothe to the pass. Heeding Heris’s warnings, Hecht was directing his company out of harm’s way. He had not explained. Not in detail. “By now the villains will have decided to catch us at the mouth of the pass.”
“I won’t ask how you know. You wouldn’t give me a straight answer. But I am interested in why you’re determined to avoid these villains. There are sixteen of us. None of us virgins.”
“All right. I have a friend. A sorcerer. He watches them and keeps me informed. That’s all you need. I’ve avoided the fight because I don’t want it to reflect back on the Empress.” Which was true. Though mainly for show. He had no objection to renewed conflict between the Patriarch and Empire.
“Things are changing. And I’m not comfortable with some of that.”
Hecht shrugged. “We’ll get back to normal once we get to Alten Weinberg.” He hoped.
Consent remained sullen for hours, upset because he was not trusted. Which could lead to trouble someday. Though, intellectually, Titus had to see that trust was not the issue. What a man does not know he can never reveal, no matter what.
Consent came to Hecht later. “I know how we can deal with these people who worry you so much.”
“Tell me.”
“We have a thousand men on the move. Maybe more. Mostly behind us. Why don’t we just sit down and let them catch up? Your villains won’t take on a whole army, will they?” Consent had a hard time believing that Serenity, or his henchmen, would risk angering Empress Katrin by attacking Piper Hecht. But the former Captain-General was adamantly attached to the opposing view.
There was a faction inside Krois that was as stubbornly anti-Imperial as the Anti-Patriarchal faction in Alten Weinberg was stubborn. It had not gotten much voice under the last three Patriarchs. But the new one was not paying attention. The new one had obsessions in another direction.
“You’re right, Titus. Why not just show them so many spears that they’ll just run away?”
Hecht entered the Remayne Pass accompanied by key staff, three hundred veterans, and armed with an up-to-the-moment scouting report from Heris.
There were people up ahead. Their intentions were not friendly.
Drago Prosek had found a dozen falcons somewhere. Hecht had not checked their inventory numbers. Prosek put them out front. Random blasts of creek pebbles thrown up the brushy slope flushed the ambushers. Who would have tried nothing against such numbers, anyway. There were scarcely two dozen of them.
Prosek brought prisoners. “Shall I have them put to the question, Commander?” As Hecht had no official title those who dealt with him direct called him whatever came to mind.
“To what end?”
“It might be instructive to find out who hired them.”
“I already know. You’ll be happier being ignorant.”
“You think?”
Titus Consent shook his head slowly. “Silly-ass discussion.”
Hecht said, “You prisoners. Two of you were with us during the Connecten Crusade. So you know where you stand. Remind your friends. And keep it in mind when Mr. Consent talks to you.”
Consent wasted no time. He asked questions. The prisoners answered. They had nothing illuminating to say. They had been recruited by a Race Buchels. Buchels had paid well, half up front.
There was no trace of Buchels. He had gone missing as soon as the smoke from Drago Prosek’s falcons rolled over his position.
Most of the prisoners thought Buchels had worked for somebody in the Collegium. A few picked Anne of Menand. And one liked those nobles in the Grail Empire who did not want the Empress getting any stronger.
Hecht told his inner circle, “Buchels works for one of Serenity’s associates. An idiot who decided to do his boss a favor and eliminate the nuisance Serenity is always grumbling about. An idiot who can’t look past the moment far enough to see that he could start a war with the Empire.”
Heris said the fool’s name was Fearo? Durgandini. She thought that was funny. Durgandini meant “woman of bad smells” in one of the languages she spoke. This Durgandini was the illegitimate son of a Doneto cousin. He was determined to make his mark handling Serenity’s unpleasant chores. Heris suspected that Durgandini operated under deniable orders.