Even in the bad cipher, the wool merchant’s despair came through, in a kind of strange shining simplicity. Eschewing all his previous bizarre elaborations, he had turned at the last not to magic, but to plain prayer. Rat and crow only to carry the plea, candles only to light his way, herbs only to lift his heart with their scents, and compose his mind to purity of will; a will then put aside, laid wholehearted on the god’s altar. Help me. Help me. Help me.
Those were the last words entered in the notebook.
I can do that, thought Cazaril in wonder.
And if he failed . . . there would still be Betriz and her knife.
I will not fail. I’ve failed practically everything else in my life. I will not fail death.
He slipped the book under his pillow, locked his door behind him, and went to find a page.
The sleepy boy he selected was waiting in the corridor upon the pleasure of the lords and ladies at their dinner in Orico’s banqueting hall, where Iselle’s nonappearance was doubtless the subject of much gossip, not even kept to a whisper since none of the principals were present. Dondo roistered privately in his palace with his hangers-on; Orico still cowered out in the woods.
He fished a gold royal from his purse and held it up, smiling through the O of his thumb and finger. “Hey, boy. Would you like to earn a royal?”
The Zangre pages had learned to be wary; a royal was enough to buy some truly intimate services from those who sold such. And enough to be a caution, to those who didn’t care to play those games. “Doing what, my lord?”
“Catch me a rat.”
“A rat, my lord? Why?”
Ah. Why. Why, so that I can work the crime of death magic upon the second most powerful lord in Chalion, of course! No.
Cazaril leaned his shoulders against the wall, and smiled down confidingly. “When I was in the fortress of Gotorget, during the siege three years ago—did you know I was its commander? until my brave general sold it out from under us, that is—we learned to eat rats. Tasty little things, if you could catch enough of them. I really miss the flavor of a good, candle-roasted rat haunch. Catch me a really big, fat one, and there will be another to match this.” Cazaril dropped the coin in the page’s hand, and licked his lips, wondering how crazed he looked right now. The page was edging farther from him. “You know where my chamber is?”
“Yes, m’lord?”
“Bring it there. In a bag. Quick as you can. I’m hungry.” Cazaril lurched off, laughing. Really laughing, not feigning it. A weird, wild exhilaration filled his heart.
It lasted until he reached his bedchamber again and sat to plan the rest of his ploy, his dark prayer, his suicide. It was night; the crow would not fly to his window at night, even for the piece of bread he’d snatched from the banqueting hall before returning to the main block. He turned the bread roll over in his hands. The crows roosted in Fonsa’s Tower. If they wouldn’t fly to him, he could crawl to them, over the roof slates. Sliding in the dark? And then back to his chamber, with a squawking bundle under his arm?
No. Let the bundle be the bagged rat. If he did the deed there, in the shadow of the broken roof upon whatever scorched and shaking platform still stood inside, he’d only have to make the trip one way. And . . . death magic had worked there once before, eh? Spectacularly, for Iselle’s grandfather. Would Fonsa’s spirit lend his aid to his granddaughter’s unholy soldier? His tower was a fraught place, sacred to the Bastard and his pets, especially at night, midnight in the cold rain. Cazaril’s body need never be found, nor buried. The crows could feast upon his remains, fair trade for the depredation he planned upon their poor comrade. Animals were innocent, even the grisly crows; that innocence surely made them all a little sacred.
The dubious page arrived much quicker than Cazaril had thought he might, with a wriggling bag. Cazaril checked its contents—the snapping, hissing rat must have weighed a pound and a half—and paid up. The page pocketed his coin and walked off, staring over his shoulder. Cazaril fastened the mouth of the bag tight and locked it in his chest to prevent the condemned prisoner’s escape.
He put off his courtier’s garb and put on the robe and vest-cloak the wool merchant had died in, just for luck. Boots, shoes, barefoot? Which would be more secure, upon the slippery stones and slates? Barefoot, he decided. But he slipped on his shoes for one last, practical expedition.
“Betriz?” he whispered loudly through the door of his office antechamber. “Lady Betriz? I know it’s late—can you come out to me?”
She was still fully dressed for the day, still pale and exhausted. She let him grip her hands, and leaned her forehead briefly against his chest. The warm scent of her hair took him back for a dizzy instant to his second day in Valenda, standing by her in the Temple crowd. The only thing unchanged from that happy hour was her loyalty.
“How does the Royesse?” Cazaril asked her.
She looked up, in the dim candlelight. “She prays unceasingly to the Daughter. She has not eaten or drunk since yesterday. I don’t know where the gods are, nor why they have abandoned us.”
“I couldn’t kill Dondo today. I couldn’t get near him.”
“I’d guessed as much. Or we would have heard something.”
“I have one more thing to try. If it doesn’t work . . . I’ll return in the morning, and we’ll see what we can do with your knife. But I just wanted you to know . . . if I don’t come back in the morning, I’m all right. And not to worry about me, or look for me.”
“You’re not abandoning us?” Her hands spasmed around his.
“No, never.”
She blinked. “I don’t understand.”
“That’s all right. Take care of Iselle. Don’t trust the Chancellor dy Jironal, ever.”
“I don’t need you to tell me that.”
“There’s more. My friend Palli, the March dy Palliar, knows the true story of how I was betrayed after Gotorget. How I came to be enemies with Dondo . . . won’t matter, but Iselle should know, his elder brother deliberately struck me from the list of men to be ransomed, to betray me to the galleys and my death. There’s no doubt. I saw the list, in his own hand, which I knew well from his military orders.”
She hissed through clenched teeth. “Can nothing be done?”
“I doubt it. If it could be proved, some half the lords of Chalion would likely refuse to ride under his banner thereafter. Maybe it would be enough to topple him. Or not. It’s a quarrel Iselle can store up in her quiver; someday she may be able to fire it.” He stared down at her face, turned up to his, ivory and coral and deep, deep ebony eyes, huge in the dim light. Awkwardly, he bent and kissed her.
Her breath stopped, then she laughed in startlement and put her hand to her mouth. “I’m sorry. Your beard scratches.”
“I . . . forgive me. Palli would make you a most honorable husband, if you’re inclined to him. He’s very true. As true as you. Tell him I said so.”
“Cazaril, what are you—”
Nan dy Vrit called from the Royesse’s chambers, “Betriz? Come here, please?”
He must part with everything now, even regret. He kissed her hands, and fled.
The night scramble over the roof of the Zangre, from main block to Fonsa’s Tower, was every bit as stomach-churning as Cazaril had anticipated. It was still raining. The moon shone fitfully behind the clouds, but its gloomy radiance didn’t help much. The footing was either gritty or breath-catchingly slippery under his naked soles, and numbingly cold. The worst part was the final little jump across about six feet to the top of the round tower. Fortunately, the leap was angled down and not up, and he didn’t end a simple suicide, wasted, spattered on the cobbles far below.