Baroness of Blood

TWENTY-NINE

Twice every day, Jorani went alone to the baron and gave him a spoonful of elixir. Peto would clench and unclench his fists, wiggle his toes. Once, he even managed to lift an arm a few inches off the bed before it fell, seemingly lifeless once more.

In truth, though Peto still could not speak, he was much stronger than Jorani suspected. However, Peto could not completely trust the Kislovan lord. He'd seen how Jorani had managed to step around the questions concerning his involvement in the poisonings, how he'd volunteered nothing as innocent people were condemned to death.

Then, two weeks into his treatment, Jorani had spooned the elixir into his mouth and whispered, "If you wish me to continue giving you this, you have to make me a promise. When you recover, you must not harm Ilsabet. You may take whatever steps are necessary to see that she never kills again, but I can't let you accuse her openly. If I have your word on this, squeeze my hand.

Peto did, but only because he had no choice.

However, with time to meditate, he saw the wisdom in doing exactly what Jorani demanded. He could not condemn the mother of his child, not here, and certainly not in civilized Sundell. To do so would put his own need for revenge above Lekai's reputa-tion. He would not see his son's rule fall under the dark clouds of murder and insanity, and have him burdened through every crisis with the quiet whispers that perhaps he took too much after his mother.

Besides, Peto owed Jorani that request, for Jorani was the only one who hadn't given up on his plight.

"Ilsabet thinks I've been feeding your some useless blend of herbs and honey," Jorani told him. "Actually I think the elixir's working far more effectively than you reveal to me. I wish we could continue, but this is the last dose I have. I have to go to Argentine to find the roots I need to mix more. It's harvest time; I have a good excuse for going, but V't't have to stay there a few weeks.

Weeks! Peto wondered how he'd get on with Jorani gone.

"In my absence, Ilsabet is going to allow Shaul to read you her letters from Sundell and keep you informed about Kislova, as I've done. I think she means it as torment, but I know you want the information."

Peto gripped Jorani's hand harder than usual, the sign they'd worked out for affirmative.

Ilsabet visited him later, bringing Lekai with her. The boy was cutting teeth, and he fretted and cried until Ilsabet placed him on the floor. No sooner had she put him down than he dug his fingers into Peto's woven blanket, pulled himself to his feet, and tried to climb back onto Peto's bed, screaming until Ilsabet lifted him and put him on Peto's chest.

"A strong boy. The old servants tell me even my father wasn't that strong at six months. At this rate he'll be lifting Ruven's little shield before he's a year old."

Peto, his head propped up on the pillow, managed to open his eyes just far enough to see the boy's face staring into his. Ilsabet, hovering close to keep Lekai from falling, was no more than an unfocused blur of red gown, pale skin and white-blond hair.

True to his promise, Shaul came that afternoon and read the most recent letter from Sundell-one from Peto's mother to Ilsabet. It was an acerbic account of how admirably Peto's twenty-year-old nephew ruled Sundell in his place. Ilsabet probably thought he'd find the news one more taunt, but Peto considered it a welcome contrast to Ilsabet's rule of Kislova.

When he'd finished the letter, Shaul began to talk to him, but not as Jorani did. Instead, he moved his mouth close to Peto's ear, whispering low and fearful.

"If you do hear me, forgive me for what I say, but I must try to tell you how I feel," he said. "This is a barbaric land. I can't help but think how we would have been treated if their invasion had succeeded. We should have done the same to the Obours, then placed a Sundell noble you despised in charge of these cursed people and gone home. Your wife seems to love you, Baron, but I cannot help comparing her to my own wife, whom I miss dearly. There is a coldness to the baroness that frightens me, and I doubt the guilt of those we executed.

"I've begun my own investigation into your poisoning. I've made a careful examination of the dungeons and found the tracks of a woman's shoe in an unused part of it. The baroness has been down there, yes, but only as far as the last occupied cell, and always in the company of the guards. The tracks I saw were made by a single person, and seem to lead nowhere. I believe there's some passage behind one of the walls, but everything sounds hollow down there. I'll continue to look.

"Baron, forgive me, but if what I suspect is true, I'll take your son and what remains of the Sundell guards, carry you to your coach, and leave this place. It may mean your death, but I think you might welcome that end, as I would if I were so helpless."

Peto wanted to take the man's hand, squeeze and nod, but he was afraid to do so, certain any movement on his part would give Shaul some hope of recovery and turn him from the course he'd decided on.

When his lieutenant had gone, Peto listened to the sounds of the castle-footsteps in the hall, the rattle of chamber pots, the giggling of servant girls, and the rustle of something moving in the wall behind his bed.

One of the river rats had gotten into the wall, he hoped. He prayed, don't let it have been her.

Shaul waited until the last of the dungeon guards had made his nightly rounds, then walked past him toward the cells, torch held high.

"Can we help you find someone, Lieutenant?" the soldier asked.

"Not at all," Shaul replied, hoping they were too lazy to follow him-relieved when they didn't.

He walked the twisting passage carefully. Slime coated the floor and the rock walls had begun to calcify, leaving milky white crystals where the wall met the floor. Shaul went to the spot where he'd found the footprints and continued on to the farthest wall. There, he began a careful inspection of the stones, looking for some sign of a door.

He found it far too easily and it opened as if it had not been latched. He held the torch out and tried to see some length into the passage, but it curved too soon. Though Shaul was far from a coward, too much responsibility rested on his shoulders for him to make an unwise move. He closed the door and retreated.

Upstairs, he hastily doubled the number of Sundell guards outside Baron Peto's room and placed two inside, then woke the rest of the Sundell force. Two men were stationed at the nursery door. Four were given orders to patrol outside Ilsabet's chambers to be certain she did not leave. AH but six of the rest were sent to guard the castle doors.

The last, armed with pickaxes as well as swords, went with Shaul to the dungeons. As he suspected, the guardhouse door was shut. He heard laughter, smelled smoke and ale. Shaul and his men made their way past it easily. Well down the passage, Shaul stopped.

"Stay here," he whispered to three of his men. "Yell a warning if anyone tries to get past you."

He continued on with the remaining three guards. The passage doorway lay open and waiting. Shaul lit a fresh torch and stepped inside.

They followed the passage as it wound slowly upward. With no knowledge of the spyholes and hidden doorways into the various rooms, Shaul passed them all by, ending finally at the door leading into Jorani's secret tower room. With the room no more than an extension of the passage, its entrance was more obvious, and just as obviously barred from inside.

"Should we break it in?" one of the guards asked.

Shaul had lost all sense of direction. The passage had curled upward, but only after a number of twists on the lower levels. They could be in Jorani's north tower or in the nearby smaller one that held the guardhouse above the main fork of the river. "Do it," he said.

While Shaul held the torch, the two largest guards beat on the door. Its old wood splintered under their combined attack until they were able to reach inside and lift the bar. A few more minutes of work and the rest of the door's planks fell away.

"Should we go in?" one of them asked.

As the man held the torch inside the room, Shaul peered past him. He recognized the room immediately. Vials sat uncorked on the table. One had overturned, its tarry liquid seeping into the pages of the book open beside it. It seemed as if Jorani had hastily abandoned the space to the spiders. Webbing was everywhere and a dozen dead rats lay rotting on the floor.

Though Shaul recalled the Kislovan lord's warning, he was curious about what it held. Til go in," he said.

The passage was no wider than the door. The soldier pulled the torch out of the room and moved sideways to let Shaul past him. As he did, the webbing stuck to the torch brushed his face. "Damned spiders," he swore. They were his last words.

Before Shaul could pass him, the soldier pitched against the opposite wall, dead before he hit the ground.

The second guard caught the torch as it fell. "What in the name…" he began, then fell backward.

Only Shaul's quick step back kept him from being burned or poisoned. He stared down at the torch flame, almost extinguished from the slime on the floor, glowing in the dead man's open eyes.

"Back away," Shaul said to the remaining guard. "Don't touch them. Try not to even touch the wall."

Easier said than done. At the first turn they lost all light, and by the time they reached the dungeons, they were coated with so much muck from countless falls that Shaul's own sentries challenged him as he approached.

"Where are the others?" someone asked.

"Poisoned. Don't touch us," he said, as if someone might want to. "Get us both a change of clothes and meet us outside."

He and the surviving guard went up the stairs and out the door that led to the river. There they stripped off their filthy clothing, kicked off their boots, and let the river carry it all where it would.

They worked quickly, without benefit of light, though even the brightest lamp wouldn't throw much light through the dense fog.

"What are we going to do now?" the guard asked.

Though he knew exactly what they would do, Shaul didn't answer. He didn't want the word to travel through the castle until he was ready, but tomorrow what remained of Sundell forces would retreat from Kislova. If he had any say, they'd never return.

In the passage they'd abandoned, the dead men lay, fresh meat for the tiny, lethal creature that dwelt in Jorani's abandoned room. It crawled over the nearest body until it reached the soft flesh of the neck, then began to eat. It feasted through the night then abandoned the room that had held it for so long and began its slow descent through the passage.

At dawn, Shaul roused the guards. He sent some of them to the stable to saddle the horses and assemble the team for Peto's carriage. Others were sent to Peto's room to ready him for the journey. "Be sure to tell him why you're there," Shaul said. "He hears. He understands. I'm certain of it."

Orders given, he went himself to the nursery to claim SundeH's heir, but found Ilsabet sitting beside an empty cradle. She stood when Shaul entered and bowed as if he were in charge. "The thief has come for the child. I'm sorry to report that the child is gone."

"Where have you taken him?"

"Someplace safe. Someplace where you'll never find him. Now I want every Sundell soldier out of Nimbus Castle, immediately."

"I will not leave without the baron."

"Then the baron's child will die."

"You'll tell me where he is," Shaul demanded, advancing on her.

She held up a glass vial. "Don't come any closer. I'll snap this and die before I confess anything to you."

"I'll search for him."

"Will you? If I hadn't left one of the doors to my labyrinth of passages open, you never would have found it. How long can an infant live without milk? Without water?"

All argument left him. "I'll do it. I'll order the soldiers gone, but I want to stay."

She laughed. Once he thought the sound beautiful, but now its coldness cut through him like a frigid wind. "In this barbaric land, so far away from your beloved wife? Very well, Lieutenant. Every lord needs one faithful servant, even a lord as helpless as my husband. Write a message to whomever now rules Sundell. Tell him if they think to invade, their precious baron and his heir will die. Tell them Kislova is mine, as it was my father's before me."

With no choice but to obey, Shaul went and wrote the letter. The fog parted as the riders left, then closed behind them. Shaul watched them go until they vanished into the swirling vapor.

The fog did not dissipate in the warmth of the afternoon, but lay dense and foreboding around Nimbus Castle. It seemed to have intelligence of its own, for shifting patterns took on shapes-of the dead, and of creatures never seen in these lands. Soldiers spoke of seeing their loved ones in it. Shaul himself had seen his wife, so real that he wanted to run to the vision and embrace it. He knew if he did, he would leave this place as had so many of the servants, or the Kislovan guards who had abandoned their posts to vanish in the dense darkness of the night.

For the first time in the memories of even the oldest Kislovans, the fog was not confined to the valley around the castle. In the days that followed the Sun-dell retreat, its long arms reached out through the streets of Pirie, through the hills above it, across the fields to the east and west. Even the dry land of Tygelt felt the fog's damp touch.

To the south at Argentine, Jorani stood on his bedroom balcony and watched it move across the land. He was not by nature superstitious, but he hadn't received any letters from the castle in over a week.

He knew what that meant, and what the fog meant.

In the time he'd spent at Argentine, he'd spoken at length with Rilca and learned exactly what sort of fertility potion she'd recommended to Ilsabet.

He'd also been working quickly, mixing the potent infusion that would bring either life or death to the baron. He'd finished the night before. Now it was time for the inevitable confrontation.

Sighing, he turned his back on the fog. With one final glance around his room, he went downstairs to where his horse was saddled, waiting to take him back to Ilsabet for the last time.

In the dank, secret passages of Nimbus Castle, the spider found little to eat, and it hurried on. It smelled the scents of the huge, succulent prey in the room just below it and searched in the dark for some crack wide enough to allow it to descend.