Exodus from the Long Sun

Chapter 13 — Making Peace

“Good man!” Oreb assured everyone at the table.

“This is Sciathan.” Silk indicated the tiny man on his left. “Sciathan landed near the Trivigaunti camp on Thelxday, with four of his fellow Fliers — I believe while the parade was still in progress. The Trivigauntis shot three of them and captured him. One escaped.”

Potto nodded, his round, cheerful face minored in the waxed and polished wood. “And he escaped yesterday with your help. I won’t congratulate you on that operation, just on its success. We could have managed it much better.”

Halfway down the table, Spider concurred. “Shag, yes!”

“It was hastily improvised,” Silk admitted. “We knew only that Sciathan had come to find Auk; we couldn’t even guess why he wanted him. Fortunately Generalissimo Oosik was able to get through to the Guardsmen on duty in the Juzgado—”

Loris interrupted. “They’ve been replaced.”

“That’s good. I’m glad nothing worse was done to them. On Generalissimo Oosik’s instructions, they pretended that they had arrested Auk, and he was able to bribe a turnkey to put him in Sciathan’s cell. Quite frankly, we thought it likely that Auk would leave him there after he had talked to him, at least for the time being. We were extremely reluctant to worsen our relations with the Trivigauntis.”

Silk scanned the faces beyond Hyacinth’s. Maytera Mint looked angry; Bison, beside her, angrier still. Oosik, eager and expectant, a slug gun across his lap; he had wanted both councillors killed, and might conceivably have a subordinate stationed somewhere to kill them.

“If things had gone as we expected,” Silk continued, “the rest would have been easy. Auk would have been escorted out by Guardsmen, and Siyuf’s sentries would have assumed that he had been questioned and was being released.

Auk himself said, “Only I couldn’t. We got to get to Mainframe. That’s him and me and everybody that’s going with me.” He glanced at Quetzal and Remora, seeking support.

Potto smiled more broadly than ever. “I congratulate you again on the outcome. It was all we could wish for and more. Just the same, our enemies retain four propulsion modules, and three undamaged pairs of wings.”

Hyacinth said loudly, “You’re the enemy!”

Maytera Mint shook her head. “They were the enemy, up to Thelxday night. Now we’ve been betrayed, and we’re no longer sure. I doubt that the Trivigauntis are either. We’re all Vironese here, everybody except the Flier. If Councillor Loris is really here to make peace, we ought to welcome it.”

She closed her eyes. “I do. Echidna, forgive me!” On the other side of the table, Remora nodded emphatically.

Silk asked, “Have you come to make peace, Councillor Loris? Councillor Potto?”

“Our azoths have been confiscated.” Potto giggled. “I was searched! Me! It was absolutely hilarious, but calling this a peace conference is funnier.”

“I didn’t say it was a peace conference,” Maytera Mint snapped, “I implied it could become one. It should, if there’s any chance for peace. As for taking your weapons, His Eminence and I went to parlay without any, and you know what you did to us. Because of that, this parley is being held on our ground with us armed and you disarmed. I will insist upon the same arrangements for any future parleys as well.”

Loris snarled, “Your troops are melting away as we speak!” to which Potto added, “It was worth it to see your face, my dear young General, when I threatened you with the teapot. I’d do it again, just for that. But you have no right—”

Oosik interrupted him, drawing his needler and holding it up. “Here is one of my weapons. It will kill me, or General Mint, or even Calde Silk. Do you want it?” He laid it on the polished tabletop between them, and gave it a push that sent it past the middle of the table.

While Silk counted three beatings of his heart, no one spoke. Potto stared at the needler before him, and at last shook his head.

“Then do not complain to us about your weapons,” Oosik told him.

Silk rapped for order. “Like you, Generalissimo, I do not believe that Councillor Potto is entitled to complain about the loss of his weapons. We are entitled to complain about the projected loss of ours, however, and I’m not at all sure that Councillor Potto — although he is inclined to be proud of his information — knows about that. Councillor Loris seems to be less than current with regard to General Mint’s volunteers.”

He addressed Potto directly. “Councillor Loris said they were melting away. Colonel Bison reports that they’ve melted altogether. We had to hurry it, and hurry it we did. Do you know why?”

Loris said, “He doesn’t, but he’ll never admit it. I’m not so pigheaded. Why, Calde?”

Silk nodded to Bison, who said, “Generalissimo Siyuf has ordered the Guard to collect our peoples’ slug guns and store them in the Juzgado.” Bison leaned forward, his eyes on Loris and his face tense. “It was exactly — exactly! — the right order to split the Guard and our people, and she didn’t even try to route it through Generalissimo Oosik. She sent it to the individual officers in command of the brigades.”

Potto put in, “Except Brigadier Erne.”

“Except for Erne. That’s right. We were lucky, in that the brigadiers wanted to clear those orders with Generalissimo Oosik. He countermanded them, naturally. Now we’ve dispersed our people so that it will be impossible for the Trivigauntis to disarm them themselves.”

Potto’s giggle mounted to a shrill laugh. He slapped his thigh. “You can’t use them against us unless you call them up again. And you won’t dare call them up because your friends from Trivigaunte will disarm them. You’re in a pickle!”

Maytera Mint told him, “Yours is worse.”

She glanced at Silk, who told Potto, “We have a strategy, you see — one that you cannot frustrate. The Trivigauntis are preparing to mount a vigorous offensive against you. You know that, I’m sure.”

Loris nodded.

“I listened to Generalissimo Siyuf outline her plans last night, and I’ve been thinking about our options all day. In order to win, all that we have to do now is sit back and let them carry out those plans. She is a rigid disciplinarian, and she’s never been down in those tunnels. Furthermore, a she’s not greatly concerned about the lives of her troops, especially her infantry, which consists largely of conscripts.”

Silk leaned back, his fingers joined in a pointed tower. “As I said, all we have to do is to let her do as she plans. There will be a terrible war of attrition, fought underneath the city between foreigners and soldiers most of the men and women who live in it have scarcely seen. In the end, one side or the other will triumph, and it won’t make much difference which it is, since the winner will be too weak to resist General Mint’s horde when we reassemble it. Either way, we’ll be masters of the city. And either way, you will both be dead.”

Potto sneered. Loris said smoothly, “A few minutes ago somebody was saying we’re all Vironese here, with a single exception. Was it you, General? You, whose troops are to complete the destruction once Viron’s army has defeated the Trivigauntis for you?”

“Yes,” she told him. “It was.

Silk said, “There are at least three major objections to the strategy I have just outlined, Councillor, though I do not doubt that it would succeed — that it will, if we choose to employ it. You’ve voiced the first yourself: it entails the destruction of Viron’s army. The second is that it will take at least half a year, and very possibly several years; either would be too long, as we’ll explain in a moment. The third is that there is one part of Siyuf’s force that we must have, and it is exactly the part that would almost certainly escape us. I refer to General Saba’s airship.

“Sciathan, will you please tell these councillors what you told me?”

The Flier nodded, his small, pinched face solemn. “We of Mainframe, we Crew, were visited by the god you call Tartaros. It was the morning of the day on which I was captured.”

Auk put in, “Right after he left me, see?”

“His instructions were urgent. We were to find this man Auk,” Sciathan pointed, “and bring him and his followers to Mainframe, so that they can leave the Whorl to journey to a short-sun sphere outside.” Sciathan turned to Silk. “They do not believe me.”

“They need only believe that I believe you,” Silk told him, “as I do. Continue.”

“This very wise man Calde Silk has spoken to you of the airship, the great vessel that flies without wings, stirring the air with wooden arms. The god also spoke to us of this airship. We were to employ it to carry back this man who is my friend now, and those who wish to accompany him.”

Profound conviction lent intensity to Sciathan’s voice. “It cannot be accomplished otherwise. No, not though a god should demand it. He cannot fly as we do, nor can the others who wish to accompany him. For them to walk or ride animals would consume many months. There are mountains and deserts, and many swift rivers.”

“We’d need enough bucks with slug guns and launchers to fight our way past anybody that tried to stop us,” Auk added. “We ain’t got them.” Seeing Chenille enter with a tray, he inquired, “What you got there, Jugs? Tea and cookies?”

She nodded, “Maytera thought you might like something. She’s busy with Stony and Patera, so Nettle and I baked.”

“There is too much eating here,” Sciathan protested in a whisper, “also, too much drinking. Behold that one.” He indicated Potto with a nod.

“I agree,” Silk said, accepting a cup of tea, “but we must consider hospitality.”

“In short,” Loris was saying, “you want us to help you take over the airship. I won’t argue about your reason for wanting it, though I might if I thought we could do it. I doubt that we can.”

Potto rocked from side to side, bubbling with mirth. “I might. Yes, I might! Silk, I’ll make you an offer on behalf of my cousins and myself, but you’ll have to trust me.”

Maytera Mint shook her head, but Silk told her, “This is progress, whether we accept it or not. Let’s hear it.”

“I’ll seize the airship for you within a month, capturing as many of the technicians who operate it as possible. I’ll turn them over to you after they’ve agreed to cooperate with you in every way.” He tittered. “They will, I promise you, when I’ve had them for a few days. Ask the general there.”

He turned to Chenille, who was serving Remora. “May I have a cup of your tea, my dear? I can’t drink it, but I like the smell.”

Maytera Mint snorted.

“I do, my dear young General. You think I’m mocking you, when I’m simply indulging the only pleasure of the flesh left to me.” As Chenille poured, he added, “Thank you very, very much. Five bits? Would that be acceptable?”

Chenille stared. “Is this… I don’t—”

Silk said, “Councillor Potto is merely using you to make a point, Chenille. He prefers to make his points in the most objectionable way possible, as General Mint and I can testify. What is it, Councillor?”

“That even trivial things are seldom free.” Potto smiled. “That there is a price to pay, even when it’s a trivial price. Want to hear mine for the airship?”

Silk nodded, feeling Hyacinth’s hand tighten about his,

Loris said, “I’ve no idea what he has in mind, but I’m going to attach one of my own first. You’re to do nothing to interfere with us during the month specified. No attacks on any position of ours, including Erne’s.”

Silk said, “We wouldn’t, of course — if we accepted. But it’s your cousin’s price that concerns me.”

“Two men.” Potto held up two fingers. “I want to borrow one and keep the other. Can’t you guess which they are?”

“I believe so. Perhaps I should have made it clear that I haven’t the least intention of accepting. Even if you had offered to do it for nothing, as a gesture of goodwill, I still could not have accepted.”

Auk started to protest, but Silk cut him off. “Let me say this once and for all, not just to you, Auk, and not just to these councillors; but to everyone present. Trivigaunte is our ally. There has been friction between us, true. I daresay that there is always friction in every alliance, even the small and simple alliance of husband with wife.”

Hyacinth’s lips brushed his cheek.

“I did not ask the Rani to send us help, but I welcomed it with open arms when she did. I have no intention of turning against her and her people now, because of a little friction. Maytera Marble often tells me things she’s learned from watching children’s games, and I received the greatest lesson of my life during one such game; now I want to propose a game for us. Let us pretend for a few minutes that I’m Generalissimo Siyuf. Will all of you accept that, for the sake of the game?”

His eyes went from face to face. “Very well, I am Siyuf. I understand that some of you are nursing grievances in spite of my long and swift march to your rescue, and in spite of the aid I brought you. Let me hear them now. There is not one I cannot dispose of.”

Loris said, “I hope you’re not so deep in your part as to shoot me.”

Silk smiled and shook his head.

“Very well then, Generalissimo Siyuf. I have a complaint, exactly as you said. I’m speaking as the presiding officer of the Ayuntamiento, the legitimate government of this city. You and your troops are interfering in our internal affairs. That is an act of war.”

Silk heaved a sigh, and his gaze strayed to Chenille, who was pouring tea for Maytera Mint. “Councillor, your government was never legitimate, because it was established by murdering your lawful calde. I can’t say which of you ordered his murder, or whether you acted jointly. For the purposes of discussion, let’s assume it was Councillor Lemur, and that he acted alone. You nevertheless—”

“I didn’t intend to get into this,” Loris protested. His craggy face was grim.

“You introduced the subject yourself when you referred to yours as the legitimate government, Councillor. I was about to say that though you searched for the adopted son Calde Tussah had named as his successor, as your duty required, you did not hold elections for new councillors, as your Charter demands. My ally Calde Silk governs because the people of your city wish it, and so his claim is better than yours. Aid given by a friendiy power is not an act of war. How could it be? Are you saying that we of Trivigaunte attacked your city? It welcomed us with a parade.”

Silk waited for a response; when none came, he said, “You have already heard that I know the contents of your previous calde’s will. I found a copy in your Jurgado. Let me say, too, that in my opinion the adopted son you searched for with so much diligence did not exist. Calde Tussah invented this son to draw your attention from an other child, an illegitimate child who may or may not have been born before his death. If she had already been born, referring to an adopted son was doubly misleading, as he doubtless intended it to be.” Silk sipped his tea. “Don’t go, Chenille.”

Potto sprang to his feet. “You!”

“Did you kill my father, Councillor?” Chenille’s dark eyes flashed. “The real one? I don’t know, but I don’t think it was really Councillor Lemur. I think it was you!”

Oosik raised his slug gun, telling Potto to sit down.

“If you did and evidence can be found,” Silk continued, “you will have to stand trial. So far we have none.”

“Are you Silk or Siyuf?” Potto demanded.

“Silk at present. I’ll resume the game in a moment. Your Cognizance, will you speak? I ask it as a favor.” Upon Silk’s shoulder, Oreb fluttered uneasily.

“If you want me to, Patera Calde.” Quetzal’s glittering gaze was fixed on Potto. “Not many of us knew Tussah. Patera Remora did, and Loris. Did you, Generalissimo?”

Oosik shook his head. “Twenty years ago I was a captain. I saw him several times, but I doubt that he knew my name.”

“He knew mine, eh?” Remora cleared his throat. “I had, er, was coadjutor in those — um — happier days. Ah — mother still living, eh, General? It, um, sufficient in itself, hey? Though there were other favorable circumstances.”

Chenille, who had stopped pouring tea, murmured, “I wish I knew more about him.”

“I, um, disliked him, I confess,” Remora told her. “Not hatred, you understand. And there were times, eh? But I was, er, substantially alone in it. Wrong, too, eh? Wrong. I, um, concede it now. Loud, brawling, vigorous, and I was — um — determined, quite determined secretly, to be offended. But he, er, put the city first. Always did, and I — ah — accorded insufficient weight to it.”

“He wouldn’t flatter my then coadjutor, Patera Calde,” Quetzal explained. “He flattered me, however. He flattered me by confiding in me. He never married. Are you both aware of that?”

Silk and Chenille nodded.

“Clergy take a vow of chastity. Even with its support, chastity is too severe for many. He confided to me, as one friend to another, that his housekeeper was his mistress.”

“Not — ah — under the Seal, eh?”

Quetzal’s hairless head swayed on its long neck. “I don’t and won’t speak of shriving, though I shrove him once or twice. This was at dinner, one at which only he and I were present. If he were alive I wouldn’t speak of it. He’s dead and can’t speak for himself. He introduced the woman to me. He asked me to take care of her should he die.

Chenille said, “If that was my mother, you didn’t.”

“I did not. I couldn’t find her. Though she was good-looking in her way, she was an ignorant woman of the servant class. I know she disliked me, and I think she was afraid of me. She was guilty of adultery weekly, and unable to imagine forgiveness for it.”

Silk said, “You searched for her as soon as you heard Calde Tussah was dead?”

“I did, Patera Calde. Not as thoroughly as I should, since she was alive and I failed to find her.”

Loris said, “I remember her now. The gardener’s wife. She oversaw the kitchen and the laundry. A virago.”

Quetzal nodded frigidly. “She was the type he admired, and he was the type she did.”

Auk began, “This gardener cully—”

“A marriage of convenience, performed by my prothonotary in five minutes. There would have been talk if Tussah had a single woman in this palace. His gardener wasn’t intelligent, though a good man and a hard worker. He was proud to be seen as married, as a man who’d won the love of an attractive woman. I imagine she dominated him completely. I thought they would look for new employment when Tussah died, and I planned to make places for them on our staff. They didn’t. I know now, thanks to Patera Calde, that they became beggars. At the time I assumed they’d known something about Tussah’s death, and had been silenced.”

Chenille said, “We sold watercress. But if somebody wanted to give us money, we took it. I used to ask for money, too, and run errands. Do little jobs.” She swallowed. “After a while I found out there were things men would give me half a card for. It was a fortune to us, enough food for a week.” She stared at her listeners, challenging them.

Loris smiled. “Blood will tell, they say.”

“Blood won’t,” Silk declared. “Blood’s dead — I killed him. But if Blood were alive, he might tell you that it was good business to give rust, at first, to the young women at Orchid’s, and to sell it to them afterward — to keep them in constant need of money, and thus keep them there for as long as he and Orchid let them stay. The Ayuntamiento let him bring rust and other drugs into our city, in return for what I must call criminal services.”

Hyacinth said, “I use it sometimes, and I’ve been telling myself that if Chen can kick it so can I, and I hope it’s true. But it’s hard, don’t ever believe anybody who says it’s not.

Quetzal gave Loris a lipless smile. “Blood does tell, my son.” “Watch out!” Oreb advised; it was not clear to which he spoke.

Maytera Mint asked, “Do you know why they didn’t try to find another situation, Calde?”

“I don’t; but I believe I can guess. Chenille’s mother had recently given birth to the calde’s child, or if she had not, she was carrying that child — and it was her child, too. She must have guessed, or known, that the calde had been murdered. At that time, the Ayuntamiento was searching everywhere for the adopted son mentioned in the calde’s will; and she would have supposed, as I believe most people did, that it would kill him if it found him. She needn’t have been an educated woman, or an imaginative one, to guess what would happen to another child of the calde’s, if it learned that she existed.”

Silk filled his lungs, feeling a twinge from his wounded chest. “We’ve gotten far off the subject, but since we’re here, let’s finish what we’ve begun. Calde Tussah left a substantial estate. I have it now as trustee for his daughter; I’ll turn it over to Chenille as soon as she reaches twenty, the legal age of maturity.”

“Good girl!” Oreb assured everyone.

Loris told Silk, “That will have to be adjudicated by the courts, I’m afraid.”

He shook his head. “Our government is sorely in need of funds, Councillor. We have a war to prosecute, in addition to all the usual civic expenses; and we gave each of General Mint’s troopers two cards, as well as his or her weapon, before we sent them home.”

Loris said, “You’re generous with the taxpayers’ money.”

“In order to do it, we’ve taken control of the Fisc; the city assumes responsibility for inactive accounts, and for the accounts in trust, such as Calde Tussah’s. We’ve sequestered the accounts of the members of the Ayuntamiento, as you know. Do you want to talk about it now?”

Sciathan said, “We must speak more of the airship. It is urgent. This Potto says he will get it, but in one month. We have a few days at most. Not more.”

“Why?” Hyacinth asked him, speaking across Silk.

Auk told him, “Let ’em jaw about the money first. If you don’t, they’ll keep going back to it.”

“Wise man!” Oreb exclaimed.

Silk rapped the table. “Which will it be, the airship or your accounts? Personally I’d prefer to deal with Generalissimo Oosik’s complaints against Generalissimo Siyuf, and General Mint and Colonel Bison’s. It’s usually best, I’ve found, to consider minor matters first and get them out of the way. Otherwise they cloud everyone’s thinking, as Auk says.”

“We knew you’d stolen our money,” Loris told him, “but we also knew it would be useless to protest the theft.”

Maytera Mint declared, “You want to make peace after all.”

“Hardly. But we’re prepared to offer you new terms of surrender, much more liberal terms than those I proposed at Blood’s, which were intended merely as an opening point for negotiations.”

“You said at the time that they were not negotiable,” Silk reminded him.

“Certainly. One always does. You were willing to listen to Potto’s proposal. Will you hear ours as well? Our joint proposal?”

“Of course.”

“Then let me first explain why you should accept it. You assert that you have a strategy that will assure your victory, though you are loath to follow it. You are mistaken, but we are not. We have a strategy of our own, one that will assure your defeat in under a year.”

Oosik said, “Clearly you do not, or you would follow it,” and Silk nodded.

“You have been assisting us with it,” Loris continued, smiling, “for which we are appropriately grateful.”

Potto grinned. “We’re giving away slug guns too!”

“We are,” Loris confirmed, “and other weapons as well, needlers mostly. We still have access to several stores of weapons. I hope you will excuse my keeping their locations confidential.”

“Giving them to who?” Bison inquired.

“In a moment. Some preparation is necessary. You were underground not long ago, Colonel. The tunnels are extensive, are you aware of it? You saw not a thousandth part of them.”

“I’ve been told the calde went into them from a shrine by the lake, and that General Mint went in from a house north of the city and came out on the Palatine. If those she saw and those he saw belong to the same complex, it’s pretty large.”

Maytera Mint told him, “Much larger than that, according to what I’ve learned from Spider.”

“I want him,” Potto put in. “I want him and the Flier. I offered the airship and you refused it. Name your price.”

Silk sighed. “I said that trivial points tend to obscure discussions. This is just such a point, so let’s dispose of it. Spider is our prisoner. We will exchange him for one of equal value, during this truce or another. Have you a prisoner to offer us? Who is it?”

Potto shook his head. “I will have, soon. Give him back, and you’ll get double value as soon as I have it.”

“No!” Maytera Mint struck the table with her small fist, and Hyacinth’s catachrest thrust his furry little head above the tabletop, saying, “Done bay saw made, laddie.”

“Of course not,” Silk told Potto, “but may I propose an alternative I believe workable?”

“Let’s hear it’

“In a moment. You also want Sciathan.”

“Only temporarily.” Potto giggled. “I’ll pay you a line for every day I keep him over a fortnight, how’s that? Like a library book. I still have a lot more money than you stole.”

Auk declared, “I heard about you from Maytera, and you ain’t taking him.”

“Auk speaks for me as well,” Silk said, “and for all of us. Sciathan is a free individual—”

“A free man,” Loris amended.

“Precisely. He is not mine to give or keep. He is here in this palace as my guest, and nothing more — nothing less, I ought to say. If you believe he’s under restraint, ask him.”

Remora tossed back his lank black hair. “’Sacred unto Pas are the life and property of the stranger you welcome.’”

“Furthermore, he would disappoint you. He’s been beaten and interrogated already by Generalissimo Siyut who hoped to learn how the Fliers’ propulsion modules operate. Councillor Lemur killed Iolar, who was another Flier, for the same reason; I shrove Iolar before he died. Since Lemur himself died soon after, you may not be aware of it. Are you?”

Loris shrugged. “We were aware of his capture, of course. What Lemur learned from him died with Lemur, unfortunately.”

“Lemur learned nothing from him; that was why Lemur killed him. I discussed the propulsion modules with Sciathan today. He freely conceded that their principle is important; that it would be valuable to our city or any other is obvious; but he doesn’t have it, and neither did Iolar.

“The scientists who make them remain in Mainframe, safe from capture. The Fliers who use them are kept ignorant of the principle, for reasons they understand and approve. It’s an elementary precaution, one that you and your fellow councillors ought to have anticipated. It would have been anticipated, surely, by anyone not blinded by the itch for power. If you want to find out how they operate, you might capture one of those the Trivigauntis have and take it apart; but I doubt that I could tell leaf from root.”

“Naturally you couldn’t.” Potto giggled. “Have you got one? Name your price for Spider. A hundred cards? I want to hear it, and the price of the propulsion module, too, if you’ve got one.”

“We don’t. Councillor Loris, Councillor Lemur told me that he was a bio, not a chem. Are you?”

“Certainly.”

“Despite the marble bookend you crushed at Blood’s?”

“This is not my natural body. Physically, I’m on our boat, well out of your reach. This body,” Loris touched his black velvet tunic, “is a chem, if you like. To simplify matters, I won’t object to your calling it that. I manipulate it from my bed, making it move and speak as I did when I was younger.”

Maytera Mint told Silk, “I explained all this, I think.”

“Yes, you did, Maytera; I’m very grateful. Spider should be grateful as well.”

“If it gets me loose,” Spider grunted.

“It very well may. From what General Mint has reported, counterintelligence has been your chief concern. I’m not so naive as to think that your organization — what remains of it — could not be put to other uses, however; and I noticed that Councillor Potto wanted you back when he was planning to seize control of General Saba’s airship.”

Potto said, “I do anyhow. He’s valuable to us.”

“Clearly. Primarily in frustrating spies?”

Loris said, “Primarily, yes.”

“Spider, General Mint says you’re a decent man, a patriot in your way. If I were to release you to Councillor Potto, as you wish, would you be willing to give me your solemn promise that in so far as our forces are concerned, you would confine your activities entirely to counterintelligence? By ‘our forces’ I intend those headed by Generalissimo Oosik and Auk — not only the Guard, but General Mint’s volunteers, including those commanded by her through Colonel Bison.”

Spider licked his lips. “If Councillor Potto don’t tell me I can’t, yeah, I will.”

Potto raised a hand. “Wait. I think I heard something funny. Does your friend Auk have a private horde now?”

Auk grinned. “The best thieves in the whole city, the ones that’s going with me and Sciathan. A month for the airship, you said. I figure we might nab it a whole lot sooner.”

Sciathan stood up. “We must! If the Cargo will not leave the Whorl, Pas will drive everyone out as one drives a bear from a cave. He will starve and afflict Crew and Cargo until we go.”

Loris’s icy blue eyes twinkled. “A rain of blood. The Chrasmologic Writings speak of such things, I’m told.”

Remora nodded solemnly. “Ah — worse, Councillor. Plagues, hey? Famine, er, likewise.”

“Listen to me!” Sciathan s excited tenor cracked. “If a landing craft leaves, even one, Pas will wait for more. But if none leave everyone will be driven out. Do you understand now? We Crew have a craft ready, but so much Crew cannot be spared so early in the Plan. For this reason Tartaros has readied Auk for us, and we must have them!”

“Me and my knot,” Auk explicated.

Chenille added, “That’s me. I hope you don’t mind that I stayed to listen, Patera. But when Auk goes, I go too.”

“With my blessing,” Potto chortled. “Oh, yes! Very much so. I’ll be delighted to lose my accuser, and have the enemy lose its airship.”

He turned to Silk. “Will Spider be free to act in any way we choose against your cherished allies? That’s what it sounded like. You didn’t expect me to miss that, did you?”

“No.” Silk’s expression was guarded. “But if you had, I would have mentioned it to him. You may not be aware of it, but Maytera Mint left the tunnels with two other prisoners. One was a convict named Eland. Eland was murdered yesterday morning in the Grand Manteion.”

“A mystery!” Potto clapped his pudgy hands like a happy child. “I love them!”

“I don’t. I try to clear them up when I can, and I’ve been trying to clear up this one. My first thought was that this man Eland had been killed by some old enemy, most plausibly someone who had attended the sacrifice there the previous night and had seen him. I asked Auk to find out who that enemy might be, and had one of General Skate’s officers inquire as well.”

Silk shifted his attention from Potto to Spider. “The harder they looked, the less probable it appeared. Eland had not been a thief, as I had assumed, but a horse trainer who had killed his employer in a fit of rage. Presumably there was some public sympathy for him, since he was not executed. Auk could find nobody who knew of anyone who bore him a murderous grudge.”

Maytera Mint asked, “Did you consider Urus, Calde?”

“We did, but we quickly dismissed him. Eland had been a useful subordinate in the tunnels, where Urus would have had any number of opportunities to kill him in complete safety. Why wait? Why run the risk of being shot by Acting Corporal Slate, as the killer very nearly was? Besides, I’ve gotten a sketchy description of the killer, and if it’s even roughly correct, he was neither dirty nor dressed in rags. I’ll tell you later how I obtained it.”

“Got to protect his sources,” Spider explained. “That’s how it is, Maytera.”

“Most of Eland’s friends and relatives had assumed he was dead long ago,” Silk continued, “yet someone with a needler had quite deliberately climbed into the choir of the Grand Manteion to shoot him. Why? After I’d turned over the question for an hour or two, it occurred to me that someone might have made a mistake — that he might have intended to shoot another person entirely, and mistaken Eland for that person. Chenille here was able to tell me in considerable detail how everyone present had been dressed, and Auk and Spider appeared to be the only possibilities.”

Eyeing Spider, Oreb whistled.

“There were a number of sibyls present. All wore habits, and could be dismissed at once. So could Patera Incus and the body of Patera Jerboa — both were robed in black, as I am. No one could mistake a man for Chenille, and so on. If an error had been made, the intended victim was clearly Auk or Spider.”

Auk said, “I don’t think he was shooting at me.”

“Neither do I,” Silk told him. “You were near the altar, and thus somewhat nearer the killer. Furthermore, you were in a relatively well lit area. Spider and Eland were in a chapel behind the sanctuary, a more distant area as well as a more dimly lit one. I would guess that the killer had been given a verbal description of Spider, and had been told that he was being guarded by soldiers.”

Silk turned back to Spider. “Were you and Eland awake when he was shot?”

Spider nodded.

“Were you standing up?”

Spider shook his head. “We were sittin’ on the floor. That soldier wouldn’t let us get up unless we had a reason.”

“There you have it.” Silk shrugged. “At least, you have as much as I do. Sitting would tend to conceal the difference in size. Slate was guarding both of you, and from what I’ve heard, neither of you had been given an opportunity to wash and change clothes, as General Mint and Patera Remora did. In the dim light of the chapel, the killer may not have seen you at all. Or he may simply have felt that Eland corresponded more closely to the description he had been given.

“The question then became, who would want to kill Spider? Plausibly, the Ayuntamiento or the Trivigauntis. The first because he knows a great deal about its espionage and counterespionage activities, and about the tunnels under the city, information that he might pass on to Generalissimo Oosik, to General Mint, or to me.”

“I’d know about it. I’d have ordered it.” Potto giggled. “I didn’t.”

Silk nodded. “And you could easily have found an assassin who knows Spider by sight, I would think. The Trivigauntis are our allies — but they are Spider’s enemies, and he is said to know a great deal about their spies in Viron.” He fell silent.

Maytera Mint said, “You can’t be sure this is true.”

“No, I can’t; but I believe it very well may be. We stole a prisoner from Generalissimo Siyuf. Is it absurd to suppose that she might try to kill one we had? Since that may have been the case, it would be manifestly unjust to limit Spider’s activities with regard to Siyuf and her horde.”

“They went after me, so I can go after them,” Spider said.

“Exactly.”

Hyacinth touched Silk’s arm. “I don’t understand. Are we for them or against them?”

Maytera Mint was staring at Silk. “I feel this is almost ancient history, but before all this started — before poor Maytera Rose passed on, I felt that I understood you, just as I felt I understood myself. In the past ten days or so you’ve become somebody else, somebody I don’t understand at all, and so have I. You’re married now, I witnessed the ceremony, and I’m thinking about marrying too.”

A change in her expression told Silk that Bison’s hand had found hers.

After a moment of silence she added, “You’ve lost your faith, or most of it, I think. What’s happened to us?”

Potto laughed loudly.

Quetzal, seated between Oosik and Loris at the other end of the table, murmured, “Circumstances have changed, Maytera. That’s all, or nearly all. There is an essential core at the center of each man and woman that remains unaltered no matter how life’s externals may be transformed or recombined. But it’s smaller than we think.”

Silk nodded his agreement.

“If I — ah — permitted.” Remora pushed back the errant lock of lank, black hair. “The General and I were companions in, um, adversity. The — ah — spirit. The inalterable core, as His Cognizance has, um, finely. The spirit that survives even death. It grows when trod upon, like the dandelion. I have learned it, eh? So may you, if you — um — reflect.”

He stared down at his long, bony hands. “Wouldn’t have killed Spider, hey? In those tunnels? Would’ve, er, failed. But I wish now I had tried, or very nearly. And here, eh? No longer coadjutor. Got my own manteion, hey? After all these years. Moved in today.”

He spoke to Silk. “I, er, necessary that I talk to you about it, eh, Calde? Sun Street. Accounts and so on. When we’re, um, we’ve adjourned.”

Silk managed to say, “Gladly, Patera.”

“Stripped of, er, power. That’s the expression. Smaller, outside, growing, inside. I — ah — feel it.” He held up the gammadion he wore; it was of plain iron.

As much to cover his embarrassment as her own, Maytera Mint asked Silk, “You said everything Siyuf’s done since her horde arrived could be defended, and she’s our ally, and yet you’re letting Spider go? Free to attack her and the rest of the Trivigauntis in any way Potto chooses?”

Potto rocked with merriment. “Be her again, Silk, and you can shoot yourself.”

He shook his head. “I’m not being asked to defend Siyuf’s actions now, but my own. I have changed, I suppose, General, as you say; but I don’t think I’ve changed as much as you may imagine. The faith I had, I had learned as one learns other lessons — from reading and lectures and my mother’s example and conversation. I’m in the process, I believe, of replacing it with new faith gained from experience — from circumstances, as His Eminence says. You have to wreck the old structure, or so it seems to me, before you can build the new one; otherwise, it’s always getting in the way.”

He held out his hand to Hyacinth, who took it.

“We’re married, as you say. I don’t believe my mother ever was. Did I tell you that?”

Maytera Mint shook her head.

“I told Maytera Marble, I’m sure. I know now, or think I know, how — how I came to be, as a result of something that happened to me in the tunnels, or at least underground. You don’t understand me, I know.”

“Certainly I do! You don’t have to talk about that, Calde, or anything. But I certainly wasn’t asking about that.”

Silk shook his head. “You don’t, you merely suppose you do. Councillor Potto, here’s a mystery for you. Can you solve it? I’ve lied about it once already tonight, I warn you; and I’ll lie again if I must.”

Maytera Mint objected, “You don’t tell lies, Patera.”

Silk shook his head. “We all do when we must. When we’re asked about something we heard in shriving, for example. We say we don’t know. This is something I have to lie about, at least until it no longer matters, simply because everyone would think I lied if I told the truth.”

Maytera Marble’s voice surprised him. “Not I, Patera.”

He turned in his chair to look at her.

“Chenille brought in tea and cookies, the ones she and Nettle baked, and she never came back. Horn seems to have disappeared, too. I thought something might be wrong.”

“A great many things are, Moly,” Silk told her, “but we’re trying to set a few right. Do you remember what I told you about my enlightenment? I saw Patera Pike praying, praying so very hard year after year for help for his manteion, remember?”

She nodded.

“Until the Outsider spoke in his heart, telling him his prayer was granted. When I had seen that, I waited, waited full of expectation, to see what help would be sent to him.”

Maytera Marble nodded. “I remember, Patera.”

“It arrived, and it was me. That was all it was. Me. Laugh, Councillor.”

Potto did not oblige.

“But for a moment, ever so briefly, I saw myself as Patera Pike had seen me then. It was a humbling experience. Better, it was a salutary one. I’m emboldened by thememory now, when I find myself having to reckon with councillors and generalissimos, people whose company is alien to me, and whose opposition I find terrifying.”

Maytera Marble nodded, “As they find yours, Patera.”

“I doubt it.” Shaking his head, Silk addressed Loris. “We’re prepared to offer you a very good bargain, Councillor — an exceptional one. Spider has promised he’ll confine himself to counterespionage as regards our forces if we will release him. We ask no oath on the Writings, no ceremony of that kind; a man’s word is good or it isn’t, and General Mint has indicated that his is. In exchange, we ask only your present self. I emphasize present — the Councillor Loris here with us. You can divert your consciousness to another such body as soon as we’re through conferring, and I assume that you will; it won’t be a violation of our bargain. Do you agree to the exchange?”

“No,” Loris said. “I have no second body available.”

Potto exclaimed, “I will!”

“I’m afraid not, Councillor. When you have a prisoner of similar importance, an exchange can be effected. Until then, Spider must remain with us. Councillor Loris, are you certain you won’t reconsider?”

Loris shook his head — then stared at Remora, who was seated to Potto’s right.

Quetzal murmured, “He has these fits occasionally, poor fellow. I think Patera Calde witnessed one last week.”

“I did, shortly before my bride and I were reunited at Ermine’s.” Longing to embrace her, Silk tore his gaze from Hyacinth’s.

“They’re coming, Silk.” Remora announced in a flattened voice. “A colonel and a hundred cavalry troopers.”

Oreb whistled sharply.

“Thank you. Auk, I’m afraid this means we have very little time. You and Sciathan must leave at once by a side door. Your followers are meeting at the Cock? Warn them that Trivigaunti patrols may search for them. Chenille had better go with you; otherwise they’re liable to take her to get you.”

Loris stood. “We’d better leave, too.”

“Not with us,” Auk snapped. “Out the front, if you’re going. C’mon, Upstairs. C’mon, Jugs.”

Potto rose, giggling. “He doesn’t share Silk’s love for you, Cousin Loris.”

Silk motioned for both to sit again. “You have come under a flag of truce. They’ll respect that, surely.”

“So did we,” Maytera Mint told him.

He ignored it. “You and Colonel Bison are affronted now because Generalissimo Siyuf wished to confiscate the weapons you gave your troopers. If she were here, she might explain that she acted in support of our government, the one opposed to the Ayuntamiento that Echidna ordered you to establish and that you have established. She probably feels sure, as General Saba and Chenille did Thelxday night, that once freed of the restraint of discipline your troopers will use their weapons to overturn it. Remember that, when we talk to these Trivigauntis.”

Silk addressed Oosik. “You, Generalissimo, are piqued because Generalissimo Siyuf bypassed you and Skate, issuing orders to the commanders of the brigades.”

Oosik nodded, his face grim.

“Bear in mind that when she tried to collect those weapons she was doing what you would have, had you not been restrained by my orders; and that she’s shown clearly that she thinks it useless to try to suborn your loyalty.”

“I — er, um?” Remora gaped at Quetzal’s vacated chair.

“His Cognizance has left us,” Silk explained. I suppose he went with Auk. You dozed off for a moment, I believe.

“Councillor Loris, Councillor Potto, you said you’d come to demand my surrender, with new terms. Let’s not trouble about the terms now. Explain briefly, if you will, how you know that we and our allies will be defeated.

Loris nodded. “Briefly, as you ask. Siyuf’s been sending patrols into the countryside to forage for food. They take whatever our people have and leave promissory notes in which our people have no confidence. Notes that are almost certainly valueless, in fact. Our farmers have begun hiding what food they have and organizing bands to resist—”

Oosik interrupted him. “You gave your permission, Calde, at the parade. I was thunderstruck.”

Hyacinth said, “You think you’re terribly clever, don’t you, Oosie. What would you have done?”

Oosik started to speak, but thought better of it.

“He would have told Generalissimo Siyuf that she’d have to buy what our farmers brought her — or so I imagine.” Silk shrugged. “They wouldn’t have brought enough, or nearly enough, and they wouldn’t have accepted promises to pay later. Soon she would have had to send out patrols, as she’s doing now, or shut her eyes to the fact that unit commanders were foraging for themselves. In either case, we would have had to stop them, or anyway we would have had to try. Within a short time we’d have been fighting Trivigauntis in the streets. I hoped to prevent that, or at least postpone it; but I’m afraid that I gained very little time for us, and it may be that I gained none at all.”

“We could have sent out foraging parties of our own,” Bison suggested.

Maytera Mint shook her head. “Then the farmers would have hated us instead of them. If they must hate somebody, it’s far better that they hate Siyuf and her Trivigauntis.”

“The point,” Loris interposed, “is that they’re beginning to resist. You’ve helped them, and we’re helping them more.”

Potto grinned at Silk. “Cementing their loyalty to us, you see. We’re the government of the good old days, coming up out of the ground with armloads of slug guns, and giving them away.” He tittered. “We get food aplenty for our bios. It’s mostly chems with us down below, and they don’t need it.”

“We estimate that fifteen thousand of General Mint’s fifty thousand-odd were countryfolk,” Loris continued. “They’re armed now, thanks to you. We’ve armed another four thousand thus far, and we continue to distribute arms. This sibyl—”

“I’m a laywoman again,” Maytera Marble told him.

“This officious laywoman once boasted that though others might be tempted to lie, her figures were accurate. So are mine. Inside of three months, Siyuf will be unable to feed her troops, to say nothing of her horses, mules, and camels. Having no alternative, she’ll return to Trivigaunte. By then half the city will have abandoned your rebellion. We came to inform you of that, and demand that you restore our personal accounts.”

“And keep your hands off the Fisc,” Potto subjoined.

“That will be guaranteed by their surrender.” Loris looked around the table, a councillor so rich in wisdom and experience that even Maytera Mint was inclined to accept everything that he said. “Would you care to hear our terms?”

“No.” Silk paused, listening to the sounds of hurrying feet in the foyer. “We haven’t time. I accept. We surrender. We can discuss terms when we have more leisure. That was why I hoped you’d remain, Councillor. It would have facilitated—”

At that moment I burst into the room. “They’re coming, Calde, like you said. A couple of hundred, some on horses.”

“Thank you, Horn.” Silk smiled sadly. “They’ll knock, I believe — at least I hope they will. If they do, delay them as long as you can, please.”

Potto was on his feet again. “We accept your surrender. Let’s go, Cousin!”

Maytera Marble stepped into their path. “Let me remind you of what I told you at my son’s. Calde Silk’s surrender is valid and binds everyone. Patera Silk’s means nothing at all. Do you accept him as Calde? For life?”

The door to the kitchen flew open then, and Hossaan strode in with a needler in each hand; behind him came a dozen women brandishing slug guns. “That life may be short,” he told Silk. “It will be, unless you get your hands up. The rest of you, too.”

One by one Hyacinth, Silk, Remora, Potto, Spider, and Horn complied, Maytera Marble and Bison raising their hands last, and together. Silk said, “You realize, I hope, that this is fundamentally a misunderstanding, a falling out among friends. It can be smoothed over, and soon will be.”

“Spread out,” Hossaan told the women who had entered with him. “Each cover a prisoner.” He smiled at Silk, a smile that did not reach his hooded eyes. “I hope you’re right, Calde. On the personal level, I like you and your wife. I’m carrying out Colonel Abanja’s—”

The crack of a needler cut him off. Ragged fire from the slug guns ended in a choking cloud of plaster dust and an ear-splitting roar as most of the west wall fell, severed from its foundations by the azoth Silk had received from Doctor Crane and given to Maytera Mint.