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“Oh, you were hurt, weren’t you?” Allin’s eyes were wide with concern. “Are you all right? But I did send word from the gate, to ask the Sieur’s permission.”
“Thanks to the Demoiselle’s Artifice, I am fully healed.” Temar smiled at her. “So, Casuel, what have you there?”
“More clues for your search, if you can tease them out,” said the mage loftily.
“Velindre was saying you must have a source of information second to none,” said Allin unexpectedly.
Casuel smiled a little uncertainly as he began unstrapping the books. “There are few wizards in Tormalin in these rational days and fewer who are also antiquarians.”
“She was talking about your brother?” Allin looked i
Casuel’s smile turned sickly. “I hardly think he’ll have anything useful to contribute.”
Temar looked from Allin to Casuel, carefully hiding a smile. “Pardon me, but I did not know you had a brother, Casuel.”
“Amalin Devoir is a noted musician, a composer of considerable skill and i
“Another talented member of your family.” Temar smiled as Casuel inclined his head with ill grace. “Surely it could not hurt to see if he could help us?”
“I could call on him, I suppose,” the wizard said reluctantly. “But I think we’ll get far more out of these books. So, if you’ll excuse us, Allin, we’ve important work to do.”
“Allin is staying for some lunch,” Temar said firmly. With his face turned he could wink at her without Casuel seeing, and she bit her lower lip to hide a smile, cheeks pink as she studied a parchment in front of her with hasty intensity.
Esquire Camarl’s Study, the D’Olbriot Residence,
Summer Solstice Festival, Second Day, Afternoon
I came straight here to warn you.” I concluded my explanation of Mistal’s news and waited for the Esquire’s reaction, hands behind my back and feet a quarter-span apart. The calm stance belied my i
Camarl was sitting by the window, a small table at his side piled high with correspondence. He turned a carved ivory paper knife slowly in his hands. “This is certainly ominous news, as is this business of someone posting a challenge in your name. You should have told me about that this morning, before going off to the sword school.” He looked up at me, raising the ivory knife even though I’d made no move to speak. “I’m not going to bandy words with you. Chosen or not, Ryshad, you have to keep me informed. Is there any other news, anything about the attack on D’Alse
I sighed. “Last night I went round every barracks where I’ve friends, every Cohort I’ve shared duty with, asked every watchman hired for Festival that I could find. If any of them knew anything or even suspected, they’d have told me by now. I’ll wager my oath fee there are no Elietimm in the city, but I can’t swear any more than that. I’ve still got a few people to check back with, but I don’t think they’ll have anything different to tell.”
“You can send one of the sworn from the barracks to fetch and carry messages. I want your help looking for answers in different places.” Camarl smiled to take any rebuke out of his words. “I’m going to a meeting of my art society this afternoon.” Camarl indicated the discreet elegance of his sober clothing with a hand bearing a solitary silver band enamelled with the D’Olbriot lynx. “I meet men of all ranks there and I’ll hear a certain amount of the gossip about D’Alse
“If I ask the right questions,” I agreed slowly. It wouldn’t be the first time I’d kept eyes and ears open for the House’s benefit. There was far more to being a sworn man in this day and age than simply swinging a sword. “But are you sure I won’t be recognised?” I spent a good few years serving in Toremal before the Sieur sent me out on his various commissions to ride the vast D’Olbriot estates.
“No one looks at a sworn man’s face,” Camarl said carelessly. “You’ll just have been another nameless body in livery.”
“Am I dressed for the part?” I was in plain breeches and a nondescript jerkin, good-quality cloth and well cut but nothing special.
“Quite appropriate, for a mason from Zyoutessela, wouldn’t you say?” said Camarl with an approving smile. “There’ll be other artisans there, as well as traders and nobles. It’s one of the reasons I joined, to widen my acquaintance beyond my own rank.”
“What does the Sieur think of that?” I asked.
Camarl wrinkled his nose. “He agrees it’s a regrettable necessity of this era.”
I laughed, hearing the Sieur’s dry wit in the words.
“I have letters that need an answer.” Camarl nodded to his personal scrivener, who was sitting patiently in a corner of the room. “I’ll see you at the gatehouse shortly, Ryshad. Get something to eat if you need it.”
The lower hall was full of kitchen maids and scullions now, drab in washed-out gowns and shirts shapeless with repeated boiling. They gossiped idly, enjoying some respite before embarking on the myriad preparations for a series of private di
I took bread and cheese from platters on a table and went out to the gatehouse, where I knew I could cadge a glass of wine from Stoll. We had scant moments to wait before Camarl’s personal gig arrived, and the Esquire wasn’t long in coming.
The groom jumped down and swung himself up on the back step as the Esquire took the reins. As Camarl drove us down to the lower city with habitual competence, I turned to the groom on the perch behind us. He was staring ahead, face as impassive as the carved cats’ masks on the side panels, and he wouldn’t meet my eye. I really was going to have to get used to being one of those served rather than serving.
The bright sunlight was touched with the faintest hint of salt on a breeze from the distant harbour as Camarl turned off the encircling road down the main highway that runs clear across the lower city to the bay. The ancient walls of Toremal soon appeared between the rooftops, once mighty bastions in their day but now hemmed in all around with buildings nearly as high. Camarl got his horse in hand as we went beneath the sturdy arch of the Spring Gate and we emerged into the sunshine gilding the Graceway. Great mansions had been packed close within the old city walls in the uncertain days of earlier generations and the Names had guarded their privileges jealously. Nowadays the iron gates, with their badges of gilded bronze high above the heads of the crowd, stand open but rank still counts for something. It’s only those with a genuine amulet bearing recognised insignia that may use the wide, well-made street marching straight to the sea. I saw a woman trying to saunter past the duty guard with a beribboned basket held high in her arms and smiled as she was turned back to take the longer route through the tangle of lesser roads spreading ever wider beyond the walls. We were passed with a curt nod from the Den Janaquel man standing sentry, pike butt resting by one hobnailed boot.