The Clan Corporate

Miriam swallowed. "Where are we?" she asked.

"Doppelgangered." The ferret's cheek twitched. Abruptly, he turned and pushed the door open. He stepped behind her and unlocked the cuffs. "Go on in."

Miriam shuffled through the door to her new home, staring at the floor. It was rough-cut stone, with an intricate handwoven carpet laid across it. Behind her, the door scraped shut: there was a rattle of bolts. She looked up, across a waiting room-perhaps a little smaller than her chambers in Thorold Palace had been-at a window casement overlooking the walled courtyard they'd brought her in through.

So I'm under house arrest. "It could have been worse," she told herself quietly. The place was furnished-expensively, by local standards-although there was no electric lighting in evidence. Doors led off to other rooms. The fireplace was about the size of her living room back in Cambridge, but right now it was unlit. "Where are the servants?" She was begi

"Do you know who I am?" Miriam asked.

The woman looked confused. "Myn'demme?"

Of course. "I am Countess Helge," Miriam began in her halting hochsprache. "Where-what-is food here?" The woman looked even more confused. "I am-to eat-" she tried again, a sinking feeling in her heart. It was, she realized, going to be very hard to get anything done.

It took Miriam only an evening to appreciate how far her universe had shrunk. She had four rooms: a bedroom dominated by a huge curtained bed, the reception room, a waiting room that doubled as a dining area, and the outer vestibule. The ferret lived in the vestibule, so she avoided it. What lay beyond its external door, which was formidably barred, she had no idea. The only window with a view, in the reception room, overlooked the courtyard but was not high enough to see over the crenellated walls. This wasn't a show house in the style of Thorold Palace, but a converted castle from an older, grimmer age. A window with a scenic view would have been an invitation to a crossbow bolt. The sanitary facilities were, predictably, primitive.

Three maidservants came when she tugged the bellpulls in the bedroom or the reception room. None of them spoke English, and they all seemed terrified of her. Or perhaps they were afraid of being seen talking to her by the ferret. She was forced to communicate in her halting hochsprache, but they weren't much use when it came to getting language practice.

On the evening of her first day, after she'd picked over a supper of cold cuts and boiled Jerusalem artichokes, the ferret came and ordered her into the vestibule. "Wait here," he said, and went back into the reception room, locking the door. Miriam worked her way into an anxious frenzy while he was gone, terrified that Baron Henryk had revisited his decision to leave her alive; a distant thumping on the other side of the door suggested structural changes in progress. When the ferret opened the door again and returned to his seat by the barred door, Miriam looked at him in disbelief. "Go on," he said impatiently; "I told you your possessions would be moved in, didn't I?"

There was a huge wardrobe in her bedroom now, and a dresser. Relieved, Miriam hurried to look through them-but there was nothing in the drawers or on the chest but the garments Mistress Tanzig had laboriously assembled for her. No laptop, no books, no Advil, no CD Walkman, nothing remotely reminiscent of American life. "Damn," Miriam complained. She sat on the embroidered backless bench that served for a chair. "Now what?" Obviously Henryk's security people considered anything that hinted of her original home to be suspect, and after a moment she couldn't fault them. The laptop-if she'd had a digital camera she might have loaded a picture of the Clan sigil into it, then made her escape. Or she might have slid a Polaroid between the pages of a book. They'd made a clean sweep of her possessions, taking everything except that which a noblewoman of the Gruinmarkt might have owned-even her battered reporter's notebook and automatic pencil were gone. Which left her with a wardrobe full of native costumes and a jewel box with enough ropes of pearls to hang herself with, but nothing that might facilitate her flight. Henryk really does expect me to revert to being Helge, she thought. She looked around in mild desperation. There was a strange book on the dresser. She reached for it, opened the leather cover: Notes towards a Hochsprache-Anglaische Grammarion it said, printed in an old-fashioned type. "Shit." Succumbing to the inevitable, Miriam started reading her homework.

The next morning she wore a local outfit. Better get used to it, she thought resignedly. No more jeans and tees for slobbing about in. She was sitting on the bench by the window casement, staring out at the courtyard to relieve her eyes from studying the grammarion, when the door to the vestibule opened without warning. It was the ferret, with two unfamiliar maidservants standing behind him, and another man: avuncular-looking, with receding hair and spectacles and a beer gut. He was holding a large leather briefcase. "Milady voh Thorold d'Hjorth?" he said in a slightly creepy way that made Miriam take an instant dislike to him.

"Yes?" She frowned at the ferret.

"If you will permit me to introduce myself? I am Dr. Robard ven Hjalmar. Your great-uncle the baron asked me to pay a house call."

"What kind of doctor are you?"

"The medical kind." He managed a smile that was halfway between a simper and a smirk.

"A medical-" Miriam paused. "I don't need a doctor," she said automatically. "I'm fine." Which wasn't strictly true-her ribs ached from the punch, and she was feeling u

"You don't need a doctor now," he said fussily, and planted his case on the floor. "However, I have been asked to take you on as one of my patients."

The ferret cleared his throat. "Dr. ven Hjalmar ministers to the royal family."

"Oh, I see." Miriam put the book down, carefully positioning the bookmark. "What does that entail?" Why me?

"I am required to testify to your health and fitness." Ven Hjalmar's gaze slid around the room nervously, avoiding her. "You are, I am sure you are aware, of a certain age-not too old for a first confinement, but certainly in need of care and attention. And I understand you may have other medical needs. If you would be so good as to retire to your bedchamber, your maids will relieve you of your outerwear so that I may prepare my report. You need not be afraid, you will be chaperoned and your guardian will be right outside the door."

Miriam glared at the ferret. "Do I get an opportunity to say no?"

The ferret was stony-faced. "Remember your instructions." The two unfamiliar maids stepped forward and took Miriam by the arms. She tensed, on the edge of panic: but the ferret was watching her.

What happened next was one of the most unintrusive but oddly unpleasant medical examinations Miriam had ever undergone. The servants led her into the bedroom; then, with the door closed, one of them (a beefy blond woman with rosy cheeks and the look of an amateur boxer to her) held Miriam's wrists together while the other unlaced her bodice. Neither of them spoke. "Let me-go," Miriam tried, but boxer-woman just stared at her dumbly.

"Stand still, please." It was ven Hjalmar. Boxer-woman refused to let go, holding her pinioned. "Open your mouth. Ah-hah. Very good." He stepped around her and she felt a stethoscope through her chemise. "Breathe in-and out. Ah, good." He worked fast, giving her a basic examination. Then: "I gather you were given a pap smear on the other side. I'll have the results of that back in a day or so. Meanwhile, I'd like to ask you some questions about your medical history."