A Song for Arbonne (39 page)

Bertran shuffled his papers together before standing up. "That's all right. Show him in as he is and then guard the door for us. We should not be disturbed, Serlo, unless I call for you."

The young coran nodded and went out. Valery rose to his feet and Blaise did the same. There was a look of anticipation and of something else now—a kind of youthful, infectious delight—in the blue eyes of the duke. Blaise, against his will, began to feel a quickening excitement.

Serlo returned moments later escorting a man who was indeed wrapped in a long black mantle with a cloth wrapped about his face, concealing all but his eyes. The man wore a sword, but had, as Serlo noted, come alone. He waited until the young coran had withdrawn and closed the door behind himself. Then, with a neat sequence of movements, he let fall his cloak and hood and removed the scarf.

Blaise looked sharply over at Bertran, saw the genuine astonishment in the duke's expression and the swift beginning of anger, and then he began, helplessly, to laugh.

"Well, good evening to you all, at any rate," said Rudel Correze brightly as no one spoke. "I hope I'm not late, or early, or anything."

Bertran's colour had risen; the scar showed white on his face. "You had best tell me, very quickly, who you are and what you think you are doing," he said icily. Valery had now moved forward, a hand to his sword hilt, his glance moving uncertainly towards Blaise and then to the man in the doorway again.

Still laughing at the sheer audacity of it all, Blaise said, "Actually, you did say on the road to Lussan that you wanted to meet this man. Shall I perform the introductions?"

Bertran looked from Blaise back to the new arrival. "Ah," he said, his tone changing. He lifted one eyebrow. "The Correze son? With the poisoned arrows?"

Rudel bowed deeply. His hair was bright in the blazing light of the fire and the candles. He grimaced wryly when he straightened. "I do apologize for that. It was a long shot at night. I am glad to see you well, my lord." He turned to Valery. "And you. I trust you are recovered?"

"Entirely recovered, thank you," said Valery politely, letting go of his sword. "I am a walking tribute to the arts of the priestesses of Rian." There was a flicker of amusement in his eyes, Blaise saw.

His old friend turned to him last of all. "You must have greatly enjoyed that last conversation of ours," Rudel Correze said quietly. "Knowing what you knew, and chose to keep from me."

"Not really," Blaise said. "Not at the time, at any rate. I thought Valery was dead, and you caught me unawares with almost everything you told me. I had a difficult time, actually. I wouldn't have told you about your mistake, though, even if I had been inclined to. If you had learned the duke was alive you might have felt obliged to try again, and I would have had to have you taken then, with problems for everyone in Arbonne."

"Not to mention for myself," Rudel said lightly. He was listening carefully though.

"You would have deserved it," Blaise said. "I'll concede that afterwards I did enjoy the thought of you showing up in Gotzland to claim the money."

Rudel made a sour face. "I'm sure you did. You ensured I would arrive triumphantly in Aulensburg, report a successful mission, confirm the deposit of my ridiculous fee—and then deal with the discovery, a fortnight later, that the esteemed duke of Talair—" he smiled briefly at Bertran " — was engaged in ongoing diplomatic exchanges with King Jorg at Aulensburg and not, evidently, from beyond the grave."

"So you gave the money back?" Blaise feigned ignorance. He was now enjoying this.

"I gave back what was left of it, under some impolite pressure from Gorhaut's ambassador to the court in Aulensburg. Not a pleasant man, I can tell you. I had to approach my father's branch bank for certain sums that were not… readily available to me privately."

"After only a fortnight?" Blaise raised his eyebrows in feigned surprise. "What did you buy? All the gems of the east? How much could you have spent in two weeks?"

"Enough," said Rudel tersely, his handsome face colouring. "Enough that you may consider our personal slate from that night in Tavernel to be balanced, at the very least. My father currently has a view of me that may well match the one yours has of you. Paying out money does that to him, I'm afraid."

"Sad tidings," said Bertran de Talair, his equanimity regained. Blaise recognized the tone and the glint in his eyes. "But leaving, as I suppose we must, past trials for present affairs, I do think it reasonable to ask what you are doing here."

"It is entirely reasonable." Rudel paused, looked over at the long table by the far wall. "I did hear you were known for serving a good wine," he said politely.

Shaking his head, Valery walked over to the table and poured him a glass. He came back, handed it to the Portezzan, then stood near him, waiting. Bertran did not speak again, and neither, now, did Blaise. Rudel sipped, smiled his approval, and went on.

"I am sadly between contracts at the moment," he said calmly, and Blaise saw Bertran and Valery both take the point. "Given last summer's events, and the unexpected involvement of my old friend Blaise, I still had something of an interest in you, En Bertran. With nothing better to do before the tournament, I made a point of tracking your movements the past two days since we all arrived in Lussan and settled in for the fair—lamentably lacking the company of the choleric lord of Andoria." He drank again, with obvious pleasure. "When you took these quarters outside the walls in addition to your usual town residence, and then rode out here at day's end with only our cousin and my friend Blaise, it seemed appropriate to conclude that some meeting of a private nature was about to take place."

However composed Rudel might be, the duke of Talair was a match for him. Coolly, not smiling now, Bertran said, "Such a conclusion might indeed seem appropriate. The question is, why, having made that deduction, would you take it upon yourself to intrude upon that meeting?" There was something unreal, an almost hallucinatory quality to the dialogue taking place, Blaise thought. One of the men talking so pleasantly here had attempted to kill the other just three months ago for a quarter of a million in gold. He couldn't think of any other men he knew who could have had this conversation.

Rudel sipped his wine again. He favoured them all with his most brilliant smile. "To be honest," he murmured, "I thought it might be amusing."

Looking at his friend, at the clever, handsome face, Blaise knew with certainty that this was at least part of the truth, possibly even the largest part. He saw that Bertran realized it, too. The duke's own amusement was obvious. He shook his head and looked over at Valery. His cousin's expression was wry.

"Does this fellow remind you of anyone?" Bertran asked.

"Someone I grew up with, yes," Valery said. "A cousin I never expected to see reach the age you seem to have attained." Blaise turned his head towards the door; he had heard voices, and now there were footsteps outside. "What," Valery went on calmly, "do you want us to do with him?"

"I should mention," Rudel said quickly, before Bertran could reply, "that I had one more piece of information in solving this riddle. While I was watching by the walls this evening, at the gate from which you left, I did see a small party of men, one of them masked, the others hooded, ride out at darkfall. They were not in a hurry. It gave me the opportunity to have this most enjoyable encounter in private with you."

There came a diffident knocking at the door. "Yes, Serlo, what is it?"

The young coran's voice on the other side was angry and confused. "I am sorry, my lord, but another party is here. A man in a mask who says he has a meeting with you here tonight. He has an escort with him."

"Four men," Rudel said helpfully.

"Four corans with weapons," Serlo went on. "I don't recognize the livery."

"I don't think you are meant to," Bertran said, opening the door. "I think that is our proper guest. Escort him here, Serlo, and then entertain his escort. These may not, in the end, turn out to be friends, but they are guests tonight. Treat them accordingly."

Serlo, looking unhappy, went away.

"I grow more and more curious," said Rudel Correze cheerfully. "I'm so glad you invited me in."

Bertran swung the heavy door closed. His expression was quite sober. "We have only a moment," he said. "I can have my corans render you unconscious, or bind and gag you in a back room somewhere. I may have to. One last time: is it only idle mischief that brings you here?"

Rudel's expression, not surprisingly, had also changed, but less than one might have expected—unless one knew the man. Eyes bright in the firelight, he said, "I am not accustomed at this point in my career to having to solicit commissions, but I did tell you I was between engagements. You might spare my pride and regard that as a hint."

There was another brief silence, and then Bertran de Talair began, helplessly, to laugh. Blaise, staring at his friend, followed suit a moment later. Rudel grinned back at them both, pleased. Whatever one might ever say about Rudel Correze, Blaise thought ruefully, things were seldom dull when he was around.

The same, for that matter, might be said of En Bertran de Talair. The duke said, "You are seeking employment with me, is that correct?"

"I am."

"Might I ask why?"

And now Rudel's expression finally became serious, and one was inescapably reminded that this was the scion of one of the wealthiest, most aristocratic banking houses in Portezza, with family connections to most of the nobility in that country. He laid down his glass on the small table beside him.

"Shall we say that I do not mind if my skills are bought? Indeed, my profession demands that this be the case. I do mind, however, rather a great deal, when my relationships are similarly exploited without my knowing it. I was not aware that Blaise was with you when I accepted his father's contract. I would not have done so had I known. I have reason to believe that Galbert de Garsenc chose me only because of my friendship with his son, and not for any flattering appraisal of my talents. This thought does not please me. I have formally relinquished his contract. It will satisfy my own sense of honour to work to ensure that no one else successfully fulfils it, if the sum is offered again."

"I doubt it will be. They have made their point, and have a larger game to play now."

"I think you are correct in that, my lord, but even so, I would be pleased and proud to enter your employment, En Bertran."

Valery coughed. "I rather doubt," he said, "that we could afford your current rates."

Blaise grinned. Rudel did not. "I will be happy to forget that. It was an unnatural offer in a number of ways. I will be honoured to accept whatever you are paying my friend Blaise at this moment, though I cannot, as I'm sure you'll appreciate, work for less."

Blaise and Bertran exchanged a glance, looked over at Valery, and then all three of them began to laugh. Rudel attempted to look dignified which, Blaise reflected, is a difficult thing to do when three men are laughing at you.

This was, however, a friend, and one who had clearly been disturbed by the dangerous events of last summer. He was also proposing to join them—though Blaise still felt an inward disquiet when he tried to weigh his own complex allegiances here.

He let Rudel in on the jest. "You have undervalued yourself, I fear. I am not now being paid anything at all. I've left the duke's employ. I'm with him as a friend and a companion in the tournament two days from now. I'm afraid you won't want to work for my current wages."

Rudel reddened again. "I see. I seem to be bound by what I just proposed, however. I can understand your amusement."

Bertran shook his head, as another knock came at the door. "Not so. I will be pleased to have you with me." He grinned. "And diverted as well, I rather suspect. I'll pay you what I was paying Blaise before he changed his status with us. We can discuss this further at our leisure—indeed, we will have to. For now, I'll greatly value discretion from all of you." He turned to the door and opened it himself.

Serlo was there, standing a little behind an extremely tall, dark-bearded man with a lean, fighter's build. The man was indeed masked and hooded, clad in unrevealing black for the night ride. On the threshold he carefully took in the four of them, smiled thinly and removed his mask, revealing thick eyebrows and deep-set grey eyes.

"You have unexpected companions, de Talair," he said in accented Arbonnais. "In fact, if we count myself you seem to have assembled a room full of your enemies." Notwithstanding this remark, he stepped across the threshold with easy confidence. Bertran closed the door behind him.

"My cousin Valery," said the duke quietly. "One friend at least. It appears you know both Blaise de Garsenc and Rudel Correze. And I am certain they both know you."

Of course they did. If Rudel's appearance had been a shock to Blaise, this man's arrival was something stupefying. He had last seen those heavy-browed, calculating grey eyes almost two years ago on a frozen battlefield in the north. A wan sun had been setting, dead men piled in the crimson snow and three generations of war lying like a curse behind the savagely contested battle being waged.

Blaise bowed with briefest formality, masking his thoughts. Rudel and Valery bowed. And then Duke Bertran, turning back from making the introductions, did the same. One bowed to the monarchs of this world. "The younger Garsenc has prowess I have learned to fear," said King Daufridi of Valensa, glancing at Blaise. "As for the Correze scion, I would rather have thought his prowess was cause for your own fears, or were last summer's tales idle?"

"They were not, your highness," Bertran said, straightening. "But it seems, happily for my fragile peace of mind, that Rudel Correze now regrets accepting a contract to end the life of a man so inoffensive as myself and has joined my corans by way of redress. Is this not so?"