Count Scar - SA (18 page)

"Certainly we are taught that the gravity is much less for an unintended sin than one committed with active purpose." I repeated this standard bit of doctrine almost automatically, for my soul
had been gripped by another dreadful suspicion. "But tell me something, friend seneschal. I have noticed that you eat and drink scarcely enough to sustain life. Do you practice the discipline of
fasting?"

"Oh yes, Father, yes indeed! And I sleep directly upon the hard stones of the hall each night, putting down no bedding. You, who come from an Order dedicated to holiness: you can understand
these things. You will know what it is to practice disciplines that purify. I strive constantly in my own poor way to do the same."

"Yes, yes, strive for purity by all means, Brother Seneschal. But remember that you also need to seek grace. If you have some sin that burdens you, you should confess it and seek absolution with a
contrite heart." My own heart was beating fast as I spoke, hoping that he would unburden himself, hoping that the fears that had now sprung up within me were unfounded.

But his eyes had dropped again and were now veiled. "Perhaps I should do as you say, Father Melchior. But my way is uncertain, my heart confused. I need to consider carefully." He rose, swaying
from what I now realized was the weakness of semistarvation while he gathered up his parchment rolls again. As he left I called after him, "Remember that you can come to me at any time and I
shall hear you without judging or condemning."

I sat with unseeing eyes for a long time after the door had shut itself behind him, my mind racing. The ideas he had expressed—the seeking of purification through self-deprivation, the contempt
for the flesh and its needs as wholly evil, the suggestion that salvation could come strictly through personal virtue—these ideas were all deeply imbued with the doctrines of the Perfected.

Of course, it would have been hard to find any lay persons from the countryside hereabouts who didn't have at least some hint of this strain in their thinking. And the man was clearly laboring
under a great burden of sadness; his mind might even be unhinged, at least to some degree. Nor had he ruled out coming back at some point to confess whatever this sin of his might be and seek
grace as the True Faith directed, rather than trying to overcome his sins through his own unaided efforts.

Besides, I was no inquisitor; I was nothing like that desiccated fanatic Count Caloran had only barely managed to prevent from putting those poor villagers to the torch. I could let the matter rest
for now, hoping and praying that the seneschal would find his way to the proper path and trying to guide and encourage him whenever the opportunity offered. Whatever his real or imagined
crime might be, it clearly had nothing to do with the recent attack on the count. The seneschal's conviction that he must continue to do his best in the job to which he had been "called" for as long
as he remained in this world would never have allowed him to place an object he would clearly have recognized as having dangerous significance anywhere in the count's castle without telling
him of it. No, I would keep this matter to myself for now. Only if I found myself confronted with incontrovertible evidence would I even consider informing the count that the man he was
trusting to discharge the office of his seneschal might have joined the enemies of the True Faith.

Chapter Seven ~ Caloran

Chapter Seven ~ Caloran

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During the days I kept hearing the sound of Bruno's voice in the distance, or catching his step as he came down the corridor. During the nights I kept hearing the crackle of mage-fire all around
my bed, and in a dream my eyes would jerk open to see the curtains a pulsating red and the dark shape of Bruno trying to beat his way through to save me. When I opened my eyes in earnest, to
find all dark around me except for the faint glow from the hearth, which I had reluctantly agreed to have kindled again when on the second day the men's grumbling about the cold had become
pronounced, I would be bathed in sweat and shaking hard. Sometimes it took nearly until dawn to fall asleep again.

None of this, of course, did I hint at to anyone. Bruno was the only one of the knights whom I would have trusted with it. And Bruno was dead, his bones lying in the cold soil of the churchyard of
the village where I had hung the adulterers, waiting to be moved to the House of the Three Kings. I would give the Order the rest of the rents, I decided, from the village that had already been half
given to the nuns of the Holy Family two generations ago. Let my great-aunt's bailiffs divide the rents with the Order rather than with me. That was the village where the people had welcomed
the Inquisition; I didn't want their money anyway.

From years of leading the emperor's soldiers I knew much better than to let the men think their leader was afraid. Melchior might have guessed, but if so he had too much sense to ask if I required
spiritual counsel and kept a prudent silence. The brave Count of Peyrefixade was not afraid of fire, not afraid of an assassin, not even afraid of the Inquisition, which might have been worrying
my knights the worst of all.

And yet I wondered about the Inquisition during the two weeks that the bailiffs were collecting my rents. Seneschal Guilhem, Melchior, and I went over the accounts together as each bailiff
brought in the proceeds: the sums that wouldn't add up on the abacus even though the individual figures all seemed right; the man who had inexplicably disappeared without paying; the coins
that looked suspect or else were from a mint that the tenants had said gave them greater value than those from the Haulbe mint, and thus required fewer to meet their obligations; the one family
who had decided to pay their rents entirely in baby chicks even though the seneschal assured me they had always before paid in cash. Once we decided that each bailiff had collected the money as
fairly and completely as he could, and that there was no use sending him back to the village a second time—or perhaps a third—I paid him his fee myself and notched his wand of office to show
that the accounts were accepted.

The archbishop of Haulbe was doubtless going over his own rent rolls with his own bailiffs, but I would still have expected a letter from him, if not indeed a self-righteous inquisitor speaking in
the bishop's name. Melchior might also have been wondering what would happen there; several times I caught him looking very thoughtful, as though he was formulating some sort of suspicion
or plan, although he did not share it with me.

Should I suspect him of heresy? My initial thought when I learned of an Order devoted to magic had been that this had seemed dangerously unorthodox. Although once I had gotten to know this
intelligent and conscientious priest I had put aside these thoughts, I had been staggered by the appearance of the telesma in his hand, especially so shortly after he had demonstrated such sympathy
toward the condemned Perfected.

Counting piles of coins, almost the last to come in, I gave a grim smile. It would be ironic for me to start suspecting evil of the man who had saved my life even if he couldn't save Bruno's, the one
man in the castle I now felt I could trust at my back. A telesma that doused fires more effectively than any water barrel could be extremely useful. I was hundreds of miles from all members of my
family except for the abbess, and had no friends I had known more than two months. A possibly heretical priest would have to do.

At least the accounts had kept my mind occupied, I thought, stretching. And there would be little opportunity to brood even now, for in a few days it would be time for the duke's Paschal Court.

Perhaps it was surprising that I hadn't heard from Argave, either; someone as vehemently opposed to the Perfected as was the duke must be a great supporter of the Inquisition.

Or maybe, I thought, sweeping all the copper coins off the table and into a bag, no one had climbed up to Peyrefixade because they knew how difficult it would be to get in if I didn't choose to
receive them. It was much easier to wait until I came out by myself.

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No one, wild-eyed heretic, self-righteous inquisitor, or skulking Nabarrese, tried to attack us as we rode down to Duke Argaves Paschal Court. After forty days of nothing but bread, vegetables, a
few eggs, and fish—and most of that salted—it would be good, I thought, to have another banquet such as the one Argave had served when I first arrived at Peyrefixade. I would, however, quite
happily skip the incident with the assassin this time.

I left the seneschal in charge of the castle, taking only the priest and a half dozen knights, the ones who had accompanied me around to my tenancies and whom I felt I knew now. That three of
them had obeyed me in returning the condemned heretics to the mountains after I saved them from the stake—and I had questioned the knights closely on what the heretics had done when set free,
to make sure they hadn't knifed them themselves— spoke well for their loyalty. The bouteillier Raymbaud had wanted to accompany me, speaking of buying new wine in Ferignan, but I quite
deliberately refused his request. He had come originally from the ducal court, and I was still convinced he was the duke's eyes and ears in Peyrefixade—especially since I had gradually given up
suspecting Melchior of being the duke's spy. If so, I wasn't going to make Raymbaud's conveying of his reports to his real master any easier.

"So here is the man who defies even the Inquisition!" said Duke Argave in greeting as we entered his courtyard, having once again yielded our weapons to his guards. A quick glance around
showed men in livery posted all around the garden, including by the back wall. Spring was advancing rapidly; flower beds that had been sere two months ago were now dense with green. "I
wanted a powerful count at Peyrefixade to form a barrier against Alfonso," the duke added, "and I may have gotten even more than I expected!"

He smiled as he spoke, but his eyes looked cautious and calculating. "I have no quarrel with those who seek out the heretical dogs of the mountains and their perfidious doctrine," I said smoothly,

"only those whose precipitous judgment may undercut my authority, the authority I received from you, O Duke." I dropped to my knees and took his hand—the one with the big emerald ring—

in both of mine. "After attending your court, I intend to make my way to Haulbe this week to assure the archbishop of my faithful adherence to the revealed Truth."

The duke's smile abruptly looked much more genuine.

"You shall have a chance to meet with him even earlier than that, Count, for Archbishop Amalric will be riding over here in a few days."

"Good," I said placidly. "Direct conversation on matters of importance is always better than messages and letters, where misunderstandings may inadvertently arise." I rose to my feet, dusting
myself off with as much nonchalance as I could manage, aware that my knights were all watching closely and that Lord Thierri had emerged to hover in the background. The brave Count of
Peyrefixade wasn't afraid of the archbishop either.

"In fact," said Argave for my ear alone as we walked together toward his hall, "it may be time that a few of the more fanatical members of the Inquisition were reminded that they are to cure
men's souls but not rule their bodies." He lifted an eyebrow as I turned toward him, his lips curved in an ironic smile, but he did not elaborate.

He said nothing more of the Inquisition that evening. It was the last night of the period of penitence, and though there were no musicians playing, the ducal cook had produced an excellent fish
chowder, better than anything my own cook's conscientious efforts had ever come up with. All the duke's castellans and manorial lords were there, most of whom I had met on my earlier visit, as
well as a count new to me. He was Duke Argave's son-in-law, married to the duke's oldest daughter; they had come to the Paschal Court from their own county some distance to the east.

Come perhaps to learn about me? I wondered, as I found this count constantly at my elbow, asking about my family back north, about the new construction at Peyrefixade of which everyone
seemed to have heard— he seemed disappointed when I told him it was nothing more than a new fireplace—and even trying to learn delicately how I had come by my scar.

"A fire a long time ago," I said shortly, irritated because his presence on one side of me at the duke's high table kept me from paying more attention to the duke's younger daughter, Arsendis, who
sat on my other side.

But maybe I was happy after all for the distraction. The memory of the conversation with my aunt the abbess came back vividly. Could Argave possibly be considering me as a prospective second
son-in-law as well as a barrier between his duchy and Nabarra? And if so, what did his dark-haired and white-throated daughter think about it?

Whatever she thought, she seemed favorably enough inclined toward me to become my companion in hawking the next day. We had of course all been up before dawn and out in the duke's garden,
to hear his own Magian priest and Father Melchior sing the divine office together, and ourselves to sing Halleluia to the risen Savior as the sun rose in a pale yellow sky. After the best breakfast
in forty days, we prepared to ride out with the hawks.

"The cranes and storks are coming north," Argave explained to me, "and my gyrfalcon grows rusty with little sport. I have a goshawk that you may use."

And so not much more than an hour after sunrise our party rode out, the gyrfalcon hooded on the duke's gloved fist—a magnificent bird, almost pure white—and the rest of us carrying lesser but
still excellent birds from his mews.