How Firm a Foundation (39 page)

Silence sang and crackled over the com for endless seconds. Then—

“No,” Domynyk Staynair
said, his voice almost inaudible. “No, I wouldn’t, Cayleb.”

“Churchill and Coventry, Merlin,” Cayleb said almost as softly, and Merlin winced. Sharleyan looked up at him, one eyebrow raised, and he shrugged.

“An episode from World War Two back on Old Terra,” he said. “It was an example I used with Cayleb once in Corisande.”

“And it’s still a good one,” Cayleb put in. “I don’t like it. Like
Sharley, I hate it. But somebody’s got to make the call, and for better or for worse, it’s me. And ugly as this is, as much as it’s going to stick in my craw and choke me, I don’t see another option. For that matter, Domynyk, if we could tell Gwylym the entire truth, what do you think
he’d
recommend?”

“Exactly what you just have, Your Majesty.” Staynair spoke with unwonted formality, yet there
was no trace of doubt in his voice.

“That’s what I think, too,” Cayleb said sadly.

.IV.

Weavers Guildhall and Royal Palace, City of Manchyr, Princedom of Corisande

Paitryk Hainree stood on the walkway around the water tower cistern atop the Weavers Guildhall. The tower’s façade was a kaleidoscope of sheep, angora lizards, spinning maidens, and busy looms, all carved into the Barcor Mountain granite of which it was made. It was one of the best known tourist attractions in Manchyr,
but Hainree didn’t care about that as he gazed out across the city of his birth and swore with vicious, silent venom while the galleons flying the black, blue, and white banner of the Empire of Charis edged delicately towards the Manchyr wharves. The sun was barely up, the air was still cool, with that smoky blue edge that comes just after dawn, the wind-powered pump which kept the cistern
filled squeaked softly, almost musically behind him, and the air was fresh from the previous evening’s gentle rain. It was going to be a beautiful day, he thought rancorously, when it should have been ripped by tornadoes and hurricanes.

His hands clenched on the walkway railing, forearms quivering with the force of his grip, eyes burning with hatred. Bad enough that that bitch “empress” should
be visiting Corisande at all, but far worse to see the city draping itself with bunting, decorating its streets and squares with cut greenery and flowers. What did the idiots think they were
doing
? Couldn’t they see where this was
heading
? Perhaps it looked for now as if the accursed Charisians were succeeding, but they’d set their puny, blasphemous wills against
God
, damn it! In the end, there
could be only one outcome for mortal men vain and stupid enough to do that.

The air began to thud and the harbor fortresses blossomed with spurts of smoke as their guns thundered in formal salute to the arriving Empress of Charis. The waterfront was the better part of a mile from Hainree’s vantage point, yet even from here he could hear the cheers go up from the packed wharves. For a moment,
his entire body quivered with a sudden urge to fling himself over the railing. To plummet down to the paving below and put an end to his own fury. But he didn’t. He wouldn’t let the bastards be shed of him that easily.

He stared at the incoming galleons for another moment, then turned his back resolutely and started towards the ladder. He had a final inspection to make before he could sign off
on his current assignment, and then he had his own preparations to see to.

He descended the ladder with the confidence and ease of practice. There was little left of the silversmith he’d once been as he swung down the rungs. That Paitryk Hainree had disappeared forever fourteen months ago when Father Aidryan Wayman was arrested by the Charisians’ Corisandian flunkies. Fortunately, before that
happened, Hainree had taken Father Aidryan’s advice to heart and established an escape plan all his own, one no one else had known anything about. And because he had, he’d managed to elude the terrifyingly efficient sweep of Sir Koryn Gahrvai’s guardsmen. He still wasn’t certain how he’d accomplished that, especially since they’d been hunting him by name and with a damnably accurate description,
but if he’d needed any evidence that God Himself was watching out for him, he’d certainly had it as Father Aidryan’s entire organization was smashed to flinders in a matter of days … and he wasn’t.

And the other thing he’d had evidence of was that the only way to avoid arrest was to operate completely independently. To trust and recruit
no one
. At least a dozen other efforts to organize resistance
against the occupation and the abomination of the Church of Charis had foundered in the last year. It was as if Gahrvai’s guard had eyes everywhere, ears listening to every conversation. The only way to avoid them was to say nothing to anyone, and so Hainree had found new employment with the city of Manchyr’s construction and maintenance office. He’d grown a beard, cut his hair differently,
changed the way he dressed, gotten a colorful tattoo on his right cheek and the side of his neck, and found himself a room on the other side of the city where no one had ever seen or known him. He’d gone to ground and become someone else, who’d never heard of Paitryk Hainree the rabble-rouser.

But he hadn’t forgotten Paitryk Hainree, and neither had he forgotten his duty to God and his murdered
prince. They’d taken everything he’d ever been from him when they forced him to flee with a price on his head, yet that had simply added to his anger and his determination. Perhaps he was only one man, but one man—properly motivated—could still change an entire princedom.

Or even an empire,
he thought as he neared the ground.
Or even an empire
.

*   *   *

“Her portraits don’t do her justice,
do they?” Sir Alyk Ahrthyr murmured in Koryn Gahrvai’s ear. “I hadn’t realized she was so good-looking!”

“Alyk,” Gahrvai whispered back, “I love you like a brother. But if you say
one
word to Her Majesty.…”

He let the sentence trail off, and Ahrthyr chuckled. The dashing Earl of Windshare found beautiful women irresistible. And, unfortunately, all too many beautiful women returned the compliment.
By Gahrvai’s count, Ahrthyr had fought at least eight duels with irate brothers, fiancés, fathers, and husbands. Of course, those were just the ones he knew about, and since Prince Hektor had outlawed public duels over ten years ago—officially, at least—there were probably more that Gahrvai
didn’t
know about.

So far the earl had managed to survive all of them, and done it without killing anyone
(and getting himself outlawed) in the process. How long he could keep that up was open to question. Besides, Gahrvai had met Cayleb Ahrmahk. Any woman he’d married was going to be more than a match for Windshare, and that didn’t even consider what would happen if
Cayleb
found out about it.

“Ah, there’s no poetry in your soul, Koryn!” the earl said now. “Anyone who could look on that face—and
that figure, too, now that I think of it—and not be stirred is a confirmed misogynist.” Ahrthyr paused, cocking his head to one side. “That wouldn’t be the reason your father still isn’t a
grand
father, would it, Koryn? Is there something you’ve never told me?”

“I’ve never told you I was about to kill you … until now,” Gahrvai returned repressively. “That’s subject to change if you don’t
shut up
, though.”

“Bully,” Windshare muttered. “And party pooper, too, now that I think of it.” Gahrvai’s elbow drove none too gently into the earl’s sternum and he “oofed” at the impact. “All right,” he surrendered with a grin, rubbing his chest. “You win. I’ll shut up. See, this is me not saying a thing. Very peaceful, isn’t it? I don’t believe you’ve ever had such a restful afternoon with me arou—”

The second elbow strike was considerably more forceful than the first.

*   *   *

Sharleyan paced calmly up the crimson runner of carpet towards the throne. It was the first time she’d ever been in Manchyr, although she’d studied this very throne room many times since she’d gained access to Owl’s SNARCs. It was rather more impressive in person, though, and much as she’d hated Hektor Daykyn, she
had to admit he’d had far better taste than the late Grand Duke of Zebediah. Sunlight spilled through tall, arched windows down its long western wall, puddling on the polished parquet floor’s inlaid marble medallions and geometric patterns. The wall itself was plastered and coffered, with the personal seals of the last half-dozen princes of Corisande worked into the recesses between the window
embrasures in vibrant color, and banners hung from the high, spacious ceiling Manchyr’s near-equatorial climate imposed on local architecture. That vaulted ceiling was also coffered, with polished, richly gleaming wooden beams framing painted panels decorated with incidents from the House of Daykyn’s history, and the entire eastern wall consisted of latticed glass doors opening onto a formal garden
glowing with tropical blossoms and glossy greenery.

At the moment she had rather less attention to spare than the architecture and landscaping probably deserved, however, and she concentrated on maintaining her confident expression as she processed towards the dais where the Earl of Anvil Rock, the Earl of Tartarian, and the other members of Prince Daivyn’s Regency Council waited to greet her
formally.

The
remaining
members of the Regency Council, at any rate
, she reminded herself a bit tartly. Although, to be fair, Sir Wahlys Hillkeeper, the Earl of Craggy Hill, was still
technically
a member. Changing that—permanently—was one of the purposes of her visit.

It was extraordinarily quiet, quiet enough for her to hear the distant sound of surf through the glass doors which had been
opened onto the garden. She had no doubt there were dozens of soft, hushed side conversations all about her, but these were courtiers. They’d learned how to have those conversations without drawing attention to themselves, and most of them were probably downright eager to avoid drawing
her
attention at this particular moment.

She felt her lips quiver with amusement and suppressed the thought
firmly, continuing her stately, not to say implacable progress along the carpet. She wasn’t as ostentatiously surrounded by bodyguards as she’d been in Zebediah, although no one was going to crowd her here, either. Sir Koryn Gahrvai’s guardsmen lined the throne room’s walls, bayoneted muskets grounded, and an honor guard of Imperial Charisian Marines had escorted her from the docks to the palace.
She’d wanted to insist on a smaller, less obvious and lower-keyed presence, but she’d known better. There was no point pretending this was Chisholm or Charis. Not that there’d never been an attempt to kill her in Charis, now that she thought about it.

That reflection carried her to the end of the carpet, Merlin Athrawes pacing respectfully at her heels while Edwyrd Seahamper kept a king wyvern’s
eye on the rest of her personal detail, and Sir Rysel Gahrvai bowed formally to her.

“On behalf of Prince Daivyn, welcome to Manchyr, Your Majesty,” he said.

“Thank you, My Lord,” she replied. “I wish my visit might have come under happier circumstances, yet the welcome I’ve received—not just from you, but from so many of Manchyr’s people—has been far warmer than I’d anticipated.”

He bowed
again at the compliment, although there’d been a slight double edge to it. For that matter, there’d been a double edge to his greeting. The exact status of Prince Daivyn remained what diplomats referred to as “a gray area,” and for all the genuine spontaneity of the cheers which had greeted Sharleyan, not everyone in the greeting crowds had been cheering. Indeed, she suspected that no more than half
of them had, and quite a few of those who hadn’t cheered had been stonefaced and grimly silent, instead.

“May I escort you to your throne, Your Majesty?” Anvil Rock asked, and she inclined her head in gracious assent before she laid the fingertips of her right hand on his forearm. He assisted her carefully (and completely unnecessarily) up the five steps to the top of the dais and she smiled
at him before she turned and seated herself.

She looked out across the throne room, seeing the faces, trying to sample the emotional aura. It was difficult, despite all the hours she’d spent poring over the SNARCs’ reports from this very city. She felt confident she’d assessed Manchyr’s attitude accurately, at least in general terms, and she knew far more about the aristocrats and clerics thronging
this room than any of them could possibly imagine. Yet these were still human beings, and no one could predict human behavior with total assurance.

A throat cleared itself quietly to her right, and she looked up at Archbishop Klairmant Gairlyng. He looked back at her gravely, and she smiled and pitched her voice to carry.

“Before we begin, would you be kind enough to thank God for me for my
safe arrival here, Your Eminence?”

“Of course, Your Majesty,” he agreed with a small bow, then straightened and gazed out across the throne room himself.

“Let us pray,” he said. Heads bowed throughout the vast room, and he raised his voice. “Almighty God, the high and mighty ruler of the universe, we thank You for the safety in which You have brought our royal visitor to this court. We beseech
You to smile upon her and so to show her Your favor that she walks always in Your ways, mindful of Your commands and the dictates of Your justice. Guide, we beseech You, all the nations of this Your world into the way of Your truth and establish among them that peace which is the fruit of righteousness, that they may be in truth Your Kingdom and walk in all the ways You have prepared for them.
And we most especially beseech You to look down from Your throne and bless Your servant Daivyn and all who advise, guide, and guard him. Bring him, too, safely back to us, and so resolve and compose the differences between Your children that all rulers of clean heart and good intent may gather in the amity Your plan has decreed for all men. We ask this in the name of Your servant Langhorne, who first
declared Your will among men to the glory of Your Name. Amen.”