Interregnum (25 page)

The commander glanced at the grim and bleak expression on Darius’ face and moved forward to the dusty signalling lamp, tapping it with his fingers. “Who knew where that room was and what was kept in it?”

Sarios shook his head. “Several people knew of the room’s existence and its contents, but only I ever kept the key.” The minister watched a look cross the commander’s face and continued hurriedly “there are a number of things in there that we keep very private and I’m breaking a rule of the council’s just by telling you about it, but I would like to think that you would allow us the trust to keep the room hidden in return for what I’m about to give you.”

Sabian frowned and raised an eyebrow as the minister continued once more.

“Since I have been incapacitated my affairs have been handled by Minister Turus and it is in his hands those keys have rested these past five days. I suggest that it’s he you need to visit to pursue your enquiries.”

Sabian smiled, though there was precious little humour in it. “Minister, I
am
grateful, and my men and I will find the good minister and deal with him accordingly.”

As he stepped back, however, he held out his hand. “I would like to think you trust me and I would hope I can trust you, but if you have a room containing such things as signal lamps, I do need to see the room and its contents. What I do after I’ve seen them is something I’ll have to think on, but please pass me the keys.”

The minister’s face fell but he held out the key without another word and dropped it in the commander’s palm.

“You’ll find the store room on the ground floor along a corridor past the rear entrance” he said. “At the very end of the corridor is a locked door. I hope I can rely on your discretion and although I realise that Turus has betrayed both you and us, but I would still ask you to inflict no harm without him being brought to the council first.”

The commander nodded. “I imagine that Turus is just a tool in this and I’ll abide by your wishes for now. What happens after the council sees him remains to be seen.” He turned, leaving an unhappy looking old man watching after him.

As Sabian left, Darius cast a quick glance at the minister and nodded once before following the commander back along the corridor and down the stairs. He hurried to catch up as they crossed the main floor and entered a corridor that the commander had never used before. The young man strode at Sabian’s shoulder and cleared his throat.

“Commander, is this important right now?”

Sabian continued to walk, talking without turning. “Darius, if Turus and the doctor had access to lamps in there, I can only wonder what else they could have found. I need to check the room out for myself before I confront the minister on it; besides, I want to know what’s in there for my own satisfaction. I can afford to be lenient in my command here, but not blindly so.”

As he finished speaking they arrived at a heavy wooden door. The commander reached out and turned the key in the lock, pushing the handle hard. The door barely moved, scraping along the floor with a spine-tingling noise. He put his shoulder to it and the heavy portal suddenly gave way, swinging inwards. He recovered himself quickly and glanced around the room; it had obviously been visited rarely and dust lay thick on everything. The window to this room was high and of opaque glass casting strangely wavering, almost submarine light around the interior. He made his way to the desk directly opposite on which sat a signalling lamp of the same style as the two he’d already encountered. Two bare circles in the dusty surface betrayed the existence of the other two. Biting his lip in concentration he began to survey the contents of the room.

Picking up a small soft leather bag from the desk, he tipped it gently upside down over a tin plate. A number of small gems of remarkable quality tumbled out onto the plate with a rattling noise. He blinked and whistled through his teeth. He was no expert on gems, but he’d be willing to bet that this small pouch would be worth enough to keep him in luxury for over a year. These must have been found in the wreckage of the palace just after they’d been made prisoners here. A glance around told similar stories and his eyes wandered across the desk as he poured the gems back into the bag and pulled the draw-string tight.

Items abounded here that he knew would be confiscated if Velutio had known of their existence. A large chest of dried foods carefully packed and sealed would be very useful on a long journey; signalling lamps that could keep the islanders in contact with someone on the mainland; a bag of gems that could keep a traveller for some time. Oh, but they were by no means all forbidden items though. Some had obviously been stored here due to their precious nature. A number of delicate and very rare books lined a shelf each covered in linen to protect them, a jewelled knife bearing the imperial crest on the hilt, a portrait of the last emperor, a little faded but otherwise well preserved. Sabian whistled again. Now that he gazed at a good portrait of Quintus the Golden, the resemblance to the missing Quintillian was unmistakable.

He quickly reached across the desk and pulled over a set of scrolls, six in all, unfastening the silk tie and unrolling them. The moment he saw their contents, he let the scroll go and it rolled back into a coil. He glanced over his shoulder to check on Darius, but the young man was poking around another desk in the corner. Unrolling the scroll again his eyes strolled across the genealogy of the Imperial bloodline and there, clearly labelled at the bottom was Quintillian. He was about to roll it back up carefully when another name caught his eye that made him blink in surprise. Tracing the lines on the chart from Quintus the Golden, he double-checked, but there it was: Livilla Dolabella, a cousin of the Emperor and her husband clearly marked next to her: Kiva Caerdin. He frowned, for there was no mention of a child. With another furtive glance at Darius to make sure he was occupied, he rolled the scroll once more and tied it, fumbling with another. Another genealogy, this time showing the ancestors of a man named Pelius; a name vaguely familiar to the commander from his roll calls on the island. A third scroll revealed another familiar name, and he glanced briefly at it before unrolling the fourth and smiling broadly. The Caerdin line. This short scroll showed Darius clearly enough along with his mother and father and some of the members of the non-direct Imperial family. Caerdin’s father had been added but presumably the northern tribes he came from didn’t keep records of ancestry beyond their father. The maternal line went back a long way, though and very high-born. His suspicions finally confirmed, along with a connection of which he’d been previously unaware, Sabian allowed the scroll to roll up once more and then placed the six back in their container. He turned to Darius.

“I think I’ve seen enough here” he said and the young man turned, pulling himself away from some dusty book. The commander went on. “I’ll speak to the minister later, but I can’t imagine any of this presenting a problem for me at least. Shall we go and have a word with Turus?”

Darius nodded and left the room, waiting in the corridor as Sabian heaved the door shut and locked it.

They strolled down the corridor in the direction of the great courtyard, the commander walking ahead lost in his own musings. Behind him, Darius carefully shuffled into his breeches the one item he’d removed from sight in the room while Sabian had been otherwise occupied. He placed a great deal of trust in the commander, but showing him the only map they had of the island’s reefs and safe channels would be taking that trust too far.

Sabian stood in the octagonal room of the ruined Golden House tapping his fingers on his bronze-plated belt, his eyes darting around the various shattered entrances to the room. Behind him Cialo leaned yawning against a crumbling wall and Iasus stood stiff and upright in what was once an alcove, his sergeant’s vine-staff jammed under his arm. No one had said a word for more than five minutes but impatient sounds abounded. How long would it take the young man?

Footsteps in the ruins announced the arrival of their guest. The commander heaved a sigh of relief and Cialo pulled himself upright off the wall. Minister Turus rounded the corner, picking his way gingerly among the fallen masonry with Darius at his shoulder. The minister spotted the soldiers and gave a crooked smile as he gratefully crossed into the clear area within the octagon.

“Commander,” the man said slightly breathlessly, “young Darius said that you need to see me? A strange place to meet.”

Sabian nodded. “Somewhere quiet… out of the way.” He grinned an unpleasant grin at the minister. “Easy to clean…”

The minister opened his mouth to say something, his eyes surprisingly wide, but the commander rode over the top of whatever comment he intended to make.

“I would assume, minister, that due to your complicity in the affair, you are aware of what happened to the good doctor yesterday?”

The colour drained from Turus’ face. He made strange burbling noises and spun around, finally taking in the solitary location in which he now found himself and the four armed men around him. Eyes so wide they looked like they might burst, he collapsed in a heap on the ground.

“This can’t be happening…”

Darius, only a couple of steps behind him dropped his sword point to the ground a foot away from the minister’s knee. “Oh but it can” he said.

Sabian reached down and grasped the slightly portly man by the tunic and hauled him to his feet. He was surprisingly heavy.

“Save your breath with denials” the commander said plainly. “We know about the doctor and we know about you. The doctor’s gone because he wouldn’t talk to me. I’d assume you’re more intelligent than that.”

The minister said nothing, still pale and frightened, but he nodded vigorously. Sabian smiled inwardly. This was easier that Velutio’s damned doctor. He released his grip on Turus and the man sank back to the floor.

“I’ll give you a very simple choice, Turus” the commander said. “Either you stand brave and irresolute and protect your fellow conspirators, in which case we cut you into several pieces to fatten the fishes… or you tell me everything you know right here and now and I turn you over to Sarios to deal with.”

As he finished speaking, he became aware that the minister was whimpering. The man reached up and there were tears in his eyes.

“I didn’t want to, but … my family! You must understand.”

Darius looked over the broken minister at the commander and cleared his throat. “The man’s daughter lives in Velutio.”

Sabian remained stony faced. “I’m waiting, minister.”

Pulling himself together as best he could, Turus hauled himself to his feet.

“Someone in the city. I don’t know who, but he must be powerful. The doctor came to me with an offer; said he could get me off the island and to my family. How could I not? I didn’t know he was going to kill anyone; that was never part of the deal.”

Sabian nodded. “I know who the someone in the city is and I know about the doctor and you. You’re not telling me anything. I know there were soldiers involved;
my
men. Tell me who they were and what was sent.” To emphasise his words, he drew his sword and tapped the flat of the blade against his shin. The minister’s eyes bulged again.

“I don’t know what the messages were; I was just to get the lamp. There are three men though… three that I know of anyway. Don’t know their names, but they’re all on the guard duty under him.” He pointed at Iasus. Sabian turned and nodded at the sergeant. The young martinet stepped forward and reached out with his vine staff, placing it beneath the minister’s chin.

“Descriptions” he said. “If you can’t give us names, give us descriptions.”

The minister tried to nod, but the vine staff inhibited him; the position looked very uncomfortable. Sabian glanced briefly at Iasus. Sometimes a strict military disciplinarian had his uses. Turus gulped.

“There’s a tall one, fair haired. I think he’s probably in charge.

Iasus nodded and spoke to his commander without taking his eyes off the minister. “Rufus. Got to be Rufus. He’s officer of the night watch. Go on minister…”

“One with a black beard, quite curly.”

Iasus tutted and lifted the vine-staff, almost choking the minister. “No one in my duty with a black beard” he said.

The minister’s eyes bulged again, but Cialo piped up from the other corner. “He means Carbo. Carbo was assigned to guard, but I swapped him for one of my crew this morning after we had a minor accident.”