The False Martyr (39 page)

“
Then let us meet them,”
Ambassador Chulters took up the call with vigor, falling just short
of pounding his fist on the table. “Already, Liandria rallies to .
. . .”

Nyel hissed. “Have you
heard nothing?”

“
A Mother has no control
over anything outside her lodge,” Juhn reminded. “The men will
decide when and where and for whom they will fight.”

“
But surely with your
support and our gold . . . .”

“
Your gold is worthless,”
Nyel snapped, a mother losing her patience.

“
His Majesty has made it
clear that he will not be outbid,” Ambassador Chulters responded.
“Prince Winslow follows with the entire treasury and the ability to
negotiate the trade deals that will allow you to spend it. The
Empire could not hope to match us.”

Juhn looked to Nyel, but
she simply shook her head and gestured back to him, seemingly
giving up on the proceedings. “I will explain this because if seems
you cannot let it go,” Juhn conceded. “Your offer to hire the
lodges is already lost. You must pursue it, but you have no chance
to succeed.”

“
I . . . I don’t . . . .“
Ambassador Chulters stammered then caught himself. “The Empire is
nearly destitute. Even if they empty the palace, they have no goods
to offer. The gold would sit cold in your lodges. How can we not
succeed?”

“
Because the Emperor
doesn’t seek to hire every lodge. He seeks only to divide us, and
in that, he has already succeeded. His delegation has already
visited the eastern lodges. The Empire has already agreed to terms
with them, has hired them as you would say. Your offer to hire all
the lodges and the Callik it necessitates is likely all that is
keeping them from marching as we speak.”

“
All the lodges east of
here?”

“
Pada Por, Okotok, and
Inuvik,” Juhn confirmed.

“
So seven remain
unclaimed?” Ambassador Chulters was catching his stride. Cary had
nearly given up on following the discussion and was trying to keep
himself from being caught by the youngest of Nyel’s daughters as he
explored her. She was far too beautiful and important for him, but
he had a thing for pregnant women – often their husbands ignored
them, and there was no risk of getting them in trouble – and she
was captivating.
Who would have thought a
Morg woman would look like that?
he asked
himself over and over. “If we can simply sway the remaining lodges
the Callik will . . . .”

Nyel shook her head. Her
eye crept to Cary, but she seemed to think better of it and
diverted her stare out the window to her side.

“
Listen,” Juhn sighed.
“The Empire need only hire two of the remaining seven to keep the
Callik from a majority, and you are dividing your gold among ten
lodges – not five – and that by number of men provided. “It is
simple math. If the Callik accepts your offer, over half of your
gold will go to Torswauk and Mehret because it will be divided by
the number of warriors they can provide. That leaves the remaining
half to be divided among eight lodges.”

“
By the Order,” Ambassador
Chulters cursed as the picture cleared. Cary, never good with his
numbers, did not have any idea what they were talking about, but it
was clearly not good. He was also worried that Nyel’s daughter had
caught him staring at her breasts. No matter how fast he had looked
away, he had not missed her scorn. Now, he was afraid that he was
further indicting himself with a rush of blood to his head. Seeking
an escape and remembering his purpose in the room, he pretended to
give the other women equal attention but found only confusion and
indifference in varying combinations.

“
The eight would each
receive, on average, only a sixteenth of what you offer – the
remaining half divided eight ways,” Juhn continued though the
ambassador made it clear that he understood. “To sway the five they
need to stalemate the Callik, the Empire needs only bring
five-sixteenths of the wealth of Liandria – about a third. Even
destitute, the Palace of Rising Sun holds more than
that.”

“
I understand now, so what
can we do?” Ambassador Chulters managed to say when Juhn paused.
“If the effort is hopeless, why should we continue to pursue it?
There must be some other way. Is that why you have asked us
here?”

Nyel turned back from the
window, face stern. “Guth,” she cursed, a word that even Cary knew
meant ‘outsiders’. “You think that your money is the only thing
that can sway us, that it is up to you, up to men, to save the
Order. Arrogance. This battle is for the Mothers.” At the call, the
women around her grew straighter, if that was possible. They looked
on their leader as any soldiers would when called to battle. “That
is why I cannot understand the thinking of this counselor. How can
these guth men do what cannot be done by women?” She dropped back
into her native tongue for a few more sharp questions.

Juhn answered them with
exaggerated patience, having obviously heard them
before.

“
I don’t think I
understand,” the ambassador admitted after the side conversation
died and a long pause replaced it.

“
Nyel has called a Thull,
a meeting of the Mothers,” Juhn explained. “These occur every few
years, but this will be the first where real issues are decided
since the Morgs split from the Empire, allowing themselves to be
mercenaries in the Liandrin Revolt.” Ambassador Chulters darkened
at the term. Even Cary felt his ire rise – it was referred to as
the Liandrin Revolution where he was from, and there was great
pride associated with it. “That Thull established that the Emperor
was not, in fact, the Order’s embodiment, and that the lodges need
not follow him. In this Thull, Nyel will seek to establish that the
invaders are the Lost Sons, the Thurs, that their wizards are the
Lawbreakers, that they are a threat to the Order and to every
lodge.”

“
And if you do, your men
will join us whether we hire them or not?” The ambassador seemed
unable to help himself.

Juhn cleared his throat
and swatted at a fly. “Yes, but this is no obvious thing. Even if
all the Mothers agree that the invaders are a threat, they may
disagree on how to deal with that threat – when and where and how.
Or the men may choose a different path. Only if the Mothers are
perfectly unified will we get the outcome we seek. As an example,
if your mother said that a wolf was a threat to your home and told
you to find it and kill it, you would certainly do so. If she told
you to take your neighbors with you to help, you would go to them
and ask, but if they did not see the wolf as a threat or had
decided to hunt it another way, neither you nor your mother could
compel them to do otherwise. Further, if your father told you to
wait or to not go to the neighbors or not to hunt the wolf at all,
you would . . . .”

“
Both sleep in the
stables. . . .” Cary said in what he thought was a soft enough
voice to keep it from any ears but his own.

He was wrong. The room
fell silent. The ambassador scowled. Cary nearly flinched for the
certainty that his superior would strike him. Juhn’s chuckle and
Nyel’s smiling nod saved him. “The horseman has found the truth of
it,” Juhn said. “The Mothers cannot control what the men do outside
the lodge, but they can control if they’re ever allowed back in. If
a Mother is strong and resolute, the men will do exactly as they
are told because they know that the alternative is expulsion. But
even that is undermined if another lodge will have them – if your
father simply slept with another women when your mother cast him
out, your mother’s punishment would be meaningless. Further, your
father might just decide to leave, take another wife, and start
another house. He may even take you and your brothers and sisters
with him. The same is true here. If the Mother is weak, one of her
sisters or cousins may take her outcast husband and start a new
lodge or replace her entirely. For something like what Nyel
proposes to succeed, every Mother must be of the same mind and they
must have absolute control of their lodges.”

“
I see,” Ambassador
Chulters said slowly. He cast a withering look at Cary to ensure he
did not have any further comments. Cary could only marvel that his
mother had apparently been a Morg all along – maybe that was why he
found them so captivating. “So what can Liandria do to aid you? Can
we negotiated with the Mothers? Can we strengthen you with our
payment?”

“
No!” Nyel slammed her
hand on the table. Her face was fierce. “We are not whores to be
paid to do what you want. After this morning,
you
will never again see a Morg
Mother. You will certainly not pay them or negotiate with them.”
Cary could not help but see how Nyel focused on the ambassador when
she mentioned seeing Morg women and how she emphasized
‘you’.
She meant the word to apply only to
him. So what about me? Do I get to see them?
“Tell him,” Nyel said with contempt. “But know that this
comes not from me.”

Juhn took a long breath
and looked at Nyel then the ambassador. “Remember, I said that it
was you, personally, that we needed. The truth is that it is only
him.” Cary’s attention piqued at that. He found every eye on him,
including the ambassador who seemed lost between horror, repulsion,
and fascination. “We invited you here, Ambassador, because it
requires your approval. I am asking in front of Nyel so that you
will know that I have the backing of the Mother of Torswauk and so
that you would understand the importance of what we ask, but it is
not you that we need. The Order has chosen the horseman. We need a
spy and the Order has dictated that it be him.”

Chapter 23

The
23
^th
Day of Summer

“
You are better at this
than I expected,” Eia said from Ipid’s side. Her hand was gripped
in his, her head resting against the side of his arm. Together,
they stared out the tall windows that stood behind the desk in
Allard Stully’s office and watched Valati Wallock step from the
coach that carried him. He inspected the mob of Darthur that stood
outside the main door then the growing numbers of the city watch
that maintained a place closer to the gates. Finally, his eyes rose
to the house and the windows where Ipid and Eia watched. He did not
give any indication of being able to see them through those
windows. He simply returned his attention to Captain Tyne and
followed him to the door.

“
It’s not like I’ve never
run anything before,” Ipid answered without looking at Eia. “My
mills were in many ways like a nation.”

“
But machines will not
hang you if you work them too hard.”

“
They’ll break down,
though, and that’s just about as bad.”

Eia looked at him
appraising. “Easy to say when there isn’t a rope around your neck.”
She broke from him and walked to the desk.

Ipid turned and watched
her leaning against the dark surface. “Are you sure this is what
you want?” she asked. “You can still reconsider. Wouldn’t it be
better to pull strings from the shadows?”

“
If there were strings to
pull. But your friends killed every person in the city who might
serve as Chancellor. I don’t have time to groom someone. My only
chance to meet Arin’s demands is to take authority
myself.”

“
They will hate
you.”

“
I thought that was your
advice all along? Isn’t the fact that I do not need to be loved my
greatest strength?”

Eia snickered. “Certainly,
but all that changes when people think they can do something about
the thing they hate. Right now you are a distant thing. You are
like war. Everyone hates it, but no one can do anything about it.
Being Chancellor will make you an evil that is before them every
day, a source for all their frustrations, the focal for all the
wrong in the world. And an evil that they can remove. Not some
distant threat, but a real man with a real position that can be
overthrown, assassinated, executed.”

Ipid sighed. She was
right, of course. He needed someone who could retrain the trust and
loyalty of the people. Someone who could say,
I hate to do this, but this bastard is making me.
If the people felt something for that person,
they would be slower to act, would wait, hoping that the evil would
depart. Without that shield, their patience would last only as long
as fear stayed their hands. It was tenuous, but Ipid saw no other
way. And a knock at the door told him that he was out of time to
consider.

“
Enter,” he called and
returned to stand behind the great black desk.

Captain Tyne opened the
door, looking unsettled, and issued Valati Wallock in behind him.
“My lord,” he announced, “Valati Wallock.”

Valati Howland Wallock
stepped cautiously past the door, his eyes darting to each of the
half-dozen Darthur who were now arrayed about the room. While he
was distracted, Ipid considered him as he never had before. He was
a relatively young man from a well-connected family that had been
blessed with an over-abundance of sons. Ipid did not know him well
but knew that he had a reputation for being pliable and pragmatic
with a good sense for politics. It was that reputation that Ipid
was counting on, but now, he wondered if he had miscalculated yet
again. The valati was thoroughly unimpressive man. He was of just
below average height with a stocky build, short, sandy hair, dirty
green eyes, and a face that would inspire neither men nor women.
Even worse, he looked stunned, as if he were somewhat simple of
mind and unable to grasp what was happening around him. His eyes
darted about the room as if searching for an escape. His shoulders
slumped, round head bowed, hands hidden as if he were hoping to
disappear within his robes.