The Guns of Empire (3 page)

T
albonn was not a city with a great deal to recommend it, in Raesinia's opinion.

It stood at Vordan's northern frontier, the last major settlement before the Murnskai border. The highway that passed through it was an important artery of commerce, but it didn't look the part. It barely looked like a road at all, more like a track worn in the mud by a bunch of animals all going the same way. Which was more or less the truth—the biggest trade here was cattle from the Transpale, driven north along this road in exchange for heavy wagonloads of timber and iron from the freezing forests of vast, empty Murnsk. Talbonn was the sort of city that grows up to cater to carters and cattlemen, with filthy, stinking streets, low, mean buildings, and an overabundance of winesinks and whorehouses.

Nevertheless, it had made an effort to rise to the occasion. Uniformed armsmen stood at regular intervals along the main road, which had been swept clean of dung and broken glass for the benefit of the noble visitors. The largest hotel in the city, which called itself the Grand in pale imitation of the real thing back in Vordan, was a four-story eyesore of plaster and gilt with pretensions to architecture, covered with unnecessary buttresses and ornamental balconies. Raesinia rolled her eyes at it as her carriage drew closer and pulled into the circular drive, passing footmen with too many shiny buttons.

“When we stop,” Sothe said, “remember not to open the door until the second carriage pulls up.”

“We've been over this,” Raesinia said. “More than once.”

“Forgive me,” Sothe said. “You have a habit of ignoring my instructions.”

That brought a faint smile to Raesinia's lips. Her Head of Household was as
jumpy as a startled cat, unhappy at how hastily the conference had been assembled and how little time she'd been given to secure the site. Though, truth be told, Raesinia wasn't sure any amount of time would have been enough for Sothe to feel comfortable. It had been almost six months since their clash with the Penitent Damned, but the attack of the supernatural assassins had clearly left a deep impression. Sothe opened every door as though she expected to find a murderous Black Priest behind it.

The carriage drew to a halt, and a few moments later Raesinia heard the second vehicle draw up behind it. Booted feet crunched on the gravel, and there was a rap at the door.

“Your Majesty?” Barely said from outside. “We're ready.”

Raesinia glanced at Sothe and got a slight nod. She stood, hardly needing to duck to fit through the doorway, and stepped out.

At least wartime was good for banishing some of the more ridiculous formality of the royal court. Raesinia wore a sober dress of black and gray, with a sash in Vordanai blue providing the only splash of color. She'd impressed upon her dressmakers that it wouldn't do to have the queen going around in some gaudy confection while Vordanai soldiers were risking their lives at the front. Sothe, coming behind her, was dressed even more severely, in a long, dark skirt that Raesinia assumed provided plenty of space for concealed weapons. As an ex-Concordat assassin, Sothe never went unarmed.

Her guards formed a loose ring around the carriage. She'd restored the old Grenadier Guards to their traditional position of protecting the person of the monarch, but insisted on adding a few of Colonel Ihernglass' Girls' Own to her security detail. The Grenadier Guards
looked
handsome, with their tailored uniforms, polished caps, and colorful sashes, but they hadn't been very effective the last time it had come to a fight.

The two women Ihernglass had left her, in contrast, had been part of the group that had rescued her from Maurisk and Ionkovo during the last throes of the previous year's fighting. Corporal Barley was universally known as “Barely,” the joke being that with her slight stature she was barely there at all. She was a canny soldier, though, and a deadly fighter. Her companion, the mute Joanna, was a foot taller and built like a blacksmith. Raesinia had a good deal more faith in these veterans—and Sothe's diligence—than in the spit-and-polish men of the Guards.

More local armsmen stood at the entrance to the hotel. A bowing footman led the way inside, Raesinia and Sothe at the center of a column of smart blue
uniforms. They wound their way through the lobby, drawing bows and stares from the curious staff, and toward the ballroom. Sothe accepted a scrap of paper from a hurrying messenger, glanced at it, and bent close to Raesinia's ear.

“Everyone's here, except for Janus. Apparently there's been a delay on the road.”

Raesinia frowned. They'd deliberately tried to arrive after the First Consul, just to make the relative hierarchy clear to the foreign guests.
Did he anticipate that? Is this a message?
Or, of course, a cart-horse could have thrown a shoe.

“There's more.” Sothe grimaced. “Orlanko is here.”

“What?”
Raesinia hissed.

Orlanko, the infamous Last Duke, had been the head of the Concordat secret police and had tried to seize power after her father's death. His coup had been thwarted with Janus' help, but the man himself had fled the country after his final attempt to turn the army against Raesinia had failed.

“As a guest of the Borelgai. The king's given him shelter.” Sothe lowered her voice even further. “Do you want me to put together a squad to arrest him?”

Damnation.
Satisfying as it might be, she couldn't, not without driving the Borels away from the conference table. Whatever their true intentions, they couldn't allow the capture of a guest under their protection.

“No,” Raesinia said. “But you'd better stay clear.” Sothe had once been one of Orlanko's best killers, and Raesinia had no idea if he was aware of her current role.
Easier to play it safe.
“I'll keep Barely and Jo with me. Have the Guards keep an eye on their foreign counterparts.”

Sothe nodded. At the entrance to the ballroom, she and the Grenadier Guards peeled off, and Raesinia continued to the double doors with only the two women from the Girls' Own for escort. Footmen pushed the doors open, and a butler with a carrying voice announced, “Her Majesty Queen Raesinia Orboan of Vordan!”

I must be getting used to this.
She hardly flinched at the introduction, or the sudden stares from everyone in the big room. Once, the suffocating blanket of official attention might have driven her to flee; now she only had to take a deep breath before gliding forward, her old court training automatically making her steps careful and smooth.

The ballroom, like the hotel, was dressed up to look like something it wasn't. Gaudy hangings covered the walls, and a hundred lamps hung from the ceiling. But there was no way to disguise the awkward, boxy lines of the room. Raesinia pictured it being used for cattlemen's rustic dances once the dignitaries had departed.

No dancing seemed likely today. Small tables were covered with food and tiny glasses of wine, and hotel staff circulated among the guests, offering pastries. There were soldiers, in the uniforms of four countries—Vordanai blue, the yellow and black of Hamvelt, Borelgai mud red, and Murnskai white. Men in shabby suits were probably clerks, while those more impressively attired were civilian officials of their governments. Raesinia had the feeling that she, Barely, and Joanna were the only women in the room.

It was easy to see where the nexuses of power lay, just by watching the movement of the crowd. Lesser lights orbited dense knots of conversation the way that philosophers said the world went around the sun, drawn in by their gravity but unable to penetrate to the inner circle. The largest group was also the loudest, a mob of wasp-colored soldiers and men in long-tailed coats engaged in such energetic argument that it seemed like punches might soon be thrown. The Hamveltai were in the most precarious situation of all the attendees, having suffered grievous reverses the previous year—their field army smashed and their greatest fortress forced to surrender, while their ally Desland had actually been occupied by Vordanai forces.

Evidently they haven't figured out what to do about it.
Raesinia decided to let them stew for a moment. She walked instead toward the Murnskai delegation. This was mostly soldiers, spotless white uniforms dripping with gold braid and trimmed with fur at the collars. Their tight circle opened at her approach, revealing a tall, broad man at its center. His uniform was the most impressive of all, both sides of his chest studded with medals alongside a cloth-of-gold sash, and he wore a long cloak of flowing white fur.

Prince Cesha Dzurk
, Sothe's briefing had supplied. Second son of the Emperor of Holy Murnsk, and reportedly favored by his father over the diligent, bloodless crown prince. Dzurk was a man of legendary appetites and little tact, but his word supposedly carried great weight with the emperor.
At least he's not a religious fanatic like his brother.

“Your Majesty,” the prince said, offering her a shallow bow. “It is a pleasure.” His Vordanai was passable, but his accent was atrocious, so broad that Raesinia wondered if he was doing it deliberately.

“Prince,” Raesinia said. “Welcome to Vordan.”

“This is the first time I have come south,” the prince said, his tone making it clear he was not impressed. “I hope it is not all for nothing, eh? Where is the famous Vhalnich?”

“On his way, I'm told. I'm sure he'll be here soon.”

“Tell him I am not accustomed to being kept waiting.”

Raesinia bristled. “I remind you that Vhalnich serves at my pleasure. I will represent Vordan in this negotiation.”

The prince snorted. “I am not accustomed to haggling with little girls, either, outside of . . . certain matters.” He raised one bushy eyebrow and looked her up and down. “Or would you like to come upstairs for some private negotiations? I'm told you're of age, though I'm not certain I believe it.”

Raesinia suppressed a flare of rage.
He's baiting me.
Boorish or no, no courtier was
that
rude except on purpose. She took a deep breath, keeping her eyes steady on the prince's smirk, and put her hand on Barely's shoulder when the woman moved forward indignantly. The Murnskai's gaze shifted to her, and then to Joanna, and his smile broadened.

“Oh!” he said. “And you've brought some of your notorious girl soldiers along, too. Though I daresay you might have found more attractive specimens. Perhaps they're here to make you look good by contrast?”

There was a murmur of laughter from the Murnskai gathered around, the polite titter of sycophants.

“The corporals are veterans,” Raesinia said. “They were both at the fall of Antova, among many other battles.”

“I don't doubt it.” He raised his eyebrows at Joanna. “This one looks like she could tear down a fortress with her bare hands, then snap a man in half with her thighs. Let me ask you a question, Corporal, that I've never had occasion to ask a woman before.” He leaned closer, a lewd twist in his voice. “Does being in battle make you . . . ah . . . excited? After I have killed a man, I can hardly bear it. The very next thing I have to do is find some whore and fuck her senseless.”

Joanna, eyes on the prince, made a gesture at Barely. The smaller woman cleared her throat and said, “She says that it hasn't so far, but she'd be happy to run the experiment again, if you're volunteering.” Joanna patted the sword at her side meaningfully.

Raesinia flinched, but the prince only laughed, echoed by his chorus of admirers.

“I look forward to discussing the subject in more detail,” he said, “especially if the consul continues to be tardy. Your Majesty—” Someone tugged on his sleeve from behind, and he shrugged. “But I am needed. Another time.”

Raesinia bit back a retort, turned, and walked away. Joanna and Barely stayed close behind her, and Barely leaned in to whisper.

“Sorry, Your Majesty. I maybe should have kept that to myself.”

“No,” Raesinia muttered, looking back at the laughing prince. “He was going to keep pushing until we pushed back.”
But why?
It had caught her off guard; she'd expected, if not deference, then a certain degree of respect.
After all, they're only here because we're
winning
the war, aren't they?

“If you want Jo to lay him out, just say the word.”

“Tempting, but not yet. I—”

“Your Majesty.” She'd been walking at random, away from the Murnskai delegation, and now a red-uniformed soldier had stepped into her path, bowing low. “It's an honor.”

“Likewise,” Raesinia said, momentarily at a loss. When he straightened up, she identified him at once. There was no mistaking the hawk-nosed profile of Attua Dorsay, Duke of Brookspring.

Dorsay was known to every child in Vordan, at least by reputation. He had been the first soldier of Borel for more than forty years, leading armies up and down the Old Coast in support of Borelgai allies among the city-states there. More recently he had been the engineer of the Vordanai defeat in the War of the Princes, and in command at Vansfeldt, the battle where Raesinia's older brother, Crown Prince Dominic, had been killed. Her father had never truly recovered from that disaster, which had cost him his beloved heir and his territorial ambitions in the course of a single afternoon.

Dorsay had been caricatured widely in the Vordanai press, a big-eared, wild-haired madman with a hook nose and a villain's smile. Raesinia hadn't been expecting a cackling goblin, exactly, but it was a little odd to see how
normal
the man looked. His nose was certainly prominent, and the wings of hair left at the back of his bald head were bushy, but his face was a friendly one, if lined by age and care. He had to be past sixty, but his eyes still gleamed with keen intelligence and a touch of humor.