The Invisible Chains - Part 3: Bonds of Blood (21 page)

“
I'm never going to solve this,”
he thought, suddenly despairing. “
My Ehandar is further away than ever.”

Silent tears rolled down his cheeks.

“
And worst of all... worst of all... he has failed the test.”

“It was of course the dishy one. The young lord of Iramid, not his father. I always suspected he had an eye for this sort of thing. Did you know he rinses his hair with perfume of lilacs? It's not exactly a breathtaking waft, but more of a subtle ambiance that surrounds him.

“Oh, the first thing I thought was ‘There comes trouble,’ but no, it proved to be a nice and lucrative experience. Since I didn't know that beforehand, I'm afraid, I snapped a bit at him.”

Varsia nipped from a very small cup with very strongarsia nipd a brandy. Renda refilled it as soon as she had set it down again.

“Oh dear, isn't it terribly early in the afternoon to be drinking this much? Then again, do we have anything better to do?” Varsia quipped.

They both laughed.

“I must say, this is very fine brandy. Must be terribly expensive.”

“Bah. It's overstock from the kitchens, love,” Renda said, thanking the Gods that the prince-governor was not much of a drinker. “Go on, Varsia, love. You were snapping at young lord Iramid...”

“Yes, I was. Well, wouldn't you? I thought ‘There's another one with a tear in his mantle for Varsia to ruin her eyes over.’ I'm a seamstress and I take pride in my craft, but honestly, I get paid to mend their uniforms, not their personal stuff. Not only that, they're rude because they're young lords and they think anything is permitted to them, but actually they're just brats, you know?

“But not this one. He called me ‘my fair lady of the needle.’ Isn't that cute? Yes, yes, I know he was buttering me up. Even so, it was nice, being buttered up by such a... well, you can't deny he's delicious, can you? That hair alone. It's like a dark wave in the sea, when he shakes that pretty head of his. A black, lilac scented wave. Ha, makes me wish I was twenty years younger.”

Renda nodded, and thought about the Lord-Governor and his brother, high up in the tower.

“For some reason or other he's staying with the barbarians. Been a few weeks now. I think he has to keep an eye on them or something, so they don't steal valuables out of the guest house, or smash things. Anyroad, he said he had been studying their clothing, and he wanted his mantle to be trimmed with fur, just like theirs.

“You can see why I snapped at him. As if I haven't work enough. So I said exactly that. ‘My lord,’ I said, ‘I have too much work as it is, and my eyes are not what they were. I would have to do it in my free time as well.’ He said he understood and that he would gladly pay me for my troubles. Now, that made me less snappy at once. ‘But,’ I said, ‘there's a problem. The fur will make the mantle hang down. It won't flow nicely anymore. The fabric is just not strong enough to bear the weight.’ He said he had thought about that.

Mukthar fabric is much coarser than ours of course, and they use a lot of leather to reinforce the seams. ‘So,’

he said, ‘let's not use the fur folded around the hem, but let's just stitch a kind of lining on the outside.”

“Maybe a tad less broad as well,’ he said.”

Varsia paused and held out her thimble sized cup.

“Fill us up, Renda, love. ‘Yes,’ I told him, ‘that could work.’ So he laid a mantle, a tunic and a shirt on the table. As luck would have it, I have a nice stock of fur in the back, in the storage room. Been there for ages. I doubt it's still on the books. He chose the dark red fox fur. Well, he's kind of foxy himself, isn't he?”

She emptied her cup.

“Then he said ‘I'm not as popular as I used to be, but I'm sure very soon a few others will come seek you out to have their clothes trimmed with fur as well. Then more will follow. Be sure to make them pay through the nose,’ he said. And he winked at me. And that divine smile of his. Renda, it would have melted you, I swear.

Oh, it was all I could do not to pinch his cheeks.”

Renda laughed nervously. She too was thinking of pinching Lorcko's cheeks. Not the ones on his ng of s o="1face.

“And what do you know? A few days later a captain came in with exactly the same request. Then another.

Then that youngish cavalry general. To make a long story short, I'm up to my ears in work, as my grandmother would say, and good money is rolling in. All thanks to that scrumptious, dear boy. Of course, when he came in to have his boots lined with fur, I did it for free, though it's hard work, stitching through leather is. He gave me a pecker on the cheek. Ah, those eyes like black silk and that alabaster neck of his.

And his black hair, contrasting with the deep red fur. He's a vision out of heaven... I'm afraid I made myself all queasy, just describing him and that delectable body of his.”

She shivered, then took another swig.

“So it was the young lord of Iramid who was responsible for this Mukthar fashion craze? I was in Lorseth Market the other day. Did you know they're selling Mukthar shirts from almost every second stall? ‘Buy your Mukthar shirts here. When the barbarians come they'll take you for one of them and you'll be safe.’ As if.

Have you ever heard anything more preposterous?”

“Never. Besides, it's terrible needlework. The fur — if fur it is — will fall off from pure misery and self loathing within the month. Those stitches couldn't hold a sparrow's feather attached to a tunic. And I know what I'm speaking about.”

She smacked her lips.

Renda understood and filled her little cup once more to the brim. Then she fetched a platter out of the kitchen.

“Oh, pastries, yummy,” Varsia cried out in a shrill, delighted voice. “Overstock, dear?”

Her majesty considered the Sermyn farm a safer place of residence nowadays, but Ffindall Dram begged to differ. Actually there was but one safe place for the queen, and as luck would have it, a very big one. It was called Everywhere Outside Ximerion, and it would do just fine.

He looked around with mounting feelings of unease as he neared the walls of the farm. The fortified place stood on its own, in the middle of open, flat terrain. Granted, an enemy could be seen coming from far away, but what good would that do? If he managed to surround the place, the inhabitants were trapped as rats in a cage. He doubted there was something like a subterranean passage out of the farm. It would have to be miles long.

He made a mental note to voice his worries to the queen.

“Master Dram, welcome,” Emelasuntha said with a smile. Her friend, the rotund baroness, nodded benignly.

It was the first time he had visited the queen in her new lair. Up until now he had sent underlings to keep her appraised of the running investigations. He did so in person now. Dry, quick and efficient.

“Thank you, master Dram,” the queen said as business-like as he had been himself. “That seems to be most satisfactory, but I sense there is something else on your mind.”

“Two things actually, my lady. I'm not, eh, very happy with you staying here. Chances are by now the Black Shields have gotten wind of your whereabouts, and I am afraid we don't have the numbers to protect this place. They, however, could easily lay siege to it.”

The baroness looked at Emelasuntha with a look that said ‘What did I tell you?’

Tlign="justify">“Yes,” the queen answered. “The danger of my position was brought to my attention already. Several times, in fact.” She looked at Sobrathi, who shrugged. “The Black Shields will not catch me, not here. I have an early warning system in place that should give us ample time to vacate the place if they show up en mass. However, thank you for your concern. It is appreciated.”

She gave Ffindall one of her most charming smiles.

“Very well, my lady. Then... It took some time before I could get to them, the old cases of my predecessor.

There was a lot of cleaning up to do after the Elmshill incident, I'm afraid. Very tiresome. Very costly, as well. Finally I got to them and—”

“Ah, yes, good old Megbert,” the queen said. “How is he doing these days?”

“His vegetable cutting skills are improving, or so they tell me.”

“Good for him. You were saying?”

“There were several investigations going on into the immediate circle of his highness, your son.”

“Yes. The baroness, in her own ingenious way, investigated his Cheridonian friends, at great cost to her health. They seem to be rather harmless.”

“Without being as outspoken as that, earlier reports seemed to indicate as much. So, in the short time I was able to devote to these cases I chose to concentrate mainly on general Sir Iftang Busskal and master Tomar Parmingh.”

The queen had clapped her hands. He paused and waited while she ordered a servant who had entered the room to bring them cooled wine and some finger food.

“We've discovered the until now hidden source of money of the Busskals. It's rather embarrassing for the general, I'm afraid. He has a long enduring affair with an older woman, a rich widow. She's been footing the bill of Busskal senior's spendthrift.”

“An older lover?” the baroness inquired. “By how much?”

“The lady pretends to be in her late forties. Actually she is fifty three. Although, our agents report she could easily be taken for early forties, even late thirties on a good day.”

The baroness laughed out loud.

“Who would have thought. Our general is what, thirty two?”

“Thirty three. They've known each other — and been in a relation — since he was sixteen.”

The baroness whistled.

“It's not exactly like she's a cradle robber, dear,” the queen said. “And they must like each other genuinely for the affair to have lasted this long.”

“That seems to be the case,” Ffindall said, without betraying what he was thinking.

“That means our general is in the clear,” the baroness concluded. “Whenever his father has accumulated too many debts, she pays them off.”

“That's putting it a bit simple,” Ffindall intervened. “Sorry, my lady. She is well off, very well off, but her funds are not limitless. They've been paying off creditors whenever foreclosure threatened, but they haven't managed to solve the question definitely. That's impossible of course, as long as Busskal senior keeps making new debts with the estate as security. It seems lately he has been exaggerating a bit, counting on his son to come up with the money.”

“He doesn't know the provenance?” the queen asked.

“No, my lady, he doesn't. He doesn't know of his son's liaison. He just accepts the money without asking questions. He wouldn't approve of his son having an affair with the widow of a merchant. Their father-son relation is strained as it is.”

“I bet he would keep accepting her money though,” the queen mused.

“Oh, yes, no doubt about that. The Busskals are on the lowest rung of nobility. As is so often the case, they're

the ones who attach the most importance to rank and social status. Not so much the general, but his father certainly does.”

“I see,” the queen said. “So, summarizing, money is running out, putting a strain on the love birds, and putting even more strain on the already strained relationship between father and son. What do you think, master Dram? Could this be grounds for blackmail?”