The Three Lands Omnibus (2011 Edition) (34 page)

I had no notion what to say. Alaric, I was sure, could not recognize the full harm of what he was doing. Raised with romantic barbarian views of love, he did not see how even an arranged marriage, such as that of Titus and Chloris, could be blessed with happiness if the husband and wife gave love to each other – and such love, I am now sure, Erlina will receive from any man selected by her father. Yet it really wasn't my place to offer Alaric lectures on his conduct. The only question that arose was where my own duties lay.
Alaric must have sensed this, for concern finally entered his face. "You will not tell him?" he said. "For Erlina's sake, you will remain silent?"
"Carle is my partner," I said, struggling to make the barbarian understand. "I can't keep this from him—"
"Oh, Carle." The lines of worry in Alaric's face disappeared, leaving only the swirling paint. "Carle you most certainly must tell, but not our host? You will not leave Carle's sister naked to her father's hand?"
"Yes, I knew," Carle said that night when I told him. "I'd guessed, from the way that she avoided speaking to him during meals. That's not Erlina's usual manner of treating guests."
"And you don't mind?" I said with surprise. We were standing next to the window in Carle's main bed-chamber – Emorian windows are too small to sit on – and were feeling the winter wind scurry over our skins. Beside us, though, blazed a generous fire that frightened away the cold.
Carle shrugged his hands. "It's as Alaric said: this is Erlina's last chance for happiness before her marriage. Alaric strikes me as an honorable man, for a barbarian – and what is more important, he strikes me as a man with too much desire for self-preservation to risk impregnating the daughter of his host. I'm sure he'll be careful not to take matters too far with Erlina."
"But Carle," I said, "surely any man honored by your father with your sister's care—"
Carle turned abruptly away from the window. "It's cold tonight," he said. "I'd best go see that the slave-servants are well supplied with fuel." And he left the room without saying farewell.
How I wish that Fenton were here. Carle's hatred of his father is so great that it is poisoning his most elementary judgment. I'm tempted to go directly to Verne with this problem, but I suppose that I shouldn't give up so easily on awakening Carle to how blind he is being.
Fenton, I'm sure, would have found a way to show Carle his father's true character.
 
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The sixth day of January in the 941st year a.g.l.
This will be a long entry, for much has happened since I wrote last – all of it my fault, alas. I suspect, though, that it would have happened sooner or later, no matter how innocent any of us were.
It started in Verne's study chamber.
"I can't resist showing you this, though my father will tear us apart if he finds us in here." Carle tilted his head back to look at the bookcase before us. "He won't even let anyone except his personal free-servant clean this room, and then only under his watchful eye. I remember it being a great privilege when I was a boy to be able to watch my father take a book off that shelf and read passages aloud to me."
I scarcely heard what he was saying. My mouth was agape as I stared up at the row upon row of books, all bound in creamy leather, all shining golden under the afternoon light. "I didn't realize there were so many," I said in a hushed voice.
"You may find this hard to believe, but my father only owns about half the law books." Carle smiled serenely with his half-raised lips. "He'd have to possess the income of a council lord to be able to afford the full set. Most of these books my father inherited; a few he was able to buy from the profits of our orchard."
A smell of aging paper was hovering in the room, as delicious to me as the scent of a fine feast. I reached out and touched the soft hairs of the binding. "May I look at one?" I asked, continuing to speak in a low, reverent tone.
For the first time, Carle's smile disappeared. He stood silent for a moment, biting the tip of his thumb, then said, "We really shouldn't, but I can't resist showing you the passage on the Chara's burdens. The volume on the Great Three is all the way at the top of the case; he'll never notice if we've touched it."
"But can we get it down?" I asked, feeling uneasy about this subterfuge, but not enough to resist Carle's suggestions. Already I could imagine what it would be like standing in front of the open law book, staring down at the curve of the neat scribe's hand, smelling the ink, hearing the terrible words of sacrifice as Carle spoke them in a soft voice . . .
Carle glanced around the room with the quick movements he used when trying to track one of the hunted, then said, "Young!" A slave-servant was passing the doorway, holding a chamber basin. He stopped and peered nervously into the room at us. "Young, fetch us a ladder, please – and be as quick as you can about it. . . . Now," he added as the slave dashed away, "this will be tricky. My father usually uses a special stepladder to reach the top shelf, but I have no idea where he hides that; it's probably locked away in the chest. So we will have to use the regular ladder."
This turned out to be as difficult a task as Carle had predicted, even with the assistance of the slave; the room was narrow, and raising the ladder required us to guide it past valuable vases on the mantelpiece. Finally, though, we managed to put the ladder in its place, and Carle scrambled up to the top rungs. He had just pulled the volume carefully from the shelf when a cough came from behind us.
Carle nearly tumbled from the ladder, which caused Erlina to grin. "Do fall," she said sweetly. "Father is only a few chambers away, and I'm sure he'd love to see you topple to the floor with one of his treasured books."
"'A spoiled pear scolds a rotten apple.'" Carle's gaze travelled down toward Erlina. "If you want to give our father something to comment on, try walking like that past his door."
Erlina blushed and let go of Alaric's hand. "What's so important about the book that you'd risk your health?" she asked.
Carle sighed as he reached the bottom of the steps. "If you stay, you might learn. Sometimes, Erlina, I think you have as much law-love as an ignorant barbari— I beg your pardon, sir."
Alaric bowed, as though he had received a compliment. "I am indeed quite ignorant of your laws but am eager to be schooled. This is the book in which they are scribed?"
"One of the books," said Carle, controlling his expression. "No, leave the ladder, Adrian; I don't think—"
It was too late; as he spoke, I swung the ladder down, breaking one of the vases in the process.
The slave, who had been standing silently in the corner next to the chest, turned as pale as new-fallen snow. Alaric looked as though a barbarian warrior fiercer than himself had walked into the room. Carle and Erlina, on the other hand, wasted no time.
"Bucket and brush," said Carle to his sister, and then turned as she fled from the room. "Put the ladder back, then return," he told the slave, who departed, ladder in hand, with as much urgency as though he were responding to a danger whistle. Carle was already on his knees, picking up the shattered pieces of vase.
"May I assist?" asked Alaric, for once abandoning his flowery etiquette in favor of quick communication.
"No, I think that you'd best— Thank you, Erlina; where's the bucket, though?" He reached up to take the brush from her hand.
"Missing," said Erlina, gulping for breath. "One of the servants must have moved it."
"My room has a basin; I will fetch that." Alaric turned on his heel. Barbarians, I learned then, are well trained in speed.
Erlina was already on her knees, locating fragments of vase under the table. I began to stoop but was forestalled by Carle's hand.
"If my father didn't hear that crash, it will be the first time in his life he hasn't heard so much as a leaf fall in his house," he said. "Adrian, could you—?"
"Yes, of course," I said, and dashed from the chamber.
I was barely in time; Verne was indeed walking in his silent way down the corridor, toward the study chamber. I had just enough leisure to fix myself in front of the tapestry bearing Carle's family tree; then I froze, pretending that I did not see the man walking toward me.
It seemed at first that my lure would not work. Finally the steps behind me paused, and I heard Verne say, "My family is of interest to you?"
"Is that what it shows?" I said in as ignorant a manner as possible. "I was wondering about the seal in the middle – the sword and the balance. I've seen the same symbol on your seal-ring."
"Ah, yes." Verne stepped beside me, forcing me to look toward him, in the direction of the study chamber. Just beyond him, I saw a flicker of movement that might have been Alaric. It took all my effort to keep my gaze from jumping away.
"The seal is easy enough to explain," said Verne, pointing toward the bottom of the tapestry. The sunlight flickered off his seal-ring, whose design matched that of the seal on the tapestry. "There, you see, are my son and daughter at the bottom, and above them, my wife and me. If you will look closely at the name of my father—" He looked over at me to be sure that I was paying attention, and stopped speaking suddenly. His eyes narrowed.
For a heartbeat, his expression stayed that way. Then his smile slowly rose from one side of his lips. "But come," he said softly, "I can explain it much better from a book I have in my study chamber." And he gently placed his arm over my shoulders and pulled me toward the study.
I drew breath to speak further, then held back. Already I was feeling guilty about luring Verne; it would be unforgivable to lie to my generous host. Surely the best thing to do would be to explain honestly what I had done, and bear the burden of Verne's look of disappointment. Yet if Carle wanted me to act otherwise . . .
I was still trying to figure out what to do when the slave ducked out of the doorway, bearing a covered basin. Verne's lips tightened as he watched the slave depart, and his smile disappeared. Releasing me, he strode through the doorway to the chamber.
The afternoon had turned dark; little light came now through the window, though a fire burned in the hearth. Erlina sat on a cushion in the corner near the chest, her face turned toward the window, as though she were idly watching passing birds. Carle was standing behind the desk; as I watched, he carefully turned a page in the book before him, then raised his head to gaze blandly at Verne.
Verne said nothing; he simply walked forward. Carle vacated the spot where he had been standing, backing up toward me. Verne took his place and stared down at the volume for a long moment. Then he carefully closed the book and looked at Carle, waiting.
In a voice as level as the flat pasture of Peaktop, Carle said, "Sir, I apologize. I know that I ought not to have consulted your books without your permission."
Verne said nothing; he simply gazed at Carle. From the corner of the chamber, there was a stirring of bright cloth. Erlina said, "Father, it's my fault. I asked him to look up for me—"
"Leave." Verne's voice was very soft, and he did not turn his gaze from Carle.
"Father, please—!"
"Leave," said Verne, even more softly. "I will deal with you presently."
I heard a sob from the corner, and then a bright bundle hurried past me. I did not turn my head to watch Erlina leave; I was frozen in my spot like a breacher not knowing which way to run.
Verne turned away, not suddenly, but in a steady manner, as though he were undertaking a task long familiar. He went to the corner of the room, pulled a key from his belt-purse, and used it to open the chest. When he turned again, he was holding in his hand a long, sleek, Jackal-black whip.
I looked at Carle; his face might have been made of mountain stone. "Sir, I am of age," he said stiffly.
"I had forgotten." Verne placed the whip carefully on his desk. "Of course, you are a man, and are no longer under my discipline. Will you call in your sister, please?"
For a moment more, Carle stood motionless. Then his hand went to his throat, and he removed his honor brooch.
Turning to me, he placed the brooch in my hand and said quietly, "Adrian, will take this to my chamber, please?"
I looked at him with uncertainty for a moment, wondering whether I should tell Verne now that I bore the guilt for this episode. Something in Carle's expression warned me that I should trust his judgment in this matter. I nodded and turned away; Carle's hand was already untying his belt before I turned.
At the last moment, something made me turn at the doorway. I looked back in time to see Carle slip off his tunic – the tunic he had removed several times a day as a child, he'd told me – and there, for the first time, I saw his back. And thus I discovered what it was that he had shamefully hidden from his fellow guards.
I felt my throat close in tight. Verne was stepping toward Carle slowly, running the knotted lash of the whip through his palm and smiling at his son a dark smile I had seen several months before, though then it had been on the face of a different man. "Let us see," Verne said softly, "whether the army has taught you how to be a man. . . ."
I forced myself to turn then and to stumble down the corridor. The last thing I remember, before my eyes darkened with tears, was the sight of Erlina crying in the arms of Alaric, as behind us the first of the lashes cut into Carle's flesh.
I wrote all of the above while waiting for Carle to return to the bed-chamber where I have been staying. It seemed a more constructive deed to do than to weep with anger at myself. Finally, though, I grew restless, and I stepped into the corridors to search for Carle.
Cowardly-fashion, I avoided the study chamber, instead peering into room after empty room. Finally giving up hope that I would locate Carle by chance, I hailed a passing slave and asked him where I might find his master's son.
"It is possible that he is in his chamber, sir," said the slave, stepping out of the shadows where I had met him.
"Where—?" I stopped then, for I had recognized the slave. He was the one whose face I mended two days past. All along his forehead I could see the jagged reminder of the blow he had received.
His gaze, which until now had been respectfully lowered, flicked up toward me, and I saw his expression change as he realized that I now understood. Then his gaze dropped, and in the monotone that all of Verne's slaves seem to hold as a common language, he told me how to find Carle's extra chamber.