He who lives by the Rule will be hoist by the Rule.
—Gray
The night was cool.
Which, Gray decided, was a decidedly different thing than either the food or the conversation. "I don't like it any more than you do," he said to Cully, forcing himself to keep his voice level.
"I frankly doubt that." Cully shook his head, and then took another careful spoonful of the awful fish stew that he had specially ordered. "Then again, I'm sure that you don't like this sciakisciuka as much as I do, so things all balance out." He grinned.
"Father, don't try to change the subject." Gray set his elbows on the table, tented his hands over his plate, and leaned forward. "I'm over my head here, and I like that even less than this inedible . . . stuff.
"But I do know how to handle it: we set sail for England in the morning, and turn the boy over to the College—let them take the sword away from him. The sword is property of the Crown—do you think the Council will let it stay in the hands of some barefoot Pironesian boy?"
"He isn't barefoot; we bought him boots," Cully said. "Dressing him up isn't a problem. He's large for his age—just about your size, Gray, and I don't doubt that your tunics, leggings, and robes could fit him."
Gray snorted. "I don't think that dressing him up like an Order Knight would persuade the Abbot General to let him retain a live sword."
Cully shrugged. "No, of course it wouldn't. Not even if it's the wise thing to do. The Order is jealous of its prerogatives even more than the College is."
"Could we save your criticisms of the Order and the Council for another occasion?"
"No," Cully said. "Not if they're relevant, Joshua, as they appear to me to be. I don't think we should count on having time to consult with others before doing anything useful, and I'm not expecting Ralph to do the right thing, in any case. Much better to settle things in Napoli, if you're unwilling to handle them."
"It's not a matter of consulting," Gray said, trying to control his anger at the suggestion. "It's a matter of authority—and of getting the right authorities involved. The Duke of Napoli isn't the right authority, with all respect to Thomas Pendragon."
Gray understood why Cully would have wanted to get the closest royal authority involved, and the fact that the third Duke of Napoli was one of His Majesty's uncles—just as the Duke of New England was—made the idea attractive, at least emotionally.
But Pendragon or not, anything involving the swords was a Crown matter, not a ducal one. Yes, Crown dukes necessarily had great authority in their own person and office, and the further they were from Londinium, the more so in practice, if not necessarily in theory. It was one thing for the Duke of York to send a messenger or courtier—or himself—to Pendragon Castle, and only a little more time-consuming for the dukes of, say, Northmarch or Normandie to do so. By the time one got as far away from the capital as Napoli was, it was impractical to wait for an answer to any pressing question. While English and French dukes were known to appear on their own behalf in Parliament, it was just this side of unknown for southern ones to do so; they were, in practice, always represented by their Court barons.
As for the colonies, William Pendragon, the second Duke of New England, was in practice rather more an independent prince than anything else, and it wasn't unusual that years would pass without him returning to Londinium to pay homage to his nephew and king, and there was always talk that, eventually, his nickname as the Prince of Whales would, eventually, become something more officially true, as well, although probably not under that name.
But there was an ocean in between Londinium and New Portsmouth, not just a couple of weeks.
"Perhaps we should consult the Fleet admiral, on Malta?" Bear asked. "It's not far."
"Better than sending off to England, and that's a fact," Cully said.
Gray shrugged. "What do you think Admiral DuPuy would do? Strip the Fleet to go chasing after this? We only lose a day or so by heading over to there, but—"
"No." Cully shook his head. "Probably not, if he's given an alternative. Cautious man, the admiral, which is as it should be."
"It's not just an alternative—it's the right one, and it's my decision. We go home."
Bear calmly conveyed another mouthful of the horrid local fish stew to his mouth, and chewed slowly and thoroughly, then washed it down with another glass of the inky wine. "I think that heading home would be unwise, Gray," he said. "Consider the time it would take. Three weeks just to get there, unless the winds, sea and tide all cooperate, all of the time."
"And as much time to get back," Cully said. "More, if the Council is as slow as they've been known to be, unless we can take the matter directly to His Majesty." Cully took a careful sip of wine from his glass. "Which is hardly the only problem with it." He gestured toward the bottle of wine. "Take a drink and relax for a while. We can't do anything tonight besides eat, drink and talk, and I intend to have my fill of all three."
Gray poured himself another glass, but imitated Cully by only taking a small sip. He needed to keep his head about him, and it would have been easy to guzzle it down, glass by glass, until his head was all abuzz.
The ride back from the castle had given him a painfully sharp appetite and a horrendous thirst, but Gray had not only refrained from drinking from their waterbags or the parchment-wrapped provisions in their saddlebags as they rode away, but had insisted that the others follow his example and throw the food and water away. It had been out of their sight, after all. He wasn't worried about poison, but it would have been a matter of just a few moments for somebody or something to pour a thimbleful of water from a Montagne Grande spring into any of their waterbags.
Would that mean that whoever drank from such would never leave? Gray didn't know, and didn't care to test the matter, not when the option had been simply a few hours of thirst, no matter how burning the thirst, as indeed it had been.
Quarts of water for drinking and gallons of water for washing had relieved some of the sense of having been turned into a piece of knightly jerky, and even the one glass of wine that was all that he had allowed himself had his brain buzzing.
He sat back in his chair, and tried to relax.
It should have been easy. It was a pleasant night out on the plaza.
The breeze was cool, but not cold, and ever so light and gentle; the waves lap-lap-lapped on the shore in time with the slow beat of his heart. Their suite of rooms at the inn was large and airy, and the small balcony off them jutted out over the water, giving the sensation that they were alone with the breeze and the night and the sea.
Barely visible beyond the waters of the cove, the Wellesley bobbed up and down on the gentle swells. Those of the crew who had been given shore leave had been gently encouraged to choose an inn down the coast almost half a mile away, and while the raucous cries and singing carried, they were far enough away to be an amusement instead of an annoyance.
All of which was just as well. A fat barkentine flying what Gray was sure was the sword-and-star pennant of the Dar—although which emirate flag flew below it he had no idea—lay at anchor a long bowshot beyond the Wellesley. Gray wasn't sure where the saracens were staying, other than that it wasn't in the village of Porto Pantelleria, and he wasn't eager to find out, although he would have guessed they had landed their launches no closer than Suaki or Sataria, what with the Wellesley anchored at the entrance to the harbor.
While the Wise rarely ventured down out of the hills or became exercised over goings-on on the shoreline at all, there was always the danger that anything perceived as misbehavior would change Pantelleria from a neutral state to an aligned one, and it was in the interest of both the Dar and the Crown not to bring the Wise in on the other side.
Would something as small as a fight in a shoreside tavern do that? Gray didn't have the slightest idea, and neither did Lieutenant Johansen, master of the Wellesley, who had restricted liberty to men he thought senior enough to obey his restriction to the village proper, upon threat of being treated as deserters. Gray would have kept them all aboard, and had briefly considered instructing the captain to do so, but had decided against it. Getting good service out of the Navy wasn't just a matter of giving orders, after all.
Neither was it with Cully, unfortunately, but regardless of whether or not Cully liked it, Gray was in charge.
"We'll have to get the boy and the sword home," Gray finally said.
"Niko's home isn't England," Cully said.
"Three weeks, perhaps," Gray went on, trying to ignore the distraction, "if we travel by sea. At that, we could stop at Malta and commandeer a smaller, faster ship. The Wellesley's reasonably fleet of foot, but it's hardly the fastest thing afloat. Or we could take the land route."
"You don't save much by taking the land route. Two, three days to Villenueve," Cully said. "Then another ten days, two weeks overland to Normandie and Calais. Perhaps a little less if you want to kill some horses and do without an old man who simply can't ride from dawn to dusk, but not much. Much more time when we detour around Borbonaisse, and we would." He took a careful bite, and smiled. "Capers. I love capers, and the pickled ones are but a pale relic of the fresh."
Gray waved away the attempted distraction. "Why would I want to detour around Borbonaisse?"
"You might not; I would. Monsieur le duc du Borbonaisse perhaps doesn't have my portrait hanging from every lamppost in the province these days, but I'm sure he would be happy to have me hanging from just one."
"These days?"
Cully shrugged. "I was involved in a . . . situation there after I left the Order, and I'm still wanted, I'm quite sure."
Gray really wanted to know what Cully was talking about, but he knew Cully too well—if Gray let him digress, he'd be listening to Cully's tales until morning, and no doubt that was Cully's intention. "If I tell you to go overland, you'll go, Brother Cully."
"Not anywhere where the fleur-de-lys flies under the bend sinister. Suicide is sinful, and it's not one of those sins I care to take up, not simply to save you some time if you're already wasting it by the bucketload. You may think I'm a knight of the Order, and my person sacrosanct—but without any way of proving it, not I'm confident that the authorities in Borbonaisse would readily agree." Cully tentatively dipped a hunk of fresh bread in the stew, then shrugged and spooned a huge spoonful of the fiery stuff on the bread, and stuck the whole thing in his mouth, an almost beatific expression on his face as he chewed. "I'll suffer for this before morning, but it's worth it, I do declare." His face darkened. "And it washes the taste of some other things from my mouth, if not quite my mind."
"I—"
"Excuse me," Bear said. "The Edicts say that when Knights of the Order meet on a matter of importance, the junior speaks first, do they not?"
Gray frowned. "Yes, of course they do. But what does—"
"As I understand it," Cully said, casually interrupting, "the idea of the junior speaking first arises from the fear that the junior will defer to the senior. When it comes to argument, if not obedience, Bear, I've never known you much for deferring."
"That may be so." Bear nodded. "I speak as seems wise to me. As I was taught to do—by you, among others. You'd violate the Edicts, Father Cully?"
Cully snorted. "It's not up to me. Talk to Gray."
"Very well." Bear nodded, and turned to Gray. "I had barely begun speaking when you interrupted me, much less finished." He looked Gray directly in the eyes. "Is this a matter of importance?"
"Of course it is, and—"
"And I take it you don't care to relieve me of my vows, Gray?"
What was Bear going on for? "I don't have any such desire. Or authority."
Cully shook his head. "You can speak better to your desires than any other man alive, but that's not the case, about the authority," he said, peremptorily tapping a rough-bitten fingernail on the table. "You were sent on this mission by the Abbot General, and travel with his authority—his authority both as Archbishop of Canterbury, and as Abbot General. That wouldn't supersede the Archbishop's-as-Archbishop authority in Sicilia—primus inter pares, and all, despite what some say about the Archbishop of Canterbury being the Anglican pope—not on ecclesiastical matters, but we're not in Sicilia at the moment."
Gray frowned. "That's just a technicality. Pantelleria's barely forty miles from Sicilia, and Sicilia is the nearest Crown possession—"
"From such technicalities does your authority arise." Cully tapped a finger against his own chest. "You had the authority to call me back into service because of the technicality of me having been relieved of my vows rather than cast out of the Order, and the technicality of your claim that I was essential to your mission. You have the authority not only to hear confessions and order penance but to permit Bear and me to do so because we are technically on mission, and our confessions and penance and absolution are technically just as binding as if they were given by the local priest, under the authority of the local bishop. Since there is no bishop—archbishop or bishop ordinary—whose diocese includes Pantelleria, technically speaking, you have the power of ordination while you are here, which necessarily includes the power to dismiss an ordination as improvidently granted." He smiled. "I don't mind at all if you release me, or Brother David."
"You're telling me that I should release Bear from the Order?"
"I don't have the authority to tell you what you have to do in the exercise of your office, Vicar. Yes, Vicar—your authority, here and now, is just the same as if you were the Abbot General himself, both in an ecclesiastical and temporal sense. You've used that temporal authority to pry the Wellesley from a reluctant admiral, and you've used your ecclesiastical authority to force me back into service contrary to my will, and if you're not going to listen to Sir David as required by the Edicts, you're obligated to relieve him of his vows. I thought you were the one who insisted that knights live up to their obligations, or was I wrong?"
"Cully—"
"You could just listen to him, instead."
Gray had been enjoying the fresh bread, although not the horribly spicy stew that came with it, but he found himself without appetite. In frustration, he heaved the chunk of bread high into the air, and wasn't at all surprised to see a gull snatch it out of the air as it reached the top of its arch. "Very well. Go ahead, Bear."
"You didn't apologize, Gray," Cully said.
Gray's hand had tightened on his wineglass enough that he forced himself to loosen his grip, for fear that he would snap it. "I stand corrected—you have my apologies, Bear. Please proceed."
"Thank you." Bear set his own wineglass down. "I think that it makes more sense to follow what clues we have where they lead, rather than just return to England and let the Council start over again."
"Which necessarily means leaving the boy in possession of the live sword."
Bear shrugged. "I don't see an alternative. It's bonded to him, every bit as much as the Nameless is bonded to me, and the Khan to you."
Or more so. Gray didn't understand the mechanics of it, but bonding a sword to a human's essence was by no means a trivial bit of wizardry, despite how easy and simple Black had made it sound. "Taking up a live sword," he said, "is difficult, yes, but no more difficult than putting one down." He gave a long look at Cully.
"Depends on the situation, Joshua," Cully said.
"There are other alternatives," Gray said. "Not that I like any of them."
A bond between live sword and its bearer could be broken by a wizard, just as it was created—or more simply, if brutally, by the death of the bearer, although Gray had no intention of running the boy through for the minimal crime of having been taken in by the Wise, or having fallen in with Cully.
"You shouldn't. If you're seriously proposing to kill the boy to break the bond between him and the sword, I'd be surprised." He smiled. "But since you're not, we don't have to see if I can manage to defeat you and the Khan with a walking stick, eh?"
Gray ignored the implied threat. He wasn't going to kill the boy just to make things easier, after all. Not unless it was absolutely necessary.
Cully turned to Bear. "Are you quite finished?"
"Yes, Father." Bear ducked his head.
"You're sure?"
What was Cully giving Bear such difficulty for? His quarrel was with Gray, not Bear. Bear was on his side, after all, and—
"Then that would make it my turn, no?" Cully asked.
Bear nodded, and after a moment, Gray joined him. Gray was, as strange as it felt, senior to Cully—not in service, but in authority.
"Very well," Gray said. "Speak your mind and then—since you've suddenly decided that I've the authority to make decisions, then I'll speak my mind, and then I'll make my decision, and you, Sir Cully, shall abide by it. All according to the rules."
"Fair enough." Cully smiled, and raised his voice. "Niko? Niko."
The boy walked through the open doors and onto the patio, standing awkwardly in what was a naval utility uniform save for the broad sash about his waist. The sword, still wrapped and tied in a blanket, looked awkward in his sash next to the Navy-issue blade, although not quite as awkward as the boy himself appeared.
"I told you to speak your mind, Cully—"
"Shhh. It's my turn. Permit me." He turned to Niko. "You do realize that it wasn't your grandfather who you met up there," he said, pointing his chin toward the heart of the island.
Niko nodded slowly. "I guess so. But . . ."
"But what?"
"But it felt like Grandfather. Not just the way he looked, but . . ." He shrugged. "But the way he helped."
"And you think that him giving you this sword was a help?" The nerve of the boy.
"Shush, Gray. You're scaring him. Go ahead, Niko."
"Grandfather said it would help me find the ones who were responsible for his murder."
"In just those words?"
"Yes, sir. In just those words."
Gray drummed his fingers against the surface of the table, desisting only when Cully put his hand over Gray's.
"He didn't say the ones who killed him?" Cully asked. "He said 'the ones responsible'?"
"Yes, sir. I mean, no, sir—he said what I said he said."
"Did he happen to say how?"
"I tried to ask, but he just smiled, the way he always did, and said, 'Niko, you must trust me.' "
Gray snorted, and Cully smiled.
"Whenever somebody says I must trust him, that's my signal to put one hand over my pouch, another over my testicles, and another on the hilt of my sword," Cully said, smiling. "And never mind that I don't have three hands, and don't have or want a sword. Still . . ." He waved Niko to a seat. "Sit, boy—this concerns you, and you might as well listen to it."
"Yes, sir."
Gray didn't like where this was going. "You're suggesting that we let him keep it, and try to use it, somehow, to find the people who killed his family."
"Not precisely," Cully said. "But that's part of it, certainly." Cully's jaw tightened just for a moment. "What I think you really ought to do is relieve me of the call into service, and let Niko and me go about our business. You and David can trot back to England and lay it all in the laps of your betters, if you are so sure that you're incapable of handling matters. As for me, I'm minded to look into this, and—"
"As for you, Sir Cully, you're just as much a Knight of the Order as I am, and—"
"No. Not quite." He shook his head. "I'm betwixt and between, Gray. You've pressed me into service, but all that means is that my old oath compels me to obey you while you need me—"
"To the extent that you're compelled by an oath, which doesn't seem to be the case, at least not when you think it's best to do otherwise."
"A fair accusation, indeed." Cully laughed. "Well, that's not likely to change; I'm rather too set in my ways. But—"
"But you think that you'll weasel out of this because of your status?"
"One can only hope. I'll certainly try. You've pressed me into service because you claimed you needed me to help you test Niko's sword." Gray started to object at that characterization, but Cully plowed on: "Very well; I've complied, and I've followed you this far—but you hardly need me to keep you company on a trip to England, do you?"
"No, I guess not."
"Then I take it I'm released? I may do as I please, go where and as I please? Without you claiming that I've violated my oath?"
"Well, yes, I guess you may."
Cully was right. Gray had no need for him simply as a companion, and while most of the Knights of the Order were otherwise occupied or on mission, if he really needed more than Bear, the Abbot could surely assign one or more. Keeping four knights with live swords to serve as His Majesty's personal bodyguard was traditional and wise, but not obligatory, and there was ample precedent of replacing one or even all with Order Knights who carried only mundane steel, although the most recent precedent that Gray was aware of had come close to being disastrous, as Cully knew better than anybody else.
The Abbot General would hate doing that. Gray didn't much like the idea himself.
Cully turned to Bear. "Do we know where all the Red and Whites are?"
Gray tried not to smile. Cully had said "we," after all.
"Well . . ." Bear shrugged. "More or less. Eric and Lady Ellen are trying to handle some problems in New England—"
Cully snorted. "The Abbot still lets the two of them work together?"
"Shut up," Gray explained.
"—Walter and the Beast left on a peace mission to the Dar just a week before we left—"
"A waste of time," Cully said.
"Please?"
"—Big John was hunting Kali-worshippers in the Kush, last anybody heard from him; the Saracen is still recovering in Coventry, from that mess in Bosnia."
"He's still carrying Jerome?"
"Yes." Bear nodded. "For how much longer, I don't know. And then there's Guy of Orkney—"
"—who is proof beyond any doubt that innocence and idiocy are not incompatible."
"If I may go on? Or should we just leave it at that?"
Cully let air wheeze out through his lips. "Let's try it this way: who might be available?"
Gray thought about it for a moment. "There are eighty-three full Knights of the Order on the active list—eighty-four including yourself. Add another fifty or so brothers in teaching assignments at the abbey—perhaps a third of them young or undamaged enough to be of any use. They're scattered about, of course, but there's certainly three dozen or more in England."
"But none of them Red or White?"
"We're spread thin, as usual. Everybody else is on mission somewhere—although I guess it's possible that Guy is back, but I doubt it. In terms of who you can count on being in Londinium, it's just His Own—and the Abbot General himself."
"Who carries Jenn." Cully said softly. Too softly.
"There's three dozen or so on the reserve list, like poor Becket," Bear said. "None of them Red or White, of course."
Of course not. The live swords were too few to be left in the hands of somebody who wasn't able to use one.
"Your family is still watching over him?" Cully asked. "Very noble." The words could have been mocking, perhaps. It was hard to tell.
"Noblesse oblige doesn't enter into it," Bear said, his smiling warming in the night. "Truly, he's no bother; he and Father sit up telling old war stories most nights that Parliament isn't in session." Bear's smile widened. "Mother insists that her confessor have her tend to him as a penance, and bathes him herself, with her own hands—and with some help, granted."
"I want to be sure that I understand this—you two were the only Red and White available?"
Gray nodded. "There was some resistance to sending both of us." He shrugged. "The other choice was, of course, to second one or more of His Own."
Cully grunted. "A terrific idea—assuming that every possible heir was clapped in the Tower as a precaution." Cully was just blowing smoke, of course—'every possible heir,' after all, included all of the noble families.
Gray shook his head. "We talked about it—His Own, that is. Prince Eric's the junior middie on the Tusk, and Prince John's just started at Eton. Both have Order knights in attendance, of course. It would be difficult—not impossible, but difficult—to assassinate them both at the same time, and more so to kill both them and His Majesty and even after that . . ."
"After that, it would depend on the House of Lords," Cully said. "Which it does anyway, if the King were to die, given Eric's age; he'd need a Regent, and the idea of leaving that up to Parliamentary politics has no appeal at all to me, any more than it would to Ralph."
It bothered Gray to hear the Abbot General referred to so casually, but he didn't complain. At least Cully hadn't first-named the King.
"I don't like the idea of leaving His Majesty unprotected," Cully went on. "He doesn't like to mingle the way his father did, but he's always been far too eager to be seen in public."
Mingle. That was a nice way to put the late King's habits.
Bear nodded. "I've heard tales of the last time that the King was left naked."
"Just be glad they're only tales to you, Bear," Gray said, not at all pleasantly.
"I am, Gray," Bear said, gently. "I hope I would have served as well as all of you did, but I'd not wish to be put to such a test."
Niko was looking puzzled—not that Gray blamed him—but there didn't seem to be any point in going into detail for the boy's benefit.
So Cully, of course, did just that. " 'Naked' is just a figure of speech, Niko; the King doesn't prance about without trousers.
"It happened about thirty years ago. Kings tend to rely too much on Knights of the Order as problem-solvers, and His late Majesty was no different—for what he thought was good enough reason, he stripped himself of his personal guard of Red and Whites. His younger brother, John, the Duke of York, took the opportunity to try to assassinate both his elder brother—the King—and his son, the Prince, who was a baby at the time—"
"God save the King," Bear intoned; Gray ducked his head and echoed him, and gave Niko a long look until he repeated it. The boy was polite enough, but utterly ignorant of ordinary manners.
"Yes, God save the King," Cully said. "But it didn't quite work out that way."
Gray smiled. "Oh, I don't know, Cully. God works His will through stranger vessels."
It would have succeeded, if a young Order Knight hadn't seen through the plan and taken it upon himself to solve the problem in a particularly ruthless manner, with nothing more than his own mundane swords, a classful of novices who had only been at Balmoral for presentation and oath, and one lone, elderly Knight of the Table Round, who had, for some reason, decided to trust a knight of the rival order, rather than the Duke that he had known all of his life.
Saving the King's and the Crown Prince's lives had done much for that young knight's status, as well as that of the surviving novices, although it had used up most of the novices and the knight of the rival order in the process, in about the same way that sending lambs through the door of a slaughterhouse used up the lambs.
The names of the dead novices had been added posthumously to the List, as was only proper. And while Sir Bedivere of Lincoln had been buried by the knights of his own order, as also was proper, every novice boy at Alton since had made the pilgrimage to Bedivere's grave to lay flowers, and to kneel down to say a prayer for the soul of that Knight of the Table Round.
To the end of his days, Gray would remember Cully standing in the doorway over Sir Bedivere's fallen body, Bedivere's sword naked in his hands, barely able to stand on the blood-slickened stones, barely moving from side to side as he blocked each spear thrust, ducked the crossbow bolts that hissed through the gaps between the combatants, while Lady Mary, ignoring her own wounds, huddled in the far corner, shielding the baby prince with her own body as much as her borrowed armor, and Gray and Alexander had each grabbed one of the King's arms, holding him up against the wall to the side of the door, ignoring his shouted demands that he be given a sword and allowed to relieve Cully in the doorway.
Say what you would about the late King, he was no coward.
Not while I breathe, Cully had murmured, over and over again. Gray and Alexander had ignored the king's increasingly loud orders and obeyed Cully.
Gray raised a glass. "To lost companions."
"Lost companions," Cully echoed.
Gray stood. "So be it," he said. "By the power vested in me, as the Abbot General's Vicar, I hereby restore you to your full status as Knight of the Order of Crown, Shield, and Dragon, Sir Cully of Cully's Woode." He took his mundane sword from his belt and set it on the table. "Now take up your sword and stop this nonsense."
"You plan to go about with one sword?"
"You can give it back to me when you get a pair of Navy swords from the Wellesley—and stop trying to distract me."
"As you wish." Cully pulled the scabbard to him, and drew a few inches of the blade. "Nicely sharpened," he said, sucking blood from his thumb. "Now, if we're done . . . ?"
"I asked you to stop trying to change the subject. As the Abbot General's vicar, I direct you to return to the home abbey of the Order, with me."
Cully nodded. "As you command, Sir Joshua." His lips were white. "I'll want that in writing—particularly the restoration of my status." His lip curled in an uncharacteristic sneer. "So there's no dispute when I'm presented to the Abbot General? I'd rather not be clapped into irons for impersonating, well, Sir Cully of Cully's Woode." The sneer changed into a grin. "Although, in truth, I can probably do that better than any other man alive, eh?"
Gray forced himself not to answer angrily. Did Cully really think that Gray wouldn't admit what he had done? "Very well. Would the morning be acceptable, or—"
"You've restored me now, and you've ordered me now; I think that it all ought to be done now. Unless, of course, Sir Vicar, you order otherwise?" Cully's smile was mocking.
"As you wish." Gray picked up the bell on the table and rang it, forcing himself not to shake the bell as hard as he wanted to shake Cully.
In moments, one of the servitors appeared.
"Yes, Your Excellency?"
"I need several sheets of parchment—not just paper—and pen and ink."
"Yes, Your Excellency."
"And some blotting powder, if you please?"
In a few minutes it was done. Cully tipped more blotting powder on the parchment Gray had given him, although Gray hadn't used a light hand with it himself.
"Dry enough?"
"Well, let's see." He blew away the powder, then carefully folded the parchment twice across, unfolded it, nodded, then refolded it and put it in his pouch. "It will serve, I think. "Another drink, perhaps?" he asked, already pouring three glasses of wine.
"Very well."
Again, Cully raised his glass. "To fallen comrades," he said, drinking.
"To fallen comrades." Gray drained the glass angrily, then resumed his seat.
Sunlight was streaming down on his face, and Bear was shaking him.
Gray's head pounded in bright red agony with every heartbeat, and by the way Bear's forehead creased in pain with every shake he gave Gray, Bear wasn't much better off than Gray was.
"He's gone," Bear said. "He took the cutter, and the boy, and the sword—and apparently rummaged through your chest; I think some of your clothes are gone, as well. He had Niko's skiff towed, but put the cutter's crew in it an hour or so out of port, and sent them back."
"Of course." It was important to keep his temper, despite the temptation. His hand found its way to the Khan's hilt.
May our enemies know great pain before they die.
Gray was knowing enough great pain at the moment, and, angry as he was, he wouldn't kill Cully over this. Probably.
"There's a note, I suppose," he said. Cully would leave a note.
Bear nodded, then grimaced in pain as though he regretted the movement. "Yes. He sent back to the captain—his runner woke me just a few moments ago." He held up a piece of paper. "You should read this."
Gray took the note from Bear's hands, but his eyes couldn't focus. He closed them and shook his head.
"He drugged the wine," Bear said.
"I've already figured that out." And he had drunk more of it than Bear had. "Can you read this? His cursed drug still has my eyes, damn it."
"I already have. He's off to find the source of the swords, with the boy, starting back in Pironisia, and—"
"And? There's more?"
"Well, yes." Bear hesitated.
"Out with it, please. Don't make me drag it out of you."
Bear spread his hands, helplessly. "It seems he's knighted the boy."
Niko had had things easier.
Sailing the cutter was really a job for at least four, preferably six, and it was more than a little difficult to do it with just two, particularly as the wind picked up—from astern, of course. The cutter was beautifully balanced, with just a trace of weather helm; much safer than lee helm, and Niko assumed that was deliberate, and under most circumstances, it would have made it relatively easy.
So, of course, the perversity of the sea being what it was, the wind was out of the east, and they had to sail almost exactly due west, before the wind, always watching for any sign of the wind changing, ready to turn into the wind and haul in the sheets.
There should have been one man constantly at the helm, at least while the wind was at their back, and another two or three for the sheets, at least.
Instead there was Niko, and Cully, and while Cully was probably stronger and certainly much nimbler than most men his age, he barely had sea legs at all, and Niko felt that if he didn't keep a constant eye on the old man, he'd be over the side before Niko could blink, and probably have long drowned before Niko could circle back for him.
Niko didn't grumble about it much, not even to himself. That was the way of the sea—it never seemed to manage to arrange anything for a fisherman's convenience. You had to settle for what you could get—when it didn't interfere with his life or his profit, the sacrifices to Poseidon were well worth it.
"Well, we could have taken your skiff, instead of putting the sailors in it and sending them back to Pantelleria," Cully said, as he worked at untangling the mainsheet from the capstan, while Niko kept the forward length taut around a bitt. "But that would have had other problems—there," he said, easing it off just a little. "Got it."
"Are you sure?"
"No. But try it anyway."
"Haul smartly, as soon as you get any slack."
"You've told me that five times already, Niko."
So now it's six, he thought, but didn't say. In some ways, Cully reminded Niko of Father and Grandfather, and was about as likely to tolerate insolence as they were. Had been.
Niko took a strain on the sheet, and released it from the bitt with a practiced flip, and, just as he'd expected, the sheet got away from him, although not from Cully. The mast rang like a drum as the boom swung out on its newfound freedom, but not far—Cully had hauled in on the sheet just as Niko had released it, and after a frightening moment, the cutter settled down again.
Niko didn't like it. Granted, the mast was keel-stepped—he had checked that for himself, although he hadn't expected any less from a Navy boat—and as far as he could tell, it was solidly so, but . . .
Niko released the wheel and pointed the cutter a few more degrees away from the wind, just in case, then pegged the wheel down again. Sailing with a steady wind at his back was one thing on the skiff, where he could either haul in the boom or just let it swing free if—when—the wind changed, but the cutter didn't just have more sails than the skiff, it carried far more sail, and the strength of the thicker mast hadn't grown proportionately, and Niko's own strength hadn't grown at all.
Cully just smiled, and said something about how the next leg would be easier.
Niko hoped so.
The sheets quickly wetted from the spray, and stayed wet, and fouled all of the time, particularly the mainsheet, which seemed to take any attempt to surge it as an invitation to tie itself into knots. What was just a matter of a taking a turn or two around a bitt on the skiff required several turns around a capstan, trying to simultaneously balance and put a brake on forces that could easily have dragged both Niko and the old knight over the side, and probably would have, if Niko hadn't made a decision that, even when the wind was light, jibing was out of the question, no matter how smoothly and easily the sailors had done it.
Coming about, particularly with the wind astern, was more time-consuming, but it was far safer, and the brisk stern wind certainly gave the craft more than enough speed to make it not only possible, but as easy as such a thing could be.
"You considered having us take the skiff, and sending them back in the cutter?" he asked.
"Not really. The cutter's faster than your little skiff, by rather a lot, carrying as much sail as it does. Wouldn't want to take it through heavy seas, but as long as the weather holds fair and the wind's not too heavy, it's faster than the Wellesley, which is the point. I want Gray chasing us, not catching us." Cully took another turn around a bitt, then tied the sheet in place around a brace with a knot that Niko didn't recognize, and didn't much like.
It must have showed in his face. "Oh, go ahead—fix it, Sir Niko," Cully said. "You're the captain of this; I'm just your crew."
"First a knight, and now a knight and captain," Niko said, retying the sheet properly. "I'm coming up in the world."
Cully laughed. "Well, don't get used to being a captain. We'll take on a full crew back in Pironesia. You can expect some deference, but don't expect too much."
"A crew? For where? And what are we going to do in Pironesia, of all places?"
"Oh," Cully said. "We're talking about two different things—when I say Pironesia, I mean the whole group of islands, including the outer ones. You mean the colonial capital city on one island, the one for which His Majesty's Possession of Pironesia was named. We're not going to that one, at least not for now."
"Then where are we going?"
Cully looked at the compass, again. "At the moment, just a little north of west, which is what I want. Navigation's an arcane art, and it's one that I don't have, and you don't, either. We've no sextant, nor rutters, much less the art to use them well—so it's best to keep things simple. I know there's some sleight involved even with the compass—it doesn't quite point true north, although it's been too long since I studied such things for me to remember what to do about that, or even if it matters, at this latitude.
"If we're too far north, we can follow the shore south; even just a little too far south, and we could slip between Kithira and Kissamos, and not find any land this side of Seeproosh, or worse. Not that there'd be much worse for the two of us, even if the water did hold out that long."
"I didn't mean where are we going at the moment. What I meant was where are we going?"
"You're going to have to tell me that, eventually," Cully said. "For now, though, any one of the Pironesian islands in the outer cluster will be fine—any one of your neighbors—just like I said in the note I sent with the skiff. The Abdullahs' islands, probably. Are they good sailors?"
Niko shrugged. "There's good sailors among them."
"But you don't like them."
"They're neighbors. They were neighbors."
"Yes. I'm assuming that the sword came from somewhere to the east of you, so we're headed in the right direction. I hope. What I'm trying to buy is enough time to get some direction from you—and from it." He gestured at the hatch. "And before we make landfall, I'd best find some time to fit some grips to the sword, for that matter. I'm fairly good at that sort of thing—I can't promise you anything fancy, but I should be able to pull the grips from your Navy sword, fit the undersides to the live sword, and bind them in place without much difficulty, if I can find some gloves—I know there's a spool of brass wire aboard. And you'll need your hair cut, and a shave." He raised his right hand, miming gripping a knife but deliberately twitching it, as though he had the palsy. "I think that can wait until we're ashore, though; I assume you're attached to your nose, and wish it to remain attached to you. With that, and Gray's robes, you should look a proper knight."
"I've spent perhaps a dozen hours with a sword in my hands, Father Cully," Niko said. "I don't think you should count on me to be of much use."
"I'm counting you to look like a knight with a sword, and not like a boy carrying around something wrapped in a blanket, that's all. We've no time or materials to make a proper scabbard—but it will fit in one of the Navy scabbards, with a bit of wadding inside to hold it in place. Just be careful with it, and for Her sake, don't touch your hand to the steel. And no, I'm not expecting to have to fight, not at the moment."
Niko nodded. "Training." He felt awkward trying to take the positions that the marines had started teaching him, but there was something about it that appealed to him, even though it made him ache in unusual places, like the insides of his thighs. He was used to much harder work than taking up an awkward-feeling stance—it was strange that it was so draining.
"Training? Yes—but I'm trying, for my sins, to get you to be able to stand and move like a knight, nothing more. Turning you into a swordsman isn't something I can do in a few days, or even a few weeks."
"But—"
"Not with an ordinary sword, no." Cully smiled. "Not for another thousand hours of practice—if you're a fast learner. But using a live sword isn't really swordplay, not most of the time. You saw what Gray did to your island, and—"
"Yes, I saw that." Niko's jaw clenched.
"—and you saw what your sword did to your father. Live swords are . . . powerful, and the Khan is more so than most." He sighed. "Too powerful—it takes a certain something to use that power in combat with any kind of restraint, and it isn't accidental that Knights of the Order spend a dozen years in training before they can even be considered to bear one. Have you ever heard of a town called Linfield?"
"No."
"Are you sure? You've never heard of the Linfield Horror?"
"Yes, sir. I mean no, sir, I haven't heard of this Linafeld of yours."
"Linfield. But perhaps I shouldn't be surprised—there isn't a Linfield, not anymore. Hasn't been for a little less than two hundred years. One knight of the Red Sword in one moment of uncontrolled, drunken anger—the idiotic feud with the Table—and land blackened for miles in all directions, deconsecrated for tens of miles in all directions, thousands of people dead. And worse."
"Worse?"
"Much worse. White swords are dangerous enough—you don't want to be in the path of the rage of a saint—but for most purposes, Red swords are worse, and the Sandoval is about as bad as it gets; the Sandoval is capable of doing far more evil than simple murder." He shook his head. "Darklings, deodands—the full range of the demonic. Churches changed, in a flash, into locii of dark horrors. Even ordinary things went black—you still hear, every year, about small children being carried off by death kites in Sussex. A wave of plague, carried throughout England and onto the Continent by things that had been rats. Locusts the size of robins, with a bite that paralyzed—and that's just part of it. It was bad. A little taste of the Zone, and it could have been worse."
"You think that my—that this sword can do that?"
"Unlikely. The Sandoval, like the Khan, is particularly powerful; I've got no reason to believe that your sword is anywhere near that dangerous. But it could be. Or more so, for all I know." He shook his head. "Although that would seem unlikely, all in all. We'll have some better idea once you actually take it in hand."
"But why—"
"Why all this?" Cully shrugged. "As the Jews say, Ayn Brera—I had no choice." He sighed. "Joshua was a good boy, and he's a good man—better than he thinks—but he's always taken the obedience part of 'service, honor, faith, and obedience' too seriously, just as David's too much a man of faith. Gray trusts in authority too much, whether it's the Abbot General, or His Majesty, or even such as me.
"That rigidity probably makes him a good candidate to carry something as awful as the Khan, but too much of anything is, well, too much of that thing.
"As for me, I think that this matter of the swords could be—is—too urgent to wait for Ralph to decide what to do, even if he'd decide the right thing, another matter on which I have little faith, and less influence.
"I would have preferred to lay it all on the lap of the Duke in Napoli. The Neapolitan navy is large enough, and good enough, and the Duke is independent-minded enough to handle things in his own court without worrying about being recalled to Londinium—but anything to do with the swords is a Crown matter, and that means Governor Halloran in Pironesia, and Admiral DuPuy in Malta, if action is going to be taken quickly. Halloran's not a problem—for Gray—and DuPuy will probably listen to Gray, given his letters of reference.
"I tried to talk Gray into getting Malta and the Fleet involved, but he wouldn't hear of it. So I'm forcing his hand. There's too much wrong going on . . . darklings this far south, the sword, the death of your family, and it all feels like matters are coming to a head, and—out with it, out with it."
"Sir?"
"You've got a question—out with it, boy. As I used to tell my students, there is no such thing as an impertinent question, just an impertinent boy, and I found I could beat the impertinence out of the boy just fine, thankee very much."
"You think that you can . . . handle this?"
Cully shook his head. "Unlikely. At best, I'm hoping to blaze a trail for Gray and Bear and the rest, and sound an alarm that DuPuy and Halloran and eventually Ralph can't afford to ignore."
That was the second time Cully had used the name; Niko hadn't recognized it before. "Ralph?"
"Sir Ralph Francis Wakefield, by the Grace of God and Order of His Majesty the King, not only the Archbishop of Canterbury, but the Abbot General of the Order of Crown, Shield, and Dragon, and for good reason and perhaps some ill, not one of my admirers.
"Right now, unless I know Gray far less well than I flatter myself, the Wellesley is making as quick time as possible toward Malta, intending to give chase once they put in there and pass the word—and, perhaps, if he's as sensible a boy as he used to be, take on what additional forces he can pry from the Admiral.
"Regardless . . . from Malta, a fast courier ship will be heading to England, and shortly, there will be the clopping of hooves on Londinium streets, and the sounds of a set of boots running up the stone cathedral steps and down the marble corridors." He chuckled at the thought. "I'd like to see Ralph's face when he opens the envelope, but if I could see his face, he'd see mine, and that would lose the virtue of it all—Ralph might decide that he doesn't have any better idea than I do as to how to find the origin of these new live swords, but he won't like the idea of me being off on my own, not with the authority that Gray was foolish enough to give me, and Ralph's not quite a fool; as tempted as I often am to think him one, he's a good man.
"He may not agree with me on the imminence of danger, but he surely will think that having me off on my own, getting involved in it—with you bearing a live sword—needs to be handled promptly, and I know he'll have to see the King about that.
"His Majesty will, I think, give me the benefit of the doubt as to how important this is, and whatever else can be said about Ralph, he knows how to obey an order from the King.
"A week or two at most, until frigates from Malta are in the eastern waters; figure six, perhaps seven weeks, and this part of the world should be crawling with Knights of the Order, ships of the line, and various and sundry other things and folk. Probably including His Own." He bit his lip. "If, of course, the purpose of the whole thing is to strip His Majesty of his best protection, I've just left the King undefended. I never was a very good chess player; still, that seems like an unlikely move, all in all."
Niko didn't understand most of what Cully had said. But—"Why knight me? Not that I'm complaining, sir—"
"Ah." Cully smiled. "Particularly since we're heading back toward your home, eh? Two hundred crowns of gold in a handsome strongbox, fine clothes on your body, and you're now Sir Niko Cristofolous, at least for the time being, and not just Niko Cristofolous, fisherboy.
"Seems little enough reward. But that's not why I did it. I have my reasons—several of them. For one, as a Knight, other knights are required to hear you out. It's important that that be in Cully's report—for your safety, among other reasons.
"They'd listen to me when they'd not listen to you?"
"They may not have that opportunity. Little loss." Cully shrugged. "I said I wasn't a good chess player, but not that I was an utterly incompetent one. If we have any luck at all, we'll have gotten closer to whatever is going on before they catch up with us; pawns like me tend not to survive contact in such circumstances." He nodded. "Which is only fair, after all. What isn't fair is that your chances are only a little better than mine."
"If that bothers me too much, we can turn the boat around?" he asked, not sure if he wanted to or not. There was something about Cully's intensity that was persuasive, even intoxicating.
"No. It wasn't right of me to get you into this without asking, but I don't always do what's right." His smile was crooked. "I don't even always do what's right on the rare occasions that I know what's right. As for this, I need the sword both for information and as bait, and that means that I need you, regardless of the danger I'm putting you in. The only way I can see that you can get out of this is to turn me in; you should have the chance soon enough."
"I wouldn't do that. These are the people that murdered my family that you're going after." It wasn't possible to forgive the gods and the sea, and a fisherman was no nobleman, who could hold a grudge for generations, but . . .
"Perhaps not. When one of the Wise tells you the truth, you can be sure that they've not told you the whole truth. I'm not at all sure what this sword will do in your hands, and finding that out, as soon as we've a safe place to do so, is our first order of business—for that and other reasons." He rose. "Enough talking. Let's take a more northerly tack for an hour or two so we're not running so before the wind—give us some time to eat, and I can fit some grips to the sword, if I can find a pair of gloves aboard this scow, and perhaps to work out."
"As you wish, sir."
"My wishes have nothing to do with it."
For just a moment, Cully's expression reminded Niko of Grandfather's, although he couldn't have said why.