Page 24 of Crucible of Chaos

She folded her arms across her chest. ‘How?’

This time he pokedherin the shoulder. ‘You teach the silly beasts to obey your whistles!’

Caeda laughed at that and stood up on her tiptoes to kiss his bearded cheek. ‘Oh, Estevar, we are going to be such good friends!’ With that, she turned on her heel and strode up to the door, which he knew now must lead into the Venerance Tower, the kennel these ‘Hounds’ had taken for themselves. She placed one hand on the door handle, then looked back at him, her expression disquietingly wistful. ‘I do hope you won’t die too quickly, my Cantor.’

CHAPTER 15

THE KING OF HOUNDS

‘Caeda, my lovely,’ proclaimed the tall, rakish figure lounging half-naked against the blue velvet back of a beautifully gilded oak throne that had once been occupied by the gentle, softly spoken Abbot Venia. ‘What a delight to see you! I’d presumed you’d fled the island with the rest of the common cattle. Had I known otherwise, I would have unleashed a few of my boys to scour the island for you that I might at last bed you. But here you are, delivering yourself to me as if fate herself demands that you be good and properly fucked.’

Laughter erupted from the three dozen men and women sprawled around the austere circular chamber, nestled together on priceless silk tapestries of gold and silver thread depicting ancient Tristian religious scenes. Like their leader, whom Caeda had named Strigan but who styled himself ‘the Wolf-King of Isola Sombra’, their state of undress revealed bare flesh inked with heretical black sigils that would doubtless have seen the lot of them incarcerated, if Brother Agneta had had her way. In this one instance, Estevar rather hoped she would.

Why these particular symbols?he wondered,and why do I find them so familiar, yet cannot recall any occult codex in which I’ve seen them before?Most of the sigils had been inscribed on the margrave’s twelve listless knights, as pictured on the illustration in the leather tube. He regretted the loss of the message, now with his greatcoat at the bottom of the sea.

I’ve seen them once before, in other circumstances, I’m certain of it.He tried and failed to summon anything more from his tired brain.If only this wretched fever would abate long enough for me to remember. . .

Although the laughter had died down, one fellow couldn’t stop giggling: a heavyset man almost his own size sitting cross-legged in front of the large curved hearth set into the tower wall. The Venerance was usually the part of Tristian abbeys where momentous questions of faith were researched and debated– and this half-naked fellow, surrounded by a fortune’s worth of books dragged down from the now-empty shelves, was presently tearing pages from one of the volumes, bunching each gorgeously illuminated piece of parchment in his huge fist– and then tossing it into the flames.

Estevar handed Imperious’ reins to Caeda before crossing the floor to loom over the giddy monk burning the abbey’s literary treasures. ‘Did you know,’ he began, staring down at the fellow whose unshaven jaw and sweating, malodorous body suggested he hadn’t bathed in weeks, ‘that in Tristia it is a crime to burn a book?’

The monk gazed up at him. His confused, inebriated smile and a brownish-green paste clinging to his teeth suggested his extreme intoxication was the result of more than mere alcohol. Estevar suspected the abuse of the abbey’s herbarium.

‘I do not speak merely of the crime against another’s property, you understand,’ Estevar continued, ‘although that would be troubling enough. No, the law in this civilised nation decrees that the burning ofanybook is publishable by several months in prison.’

He turned to the rest of the Hounds, who were witnessing his performance in disbelief, doubtless anticipating the price their leader would extract from him for his brazenness. ‘You are all educated men and women– do you know the manner in which the sentence for book burning is assessed?’

He gave them time, but no one spoke, though Strigan the Wolf-King watched with a keener intensity than his followers. Caeda shot him a warning glance, perhaps to remind him that it wasn’t only his safety at risk here.

‘No one knows?’ Estevar asked. ‘Then allow me to explain, for it is, I think, a remarkable example of what we callequajudia, or balanced justice. The sentence for burning a book is commensurate with the number of months required for a scribe to produce a new copy of that same book. Most equitable, no?’

The monk who’d been burning pages attempted a threatening scowl, as if he were debating whether to challenge Estevar. He seemed to think better of that, however, and cast a questioning gaze at his liege.

‘Careful now,’ warned Strigan. ‘The Venerance Tower is my domain, Greatcoat, as the abbey will be soon enough, and the entire island not long after.’ He leaned forward, resting one elbow on his thigh, the ropy muscles exposed by torn grey robes. With a forefinger, he traced one of the black sigils covering his muscular chest and shoulders. ‘The sheep have fled Isola Sombra; it is the laws of wolves which govern here.’

Estevar silently reached down and took the book from the monk’s hands before returning to where Caeda and Imperious waited. He stuffed the tome into the mule’s saddlebag.

‘What do you propose to do with a half-ruined book?’ Strigan asked. ‘Assuming I allow you to leave with it?’

‘I propose to make a gift for you, Mighty Strigan.’

‘A gift?’

Estevar said solemnly, ‘In recompense for your cooperation with my investigation into the murder of Abbot Venia, I promise that on my return to Aramor, I will speak with the royal scribes on your behalf. They may be able to find a second copy of this book within the castle library and thus reproduce the pages torn from this one. Once fully repaired, I will have whichever of my fellow magistrates is next travelling this circuit return the book to the abbey, and the sentence for your complicity in its destruction will be commuted.’

Strigan laughed, the rich, carefree laughter of one who knows he holds all the power and can afford to appear amused by blatant challenges to his rule. ‘Alas, your Eminence, we have burned very, very many books already.’

Estevar’s forehead was slick with sweat, from both the fire and his own fever. He locked eyes with the taller, leaner, younger man. ‘Then I suggest you be very,verycooperative.’

Jeers erupted from the Hounds– some even barked. The Wolf-King rose from his throne and held out his right arm, palm flat. His unspoken command was instantly obeyed as one of his followers placed a rapier in his hand. The hilt was an A-cup, much like the one hanging from Estevar’s belt, and of identical length.

Estevar walked to Caeda, waiting with Imperious. ‘The sword you gave me was stolen from this tower?’ he asked quietly.

‘Technically, he stole them from the old armoury, which is a crime. Me being your Piccolo and all, which is halfway to being a Greatcoat, it was my duty to administerequajudia– isn’t that what you called it?’

‘I feel I must observe that you pilfered the weaponbeforewe discussed you assisting my investigation.’

‘Whatever. He’s got so many rapiers, I doubt he even noticed one was missing until you walked in here wearing it.’

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