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Summary

Kethol is an adventurer with an easy smile, a man who is quick with a quip and quicker with a sword. His partner, Pirojil, the ugly one, looks impressive and deceives people into thinking he's stupid to their sorrow-for his might and loyalty are worth a kingdom. And the fledgling wizard Erenor, a man who tries to stay two steps ahead of his enemies, as well as one step ahead of his friends. Loyal retainers they are, sworn to Jason Cullianane, a man who walked away from a crown, and who has been trying to convince all the almost-warring factions that he doesn't want the job back. Their lives aren't very easy, what with keeping Jason from getting killed by yet another conspiracy, rescuing some damsel or whatnot in distress, and squirreling away something for the ever-diminishing prospect of retirement. And now it looks like our heroes might wind up succeeding in none of their schemes, for there are plots within plots, and Kethol has been forced into a disguise not of his own making. There is magic aplenty in the air (and on the ground), and in order to save a kingdom, they may have to pull off a complicated scheme that could kill them all--or land them in positions of supreme power. But, hey, whoever said that a soldier's life was a cakewalk? Set in Joel Rosenberg's bestselling Guardians of the Flame series, Not Really the Prisoner of Zenda is the third adventure of the journeymen soldiers of Castle Cullianane (and their sometimes ill-fated leader) in all their raucous glory. A fun, fast-paced read, it's a rollicking roller coaster of a book that will have fantasy fans reaching for more.

Author Biography

Joel Rosenberg is the author of the best-selling Guardians of the Flame books as well as the D'Shai and Keepers of the Hidden Ways series. He resides in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Home Front is the first in his Ernest "Sparky" Hemingway mysteries, a delightful new series with a wonderfully quirky character set in the land of the Cohen Brothers' Fargo.

Not Really the Prisoner of Zenda

Part 1

OPENING MOVES

The Widow's Walk

Put three nobles in a room for lunch, and before the appetizers are served, you'll have four conspiracies. At least.

--Walter Slovotsky

The wind had begun to howl, threatening still more rain, but the Dowager Empress neither quickened nor slowed her already sodden pace.

Beralyn Furnael simply refused to be affected; it was no more and no less than that.

It wouldn't have been accurate to say that threats meant nothing to her--in fact, the truth was entirely the opposite--but she was far too old, and had far too long been far too stubborn, to let anything as unimportant as the wind move her mind or her feet from any path she had set them on, even if that path was something as familiar and trivial as that of her nightly walk around the ramparts of Biemestren Castle.

Yes, there was some truth in what she said: that she needed her exercise, and that the moment that she permitted her traitor body to deny her that need, it would be time to have servants dig a deep grave, next to her husband's, on the hilltop behind the castle that had been theirs, and lie down beside him for all of eternity.

Beralyn didn't mind lying, but she didn't believe in doing so promiscuously.

It was also true--at least when Parliament was in session, or when there were other visiting nobles, which was more common--that her nightly walks gave her son the opportunity to spend some private time with one or more of the lords' and barons' daughters who, through no coincidence, always seemed to be accompanying their fathers to Biemestren Castle.

None of them had any use for a useless old woman, after all. She would just be in the way.

There was always talk, of course, about how the visits were inspired by the cultural life in the capital, about how theater and music and generally better craftsmanship could be found here than out in the baronies, and such. All that was, of course, true enough, and perhaps more than a tiny proportion of the apparently empty-headed young twits really had that as a main reason for coming to Biemestren, unlikely as that seemed.

Their fathers, she was sure, invariably had other goals in mind. There were always commercial bargains to be made, and political ones, as well, besides the obvious hope: the grand prize. Her son. The Emperor.

An unmarried emperor was an obvious prize, as well as both an obvious and subtle threat, and the easiest way for any of the barons to simultaneously gain that prize and neutralize that threat was to have him marry into the baron's family.

She wished one of them would succeed. Any one; it didn't much matter to her, as long as the girl was fertile--and Beralyn would have the Spidersect priest make sure of that, while supposedly examining her for her virginity. Beralyn couldn't have cared less about whether a young girl had spent her years keeping her knees together, or spreading them for every nobleman with a smooth smile--but whoever Thomen married had better be able to producea son, and quickly, or the poor girl might just have an unfortunate accident, some dark night.

Hmm ... it would be better, come to think of it, if Beralyn didn't like the girl at first. While it wouldn't make a whit of difference in what she did, it would bother her to push somebody she actually liked down the stairs.

Below, in the courtyard surrounding the donjon--what everybody else called the keep, or the Emperor's House, although she preferred the older term--the remains of the Parliament encampment looked like what she remembered from her childhood as the remains of a party.

Biemestren Castle was large and roomy, certainly--easily four times the size of her late husband's keep in Barony Furnael--but it had never been intended to accommodate a meeting of even all of the Biemish barons and their entourages, much less the Holts, as well.

So, once again, despite the local nobles minors' homes being pressed into service, the castle had been painfully overcrowded and cramped during Parliament, and the kitchens had worked day and night to turn the constant flow of every sort of edible beast or vegetable imaginable through the castle gate into meals for those attending, while scullery men plied their trade behind the kitchens and beneath the castle's garderobes to carry the refuse out.

Now it seemed almost empty, and she wondered why that bothered her.

All of the multicolored pavilions had been taken down, and the tents and floors packed away against the next Parliament. The sodden ashes of four cooking fires had yet to be removed from the gravel-covered grounds, and she frowned at that--with the kitchens working night and day, what had the barons needed with their own cooks and cook fires? What were those lazy scullery men doing?

It would all be cleaned up and gone within a few days; Beralynwould make sure of that. And then it would be absolutely empty.

No, it would just seem that way--the castle was really never empty of visitors.

There were always delegations from Nyphien and the other of the Middle Lands coming and going--for talks, they said, but mainly to spy--as well as engineers from the Home colony, and the occasional contingent from one or more of the dwarven countries, mainly Endell, always eager to trade for what they saw as the unceasing flow of good iron and better steel from what she still thought of as Adahan City, but which had been renamed New Pittsburgh back when that horrible Karl Cullinane had been emperor. She didn't much like the people from Home--even apprentice engineers treated nobility with shocking informality, and Ranella, the Empire's chief engineer, felt free to walk into Thomen's presence whenever she felt like it--but Beralyn was willing to make allowances, given that it was the Home engineers who had built the blast furnaces in New Pittsburgh, and if the Emperor putting up with a few of the too-loud, too-self-assured swaggerers was part of the price, she could live with that.

And then there were the nobles minor, some from the Emperor's own barony, but even more from Arondael, and Tyrnael, and Niphael, and every other of the Biemish baronies, and increasingly the Holtish ones. They would never have the status of the ancient noble lines, which were tied to landownership, but many of the upstart merchant lords were actually wealthier than all but the richest of the old nobility.

The Imperial court was not only the commercial heart of the Empire, but the social center, as well. Most of the time, at least a dozen of the local nobles minor would be playing host to at least one young visitor from an outlying barony, usually a younger son or daughter of a father who already had an heir, and who had come to the capital for any of the number of declared reasons, and never forthe declared but usual reason of seeking some suitable mate, preferably one of good breeding, better lands, and even better wealth, but who often would happily settle on a marriage that would unite some portion of the merchant concerns of the nobles minor.

Ancient laws of primogeniture forbade the division of major nobles' domains, but commercial enterprises were another matter.

It would be interesting to calculate how many marriages had been prematurely consummated--often marriages that had yet to be arranged--in the guest quarters of the donjon alone. And never mind how Lord Lerna's house in Biemestren seemed to regularly have more action going on than a lowertown brothel on payday. There was something about the air in the capital, presumably, that prevented young noblewomen from visiting the Spider for the potions that would have prevented pregnancy.

Pity that Thomen's own quarters were far too well guarded for that to happen there.

Yet another thing to blame Walter Slovotsky for, she decided.

Not that there weren't enough already.

She looked out, past the town below, toward the dark horizon, and for a moment she thought she could see a speck that might be the dragon, Ellegon, carrying that horrible Jason Cullinane back toward what was now known as Barony Cullinane, but which, to her, would always be Barony Furnael.

No, it wasn't. It was just some speck in her eye. Jason Cullinane and the dragon had left early in the morning, and were long gone.

She had heard that the dragon would soon be back to carry the new Baron Keranahan back to his barony, as well--the Cullinanes were awfully friendly with Forinel, suspiciously so--but any time that Ellegon was gone from Biemestren was a good time, from her point of view.

She had heard the dragon say, more than once, that it didn't like peeling back the mind of somebody that it didn't know, but thatdidn't mean it was true, and she kept iron control over her thoughts whenever the dragon was around, just as she kept the same iron control over her actions at all times.

Jason Cullinane was gone, and he would not be back soon. Not gone nearly far enough, nor permanently enough, but there was nothing that she could do about that.

At the moment.

She shook her head as she walked. Others would say that Jason Cullinane had been generous in abdicating, in giving the Imperial crown to her son, Thomen, accepting only the Furnael barony in exchange. Others believed that Jason Cullinane meant what he said: that Thomen was better suited to rule the Empire of Holtun-Bieme than Jason was.

Others were fools.

There was nothing generous in it. Thomen had been running the Empire, while Jason Cullinane, then the heir apparent, gallivanted about the Middle Lands, enjoying himself. Thomen had not only deserved the crown by birth--he had earned the crown, by hard work, over years, serving first that horrible Karl Cullinane, and then as Regent for that even more dangerous Jason Cullinane.

She had discussed that with him, many times, and he had always said the same thing: "Well, then, Mother, you should be very happy, because now I have the crown." And then, he would smile and would tap at the place on his forehead where the silver crown of Holtun-Bieme would rest on those rare state occasions when it was removed from the castle's strong room.

He ignored the truth. That was all there was to it; he simply chose to ignore the truth.

Thomen could be very bloody-minded when it came to other matters of state--he was wisely resisting too quickly giving control of most of the Holtish baronies back to the barons, and he watched the Treasury very closely, not paying out good gold for works projectsof questionable worth, insisting that the barons involved would have to fund the projected rail line between Adahan's New Pittsburgh and Biemestren.

He even said that he had put off marrying for good reason, not out of a lack of time or interest. She believed that the way that little upstairs maid of his made a point of having difficulty sitting down most mornings was a reliable testament to his interest, just as Beralyn's insistence that Derinald regularly take the girl to the Spider had proclaimed loudly to that little piece of common trash that there would be no question, ever, of a bastard to complicate matters.

But, so he said, as long as the Emperor remained unmarried, and made it clear that he would choose his bride, when he did choose a bride, from whichever noble family--Holtish or Biemish--that he decided upon, then he would not have to put up with the conflicts that any choice would of necessity instigate.

There was, he said, no need to rush.

She disagreed, but his wasn't a stupid position to take. In the short run. Particularly if he had been sensible enough to be sure that the major danger to his throne was dead and buried.

Jason Cullinane was a real threat.

The awful truth--the truth that simply everybody knew, but which was spoken of only in whispers, when it was spoken of at all--was that if Jason Cullinane chose to take the crown back, he could do so overnight.

There was no doubt in her mind that he someday would.

Oh, he certainly could and no doubt would claim to have some noble purpose in mind when he did that.

Perhaps he would decide that Thomen was not removing the military governors and lifting the occupation of the Holtish baronies quickly enough, or perhaps he would convince himself that the Emperor's justice fell too heavily on common thieves or too lightly on some noble's son who had had his way with a few peasant girls.Perhaps he would decide that the occasional bandito raids along the Kiaran border required a stronger response, or--if Thomen finally decided to bring those Kiaran dogs to heel--Jason Cullinane would decide that it should have been a weaker one.

Or, more than likely, Jason Cullinane would marry that disturbingly masculine little Slovotsky girl, and find that he wanted to gift his own son with an empire, and not just the barony.

Or, perhaps, it would be all of those.

But it was, of course, only a matter of time, not of whether.

She had said that to her son, more than once.

More than once she had explained that he simply had to produce an heir, that he had to intertwine himself and his blood with a noble family of impeccable lineage--Lady Leria Euar'den had been Beralyn's choice, but hers was hardly the only noble womb available for the purpose--and establish not just himself, but his line.

And for the sake of his blood and his lineage--and for the sake of the memory of his dead father and dead brother--he simply had to find some way to eliminate the Cullinane threat that Thomen, sweet Thomen, foolish Thomen, saw as an alliance rather than the danger that it most surely was.

Taking the barony away from Jason Cullinane would be a good start. There were collateral cousins of the Furnaels that had a claim to it, and while the Emperor would be a fool to promiscuously strip a baron of his title and lands, there was precedent for it in Bieme, as well as in Holtun.

No. That wouldn't do. She could fantasize about it, but for Thomen to take away the Cullinane barony would likely trigger the revolution that she feared, that she knew, would surely come one day.

Why wait for it? Why not simply cut the head off of the snake now?

Thomen would just shake his head, and say that he didn't thinkof Jason Cullinane as a threat, that Jason Cullinane didn't want to be emperor, anyway, or he wouldn't have abdicated at all, much less in Thomen's favor.

Just wait, he would say. Notice, he would say, time and time again, that Jason Cullinane himself had put off marrying that Slovotsky girl--or anybody else. Jason was waiting for him--let the Emperor marry first, let him produce an heir, and Jason Cullinane himself would stand guardian at the boy's naming.

It didn't matter to her if Thomen was right. Did anybody think that she would let Jason Cullinane within a dozen leagues of her grandchild?

In the meantime, what she was supposed to do, of course, was to wait, and be a useless old woman, and occupy herself with fripperies like the needlepoint that her old fingers were far too clumsy for, and managing the servants that were perfectly capable of being managed by the majordomo, and doing anything and everything except remembering that every time Parliament met it was just another convenient opportunity for Jason Cullinane to take her son's place.

Wait?

No. She would not wait for the inevitable ax to inevitably fall.

There was a sense of freedom, she thought with a private smile, in not doing what you were supposed to.

She trudged on.

A head leaned out of the guard shack at the southern rampart, then quickly ducked back in. There was no need for an alarm; it was just that useless old woman on her nightly walk, and if her tongue was still sharp, it was a simple matter to avoid her, after all.

The servants in the castle had taken to calling her the Walking Widow, she had heard, and calling the ramparts the Widow's Walk

That was just fine with her.

Ahead, just at the top of the stairs that led up from the innerbailey, Baron Willen Tyrnael was waiting for her, as she had half-expected. Usually, he was among the first to leave after Parliament, pleading the exigencies of running a barony on the Nyphien border; this time, though, he was almost the last to go, and she had assumed that it was to find the opportunity to speak to her privately. It wouldn't be the first time that he had caught her on her nightly walk.

She reminded herself that she always had to watch herself around Tyrnael--the misleadingly gentle eyes and the tight, fierce mouth reminded her, far too much, of her dead husband, Zherr. Understandable, really, since all the Biemish barons were distantly related, in many cases having married each other's sisters or daughters. Even more understandable, really, that he would cultivate the resemblance to Zherr Furnael, the more easily to manipulate a lonely, useless old woman whom nobody took seriously.

She forced herself to concentrate on the ways in which he was different: how, for example, his hair and beard were always neatly trimmed, and close-cropped, not like Zherr's, who she had practically had to drag into the barbering chair.

"A good evening to you, my Empress," he said, awkwardly touching a knuckle to his forelock. That was the only awkward thing about him. Understandably, Willen Tyrnael had had little practice in showing obeisance; surprisingly, he had not put in the time or effort to learn how to do so deftly.

"Do you really think so, Willen?" She didn't pause in her pacing, but nodded at him, giving permission for him to walk along with her. "I find it a rather glum and utterly unpleasant evening, myself. Which is why most have turned in for the night, as I thought you had."

Most men would have nodded in agreement--Beralyn had long since become used to insincere agreement--but the baron shook his head.

"I did turn in, but I found myself not particularly sleepy, and I also find myself the last Holtish baron under the Emperor's roof"--he glanced at the dark sky above--"so to speak, and I find it pleasant not to share his attention with any of those Holtish barons in particular, nor, for that matter, others of the Biemish barons."

"Then why," she asked, "are you not spending time with him, and instead waiting here, out in the dark, for a useless old woman?"

"I would never think of you that way, and I am sure that I have never heard anybody call you that, my Empress, but be that as may ..." Tyrnael eyed her for a moment. "I asked for some time with Thomen this evening, but I was told that he was closeted up with the baron minister and the lord proctor. And I'm told that he has an appointment with Forinel at the tenth hour, as well. Spending some time speaking with the new baron before Forinel takes his leave seems to be of some understandable importance."

If the idea of Thomen giving precedence to spending time with Bren Adahan and that awful Walter Slovotsky bothered the baron, it didn't show in his voice or face, any more than did his irritation at Forinel's presence. The sudden, surprising appearance of Forinel to claim his barony--just as Parliament and the Emperor were about to name Forinel's half-brother, Miron, as Baron Keranahan--seemed to bother him not at all.

It did, of course. But she admired his self-control; his self-control made them kindred spirits.

After all, Miron was obviously a creature of Tyrnael's. Whatever Tyrnael had spent, in promises or gold, to gain a hold over the would-be baron had, the instant that Forinel had appeared in Parliament, become a wasted investment, and Tyrnael didn't seem to be the sort of man who would fail to regret such a lost investment, and he most certainly wasn't the sort of lord who would fail to attempt to recoup such a lost investment, either.

"So you leave tomorrow?" she asked.

"I'd best. Not that I'm utterly indispensable to the running of my barony," he said, with a self-deprecating chuckle that almost seemed genuine. "After all, graveyards are filled with men who thought themselves to be indispensable. Still, I do like to think I'm of some use--and word has reached me that there are some problems on the Nyphien border."

"Oh?" "Problems" could mean anything short of a Nyph invasion.

"It's probably just more ores, but I'd rather check it out myself. Delegating things is all well and good, but one of the lessons that the Old Emperor taught all of us is that there's no substitute for getting out and seeing for yourself." His smile broadened. "Of course, doing that once too many times killed him, but no policy is perfect, yes? And I did want to leave you with a present before I left."

"Oh?" She fingered the pendant around her neck--a finely polished garnet on a silver chain.

Cautious by policy as much as by temperament, she had had it examined by Henrad, Thomen's pet wizard, before ever putting it around her neck, and indeed it had been as innocuous as Tyrnael had claimed: it was touched with just a minor glamour, just the smallest of spells that tended to make sweet food taste a trifle sweeter, cold water feel a touch cooler, and the like.

"Another gem?" she asked, fingering the garnet.

His face was impassive, no hint that he recognized it as the Tyrnael family heirloom that he had given to her.

Sometimes she thought that he took his self-control too far, although that was something that could safely be said about Beralyn herself, as long as it wasn't said where such words could reach her ears.

"No," he said, smiling. "Something less appealing, I'm afraid, and more subtle. Would it surprise you, my Empress, to know thata couple of men--Nyphs, by the look of them--two days ago showed up in a tavern in the lower city, looking for your aide, Captain Derinald?"

So there it was.

She didn't bother asking him how he had found that out. There was no question that all of the barons--and certainly some of the minor lords, as well as others--had spies in the capital, and it didn't surprise her that Tyrnael's were among the best.

It did surprise her that the men Derinald had hired were stupid enough to come back to Biemestren, but it didn't surprise her much. Men were, by and large, such stupid creatures, and men who made their living soldiering for others were among the stupidest of men.

But she didn't let him see any fear in her face. She had realized, long before, that there were risks, and she did have a plan to protect her son from her own exposure.

Still, it was worth trying to see if she could find a way out of the swamp that Derinald's stupidity had put her in.

"Derinald," she said, "has some low-life friends, and that's long been known to me." It had long been useful to her, as well, although the usefulness of that, and of him, was clearly about to end.

It had all made sense at the time. Derinald had been supposed to have traveled incognito in Enkiar, not Nyphien--he was supposed to pass himself off as a Pandathaway Guild slaver, and she had given him enough gold to make that credible--but he was never quite as clever as he seemed to think he was, and this time his stupidity was going to be expensive.

Tyrnael smiled. "I hadn't thought much of it, until then."

"I had nothing to do with it. Everybody knows that it was the Slavers Guild that tried to have Jason Cullinane assassinated, after all."

His smile broadened. "What everybody knows and what is true are so often such different things. Yes, hired assassins trying to killa Cullinane spoke of the Pandathaway Slavers Guild, after all. But the timing was interesting."

Yes, it was. Just before Parliament. Just before another chance for Jason Cullinane to take back the crown, despite his protestations that he supported Thomen.

Still, she had expected that the blame would fall on the Slavers Guild, and it had, of course.

Until now.

"Yes." She allowed herself a slight nod. "How interesting. And I suppose that these, these thugs have all sorts of interesting stories to tell."

"Stories?" Tyrnael affected to look puzzled. "About what? I'm afraid I don't understand. Surely there will be no stories about the Dowager Empress's aide having solicited them to murder a baron on his way to Parliament, I'd imagine, if that's what you're worrying about."

So: there it was, all out in the open, or, at least, as out in the open as Tyrnael wanted it to be at the moment.

He thought that she was utterly at his mercy, but she wasn't.

Rumors and suspicions were one thing, but let some reliable word leak out that the Emperor--or the Emperor's mother, it would make no difference--had tried to have any one of the barons murdered, and the outcry could shake the crown right off Thomen's head.

Jason Cullinane's father had earned far more than his share of loyalty among the Biemish barons by turning the tide in the war against Holtun, and even more than that among the Holtish barons by letting them keep their titles and most of their properties, even under the occupation. They had expected, after all, that the conquering Biemish would do to them what they had been busily trying to do to the Biemish, before the war had turned. Cart off the excess peasants and sell them to slavers; kill most of the Holtish nobility,and reduce the rest to nobles minor, at most, and distribute lands and titles among the Biemish conquerors.

But Karl Cullinane hadn't done that, and he had not just forced his will on the Biemish barons--although he had--but eventually even persuaded them that welding Holtun and Bieme together would leave the created Empire stronger than would a Bieme that would have to spend the next generations digesting Holtun.

She was glad he was dead, but she was far too honest to deny to herself that he had earned himself some of that loyalty, and that was the way of it--loyalty could be transferred from father to son, and Thomen's father was long gone.

Still, it was hardly just a matter of loyalty. Loyalty was a far weaker staff to lean on than self-interest. If the Emperor could have any one of the barons assassinated, why, he could have any other of the barons assassinated.

It wasn't just their own necks that would concern them, of course. They would be as worried about their own heirs' necks, as well, just as Beralyn was concerned about Thomen's.

There was a simple solution, of course.

The only trail led through Derinald to her. So let it end with her, and let Derinald flee for his life. With any luck, the dolt would fall from his horse and break his neck.

There was no reason to wait, and there were advantages to doing it here and now.

It would just be a matter of flinging herself over the ramparts, to the hard stones below. Then let Tyrnael explain how the Empress had managed to stumble and fall over the stone railing that rose to her mid-chest.

She wished she could be there to see it, but, of course, if she was, there would be nothing to see.

It would have been better to shout out, "Please stop," or "Please don't hurt me," or "He's going to throw me over the railing, help,"but not only would that be beneath her dignity, it would also give him a warning.

She regretted that. It would be good to be sure to take him with her, and that cry would surely do it.

There was much to regret, but no time to regret it.

But as she started to move, his hand snaked out and gripped her wrist tightly, almost hard enough to break bones.

"No," he said, "you misunderstand me."

She didn't bother to pull against his much greater strength. There wouldn't be any point, and Beralyn never believed in useless gestures.

"Release me, now," she said, forcing herself to keep her voice low and level, "or I'll call for the guard."

"And tell them what? That you tried to kill yourself when I told you I know that you tried to have Baron Cullinane assassinated? Let's not be silly, my Empress." He shook his head. "Ah," Tyrnael said, "you have such admirable bloody-mindedness in you. Your son didn't inherit that from you, more's the pity." He raised a finger. "Promise to stay and hear me out, and I'll release your hand. Let me speak, and then do what you will."

"I said--"

"I want your word. I would have been willing to wager anything on your husband's word, and I know you wouldn't dishonor the word of the Furnaels--so give me your promise, your word, on your family honor. It's not much to ask, after all. Surely, surely you can spare me a moment's attention. Then," he said with a smile, "if you absolutely insist on shattering your body on the stones below, I'll ask that you at least give me a few moments to make my escape before you do."

After a moment, she nodded. "You have my word. For what it's worth."

"I wouldn't dare to presume that the Dowager Empress's wordwas not her bond." He released her wrist, but didn't take a step back. "Don't blame Derinald," he said, "any more than you'd blame the knife you chose because it wasn't sufficiently sharp for the task. Nor were the men he found--in Nyphien, was it?--sufficiently sharp for their task. Still, the poor fellows appear to have disappeared, and I don't think they'll ever be seen again."

"Unless, of course, I don't do whatever you ask me, whenever you ask it."

"You misunderstand me, I think. I meant what I said: I think that they'll never be seen in Biemestren again, regardless of what happens between you and me. You're mistaken if you think I'm trying to blackmail you."

He shook his head. "The truth is I'm trying to protect you. And your son. And the Empire. You have been foolish, my Empress, and that foolishness could redound to the detriment of yourself, of your son, and of the Empire. You seem to trust too little, and when you do, you trust the wrong people. That last is a lethal failing, and one I hope you'll repent of--just as I hope you realize that you'd be unwise to mention to Derinald that we've talked, or he's liable to panic and start saying all sorts of silly things, and not think until it was too late that that would cost him his scrawny neck."

"And your gift is?" she asked. "No, let's not mince about the subject: your price is?"

"No, there is no price." He shook his head, again. "You don't understand me at all, my Empress. I've little fondness for the Cullinanes, and thought--and think--that the crown should have been mine when Jason decided to abdicate. But that is what he decided, and that's how it is, and I'd be a fool to try to change that for my own benefit. I may be many things, but I'm not a fool.

"The thing is, my Empress, that I actually care about the kingdom and the Empire. I'm not a sentimental man--that seems to run in the Furnael line, not mine--but we've had a time of peace,and of power. Still, still the world is a dangerous place, and it seems to me that the Empire itself is the wall that keeps some of that danger out.

"I like walls, my Empress. They have such a nice way of keeping things out, don't you agree?" He waited a moment for her to answer, but when she didn't, he went on: "So it would be a bad thing, I think, if it were to become known what you've done, or what you will do." He smiled knowingly. "So, my gift to you is this: my finger, held to my lips," he said, touching his finger to his lips.

She cocked her head to one side. "Surely, Baron, you're not telling me that there is to be no price to pay for that ... gift?"

"You wound me to the heart, my Empress, truly you do." He shook his head, sadly. "I'm hardly a merchant, engaged in common trade, balancing favors and obligations on either side of a scale. Yes, when you think your voice will be heard, I'd very much like it raised in support, say, of maintaining the occupation in Holtish baronies, and it would bother me not at all if you were to summon my daughter, Greta, to wait upon your most impressive Imperial person--"

"Ah. So you'd like an Emperor for a son-in-law, wouldn't you?"

"Who would not? If the crown is never to sit on my head, or one of my sons', a grandson's head would surely do." He shook his head, sadly. "Sadly, I doubt you could prevail upon your son to see her in any other light than that he would choose himself. No, I'd not ask you to try to foist her on him--you're his mother, after all, and I'd much rather you explain how unsuitable she is. How she has no grace, does not bathe well or frequently, does not--well, whatever flaws you can find in her, particularly if they are flaws that she does not indeed have." He thought on the matter for a moment. "And it might be best if the Lady Leria were to be here, too--and for you to seem to push her at your son, perhaps?"

"She is here now, and she doesn't do anything but make little calf eyes at that Forinel."

He nodded. "They have been long separated, and that's understandable--but she is about to leave for Keranahan, with her betrothed." He pursed his lips. "Let her settle in for a tenday or two, and then send for her, at the same time you send for my Greta. I think my Greta will acquit herself adequately--she's hardly a country lady, untutored in the gentle arts." He spread his hands. "There's no guarantee, but it's worth the effort of writing a letter, is it not?"

She nodded. It might work. "And if my telling Thomen that your Greta is totally unsuitable does not make her more attractive to him--if he picks, instead, this Leria chit, or some other girl ... ?"

"Friends do not require each other to be successful; but, of course, friends do make efforts on behalf of their friends. Do they not?" His smile broadened. "Regardless, I hope you will still look upon me as a friend and ally, for that I surely am. Not just a merchant to whom you owe a debt. A friend, for whom you would willingly do a favor, as a friend often does for another." He bowed slightly. "And I'd ask another favor more of you."

"Yes?"

"The next time," he said, quietly, but with some heat, "the next time and any time that you find it expedient to have some throat slit, I'd take it as a great personal favor if you'd simply chalk the name, say," he went on, looking around, "here, on this buttress, rather than trusting that idiot Derinald to do better in the future than he has in the past."

She had always assumed that all--or at least most--of the barons had spies in the castle. It would be interesting, if she had any servants that she could trust--Derinald clearly wouldn't do--to keep watch on that buttress, and see who read the scrawl.

"I can do that," she said. "But if the name that I scrawl is Jason Cullinane?"

"No, I don't think it will be." He shook his head. "I think thatwould be a very bad name to scrawl, and I hope you will trust me on this."

No, she didn't think that would be a bad name to scrawl. She thought it was, in fact, the perfect name to scrawl.

"Very well," she said.

"It's good for friends to trust each other," he said. He scratched his nose, then looked at his finger, as though he had never seen it before. "It may happen someday that I might say something that would frighten you, anger you, but I ask now that you would hear me out, then and always. Perhaps the only warning you will have is me scratching my nose--perhaps there will be none. But always, always, I hope, as a friend, my dear Beralyn, you will hear me out, as one friend does for another."

"And if your nose simply itches?"

He shook his head. "My nose never simply itches."

"And the ... attack on Jason Cullinane? The one that you seem to suggest that I might have had something to do with, but which we all know failed miserably, embarrassingly, totally?"

He reached out and patted her hand. "Why, I'm sure that was just the Slavers Guild, aren't you? Pandathaway is so far away, and even if the Slavers Guildmaster were right here, right now, swearing his innocence on his sword, he wouldn't be believed."

She didn't answer.

"I must finish my walk," she said.

"Then I'll ask you one last favor," he said. "If I may presume again upon our friendship."

"Yes?"

"I think it would be best if we simply forget we had this conversation, don't you?"

There was something overly self-satisfied about the way he asked that, something that seemed very atypical for Tyrnael. He usually concealed his feelings much better.

"I see no problem," she said. "You came to bid me a good night before I turned in, and we exchanged a few pleasantries. In fact, since I've not shown your previous gift to anybody, it might be that you gave it to me tonight." That, of course, was a lie, but not much of one--she had only shown it to Henrad, and the wizard wouldn't talk. "Why would I need to forget that?"

"No reason. No reason at all, dear Beralyn." He touched his finger to his forelock, again. "In that case, I'll bid you a very good night, my dear Empress." He scratched his nose, again, and bowed, once again, this time more deeply, and waited patiently, politely, while she walked away.

Well.

There would have to be another way to deal with the Jason Cullinane problem, but the world was full of throats that her son, her sentimental son, was too weak to have slit.

The only question was where and how to start.

After, of course, she scrawled the name "Derinald" on the buttress.

The trouble with being Emperor, Thomen Furnael decided, and not for the first time, was the hours.

Morning always began too early, with some crisis in the making--whether it was an overnight telegram from Tyrnael, about rumblings on the Nyphien border, and laconic reflections about the relative sizes of the forces just across the border; word from Becca that Ranella had been waiting for hours (she apparently never slept) to harangue him about the need for more dwarven miners in Adahan, complete with sniffs about how she didn't think that King Daherrin was actually running out of dwarves, although somebody apparently did, given what kind of pay Daherrin was asking; and, always, proctors' and bursars' reports that his minister, Bren Adahan, or the Imperial proctor, Walter Slovotsky, should have caught andhandled before they reached the Emperor's desk ...

And that was just the morning.

The days had a way of filling up, although with Parliament now adjourned until fall, and almost all of the barons back where they should be, his work would be real work, at least for a while, and less balancing off of all those irritating, competing interests and personalities--at least in person--and some of that could be laid off on Bren and Walter.

They had asked for--demanded--the jobs as minister and proctor, and Thomen had no objection to letting them do some of the work.

But Bren Adahan was off in New Pittsburgh, and while there were things that the Emperor could count on his Lord Proctor for, paperwork wasn't among them.

Which was why Thomen Furnael was, well after midnight, still at his desk, even though the exquisitely neat printing of the detailed report as to what Ranella's railroad had already cost--and never mind, for a moment, what it was going to cost before Biemestren and New Pittsburgh were finally linked by rail--was starting to blur in front of his eyes, even before he got to the bottom line.

And without so much as a league of track being laid, except for the short test track outside of New Pittsburgh, and with what she lightheartedly referred to as her Mark III steam engine still barely able to pull its own weight.

°I guess it isn't steam engine time, quite yet, eh?° sounded in his head.

Ellegon? He raised his head. The dragon sounded nearby.

°No, some other dragon. Humans in the Eren regions are so very hospitable that I'm stunned that you aren't utterly knee-deep in scales.°

Thomen smiled. "Would a quick apology do?" he asked, quietly. He didn't even have to speak out loud, but he preferred to. A man'sthoughts should be his own, and not shared unless he spoke.

°I'll try harder not to listen, then,° Ellegon said.

Neither Thomen, personally, nor anybody else in Holtun or Bieme, had anything to apologize to Ellegon for--Ellegon had, granted, spent a couple of centuries chained in the sewage pit in Pandathaway, forced to flame the city's wastes into ash or be buried in offal, but that was Pandathaway, not the Empire, after all, and things were different here.

°I guess I should admire your detachment, but I'm not sure that I do.°

"Well, then, I'm sorry," he said. He set down the papers, stood, stretched, and walked to the window.

°It's not your fault, Thomen.°

"No, but I'm still sorry. Really," he said

°I know.°

Beyond the bars, the dragon stood in the courtyard, stretching his neck out to shoot a gout of flame skyward. Ellegon preened himself, and stretched his wings, then turned his head toward where Thomen stood.

"So," Thomen said. "Last I heard, you were going to fly Baron Keranahan and his party home tomorrow."

Ellegon flicked his wings; a sort of draconic shrug. °Jason asked me to. You have some objection?°

Thomen shook his head. "No, no objection--just some petty jealousy. I'm stuck in this castle, while Jason is back in his barony, probably already out hunting, and--"

°And Lady Leria is also returning to Keranahan, with her betrothed. Does that bother you?°

Thomen's jaw tightened. "Read my mind if you want to know that badly."

Yes, Thomen had been more than slightly attracted to Leria, and had entertained the possibility of marrying her, which madesense for reasons of state, as well. Thomen's main task, as he saw it, was to bind Holtun and Bieme together, and for him to marry a girl of an old Euar'den family might help to do that.

His private thoughts were none of anyone else's concern.

°My turn to apologize, I expect,° Ellegon said.

Thomen forced himself to unclench. He was just tired, and overreacting. Complaining about Ellegon reading his mind was silly. It was natural for the dragon to do that--

°At least with friends, and at least on the surface level,° Ellegon said. °I can sense that there are some things you're trying hard not to think about--some painful memories, perhaps, or some things you're ashamed of, possibly--but I'm not looking at those, Thomen. Not that it would matter if I did. And not that I would tell anybody, either.°

Thomen nodded. "So, you're back to carry the baron and his lady home?"

°Yes. But I made it a point to be a little early. They won't be ready to leave until morning, unless I wake them up now, and I'm not of a mind to, for any number of reasons.°

"Such as?"

°Can you keep a secret?°

"Yes."

°Well, so can I. In any case, they're not leaving until morning, and ...°

"And?"

°And I was wondering if the Emperor can drag himself away from his paperwork for a short ride.°

"For what? Is there something--"

°No, there's nothing wrong. Not everything has to be a problem, or a solution, after all. I just thought you might like a break.°

"No important affair of state?"

°No. No surprise inspection of the guard in Tyrnael; no quicksurvey of wood stock in Adahan; nobody to talk to except me, and nothing to do, except maybe look at the river from cloud level; it's pretty under the starlight, and the faerie lights over Kemat are lovely tonight. No plans--although I might swoop down and swoop up a sheep, because I'm getting hungry--just for fun.°

Thomen looked back at the stack of paper on his desk. It hadn't gotten any smaller while he had been chatting with the dragon. He was the Emperor, after all, and he had responsibilities. And he was a grown man, and had been, for years, and not a boy, who could simply take off whenever he wanted to, to do whatever he wanted to.

°Sure you can. As long as you don't do it very often. I warn you, though: your mother will have a fit.°

Thomen smiled. You didn't have to read minds to know that. "You just talked me into it."

A gout of flame roared skyward. °I thought that would do it. Dress warm; it's cold up there.°

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