The Thousand Names Part 35

"He's . . ." Marcus sighed again. "Sometimes I think he just likes being dramatic, like a penny-opera villain. It's always, *Oh, you'll see, Captain,' or, *Matters will become clear soon, Captain.'" Marcus managed to produce a reasonable simulation of Ja.n.u.s' erudite accent, and Jen chuckled.

"You must know something, even if it's just from standing around behind him," she said.

Marcus s.h.i.+fted awkwardly, and smiled to cover it. "If I did, I couldn't tell you. You're a spy, after all."

"A clerk," she insisted. "Just a clerk. But I do have a report to write." She tipped her head and looked at him slyly. Stray hairs escaping from her bun hung in front of her eyes. "I'm really not going to get any more out of you?"

"I think that's all I can say that's consistent with my duty as an officer," Marcus said, with mock gravity.

"The h.e.l.l with it, then." She pushed up her spectacles and rubbed her eyes, then reached behind her head and tugged at her hair until it came loose from its bun and flopped free. He'd never seen her let it down before. It fell just to her shoulders, mouse brown and slightly frizzy. "I'm officially off duty. What about you?"

Marcus looked down at his uniform. "We haven't really worked out a duty schedule, to tell the truth. But nothing seems to be going on at the moment."

"Come with me, then. I've got something special I want to show you."

a a a The room she led him to was furnished in the same eclectic mix of ancient and cheap as the rest of the post-Redeemer Palace. Here the ancient included a ma.s.sive bed with bra.s.s poles, big enough to sleep six or seven, with equally ancient faded linen obviously scrounged from the bottom of some dusty closet. Beside it was a little table and chair, and a couple of open trunks.

Whoever was staying in the room was not very organized, and the floor beside the trunk was strewn with clothes. Marcus spotted a few undergarments of a notably feminine nature and felt his cheeks color slightly. He turned to find Jen tugging the thick door closed behind them.

"This is your room?" he said.

She grinned wickedly. "Of course. Where better to secretly murder you?" Catching his expression, her smile faded a little. "Is something wrong?"

"No." Marcus cleared his throat. "It's just been a long time since I was in a lady's bedroom."

Jen arched an eyebrow. "Oh, come on. The gallant captain must have had some conquests among the impressionable native girls."

"About the only Khandarai women who would have anything to do with us wanted to be paid afterward," Marcus said. He reflected a moment. "Actually, mostly they wanted to be paid in advance."

"Well, I think I can get by without a chaperone just this once," she said. "I don't want to share this."

"Share what?"

She brushed past him, heading for one of the trunks. The casual touch left Marcus feeling even more awkward than before, but Jen didn't appear to notice. She tossed more clothing aside, then a couple of blankets, and finally emerged with a wooden crate the shape of a coffin, a couple of feet long. Words had been burned onto the outside, in such an elaborate script that Marcus couldn't read them, but he recognized the shape immediately.

"Where did you get that?" he said.

"It was a gift," she said, setting the little box reverently on the table. "From some of my friends at the Cobweb." She looked up at him. "Looking back on it now, I don't think they ever expected me to come back."

"And you haven't opened it yet?"

"Sort of silly, I know," she said. "If I really had been killed at one of the battles, I expect I would have regretted it. But somehow just sitting by myself didn't seem . . . I don't know." She shrugged. "Let me borrow your knife, would you?"

Marcus wordlessly drew his belt knife and handed it across. Jen pried up one of the thin wooden planks, which were nailed only loosely into place, and pulled the top of the box off. Inside, nestled in spun wool like a fresh egg, was a thick-bellied gla.s.s bottle that glistened amber all the way up to the wax seal at the neck. Another seal, pressed with a fanciful rendition of the charging-bull standard of Hamvelt, adorned the front.

"It always seemed vaguely unpatriotic to me," Jen said, lifting the bottle gently from its cradle. "I mean, we've got brandy in Vordan. Why does everyone love this Hamveltai stuff?"

"Because it's better," Marcus said fervently. "You've never had any?"

"I could never afford it. Clerking for the secret police doesn't pay as well as you might imagine."

Marcus smiled. Just the sight of the bottle sent him back in time, to his days at the War College. He and Adrecht had had-not friends, not really, but cronies, men they lived, studied, and drank with. Drank with most of all. He'd sometimes thought that the War College was really a thinly disguised royal subsidy to the local tavern industry. Adrecht had once obtained a half-empty bottle of Hamveltai brandy, through some unexplained but presumably nefarious method, and there had been just about enough for everyone to have a sniff. He'd never forgotten the taste, which compared to even the best of the local stuff like pure spring water to sewer sludge.

Jen worked the point of the knife delicately under the wax, split the seal up one side, and peeled it off the top of the bottle. She'd produced a couple of gla.s.ses from somewhere, and Marcus watched as she expertly tipped two fingers of the liquid amber into each. She handed him one, held up her own, and met his eyes.

"To Count Colonel Ja.n.u.s bet Vhalnich Mieran," she said. "G.o.d grant that he know what the h.e.l.l he's doing."

"G.o.d grant," Marcus said fervently. They both sipped. The bite on his tongue seemed to dissolve into smoke before it reached the back of his mouth. It was better even than he remembered. From the look in Jen's eyes, she was similarly enraptured. She put the gla.s.s on the table slowly, and stared at it as though she thought it might move.

"Saints and martyrs," she swore. "Now I am glad I didn't get killed in the battle."

"If only we had a bottle for every man in the regiment, they'd all come back alive," Marcus said.

Jen laughed. "If we had that much, we could probably buy the throne of Khandar."

"You'd be surprised. You remember those carts, the really heavy ones at the end of the train? The ones that were always getting stuck."

"Vaguely."

"Supposedly the prince packed them full of gold before he fled the city. All the treasures of the Exopterai Dynasty, or at least all the ones he could carry. Now he's probably got them tucked away safe in his dungeons again."

Not every treasure. These "Thousand Names" weren't in the prince's h.o.a.rd. But someone else must have had the same idea as Exopter did. His mood darkened. Whatever it is, it's clearly more important than a few sacks full of coin. If only he'd tell me, I might be able to come up with something.

Jen, sipping from her gla.s.s, watched his face. "Something wrong?"

Marcus shrugged and looked down. "Not really."

"No?" She leaned closer, until they were only inches apart. "You can tell me. I won't even put it in a report. I promise."

Her tone was still light, but there was an undercurrent of real concern. Marcus sighed.

"I was just wis.h.i.+ng the colonel would take me a bit more into his confidence. Then I might be able to say something when people ask me what happens next."

Jen nodded sympathetically. "It's only natural that they'd want to know, I suppose."

"Of course it is. It's not just the officers, either. Val and Mor are lifers; they're used to this sort of thing. But what about the recruits?" Marcus shook his head. "Most of us Old Colonials got sent to Khandar because we'd p.i.s.sed off the wrong person, but the recruits just signed up on the wrong day and drew the short straw. How long are they going to stay here? Until we catch the Divine Hand and the Steel Ghost? That could be years-or never."

"Have you asked him about it?"

"Asked who? The colonel?"

She nodded and raised the bottle toward him. He hesitated, then held up his gla.s.s, and she poured a generous portion for both of them.

"I've never had the chance," Marcus said. "I barely see him anymore."

"Why not?"

Marcus shrugged. "He spends his time in his room, or in with the prince."

"Has he ordered you to stay away?"

"No," Marcus said, uncomfortably. "But-"

He suddenly wanted to tell Jen about the underground room. The mysterious Names, so important that they warranted a royal command. She might know what Ja.n.u.s had meant. She might be able to help- Don't be a fool, something whispered at the back of his mind. She's Concordat. They're killers, spiders, eyes and ears and knives in the dark. She works for the Last Duke, not for the king, and certainly not for the colonel. Tell her anything and G.o.d alone knows what she'll do with it. But looking at her, her head tipped as she studied the glistening brandy through a thin fall of brown hair, he found it hard to picture her in the company of the sinister figures in leather greatcoats that haunted the sets of bad dramas.

He raised his gla.s.s abruptly. "To Adrecht."

"Captain Roston, you mean?" she asked.

"He got me my first sniff of this stuff, way back at the dawn of time."

Jen paused. "Is he still . . ."

"He stopped a saber for me at Weltae. It didn't look awful at the time, but it went bad on him. The cutters took his arm off last night. As of this morning, he was looking a little better, but . . ." Marcus closed one hand into a fist and stared at it.

Jen nodded and raised her gla.s.s. "To Adrecht, then."

They drank. After a moment's respectful silence, Jen said, "I wanted to ask you about him, after the battle on the road, but . . ."

"But?"

"I figured you'd a.s.sume I was fis.h.i.+ng for the Ministry and clam up."

"Ah. You might have been right."

"Do you mind if I ask now? I swear it isn't for . . . official purposes. I'm just curious."

Marcus looked at her for a long moment, then shrugged. "Go ahead."

"When the colonel wanted to arrest him, you threatened to resign." It wasn't a question. Marcus wondered if Ja.n.u.s had told her, or if camp rumor knew everything by now.

"I did," he said.

"Why? The colonel could have had you shot."

"He's my friend," Marcus said. "We were at the College together."

"That was a h.e.l.l of a thing to do for a friend."

Marcus paused, staring into his empty gla.s.s. What the h.e.l.l? he thought. Even if she does put this in her report, I can't see how it would matter. He held out the tumbler, and Jen silently refilled it.

"He saved my life," Marcus said, after a few moments' contemplation.

"Ah. In a battle somewhere?"

Marcus shook his head. "Long before that. You've read my file, I suppose?"

"On the way over."

"How much detail does it go into?"

She shrugged. "Not much. Even the Ministry can't keep track of everything about everyone. It says you're an orphan, top quarter of your cla.s.s at the College, requested a.s.signment to Khandar."

"An orphan." Marcus turned the gla.s.s on the tabletop, watching the colored light refracted through the liquor. "I suppose I am."

Jen said nothing, sensing that she'd stumbled into dangerous territory. Marcus took a deep breath.

"When I was seventeen," he said, "about a year after I left for my lieutenant's course at the College, there was a fire at home. It had been a dry summer, apparently, and something touched off dry gra.s.s on the lawn. It spread to the house before anyone noticed. The whole place burned. Mother was always telling Father it was a rickety old firetrap, but he said it was historic and it would be a crime to renovate." He tapped the brandy gla.s.s and watched the patterns of light ripple. "They were both killed. My sister, Ellie-she was four. Most of the servants, too, people I'd grown up with."

Jen touched his arm, very lightly. "G.o.d. I'm so sorry."

He nodded. "Adrecht was with me when I got the news. I . . . didn't take it well. I started sneaking out, spending a lot of time in the foreigners' bars, drinking too much, starting fights. I didn't even realize he was keeping track of me, but one night he cornered me in a back garden by one of the pa.s.sages we used to get past the sentries. He handed me a pistol, and he said . . ."

Marcus smiled slightly, remembering. "He told me that if I wanted to kill myself, I should do it here and now, because the way I was trying was taking too long and causing everyone a lot of trouble. I was furious with him, told him there was no way he could understand, but he kept at me, asked me if I was too scared. Eventually I put the pistol to my head, just to show him. I don't remember if I meant to pull the trigger or if it was just my hands shaking. But I still remember the little click as the hammer came down.

"It wasn't loaded, of course. When my heart started up again, I realized Adrecht was right." Marcus picked up the gla.s.s in front of him and drained it. "I went back to cla.s.s, did well, got my silver stripe. After my tour as lieutenant, Adrecht told me he was going for captain, so I did, too. Then he got himself sent to Khandar, and I told him I would come along. He tried to talk me out of it, but I said, *What the h.e.l.l is there for me here?'" He set the gla.s.s down with a decisive click. "And here we are."

There was a long silence. Jen took her own gla.s.s, refilled it, and held it up.

"To Adrecht," she said.

WINTER.

Winter laid her hands flat in front of her and took a deep breath. "All right. We need to talk."

"I know," Bobby said, almost inaudibly. She seemed drawn in on herself, shoulders hunched, staring at the lamp in the center of the table. "I think . . ."

There was a long pause. Then Bobby looked up, and Winter was surprised to see that there were tears in her eyes.

"I think I'm going mad," she finished, all in a rush.

The girl's face was drawn and haggard, and bags under her eyes hinted that she hadn't been sleeping much. Feor sat beside her, resting her splinted arm on a stack of cus.h.i.+ons.

They were in the upper room of a Khandarai tavern, the one breed of business that had weathered both the Redemption and the Vordanai reconquest with the equanimity of c.o.c.kroaches. This one was typical, furnished with only a few threadbare pillows and a low wooden table, but Winter wanted privacy more than comfort. She'd tipped the hostess not to let anyone else up to the tiny second story.

Winter ventured a cautious smile. "Why do you say that?"

"Something happened to me in the battle," Bobby said.

"Getting shot, you mean?"

"I thought so. It certainly felt like it at the time." Bobby shook her head miserably. "I remember thinking, this is it. I'd always wondered what it would feel like, and it didn't seem so bad. Like someone had kicked me. I fell on my a.s.s and watched the rest of you march away, and I tried to get back up to follow you, and then it hurt." Her lips quivered. "It hurt like . . . I don't even know how to say it. So I lay back down and thought, *Oh, okay, I guess I'm dead, then.' And I closed my eyes, and-"

She broke off as the hostess entered carrying a tray with three clay mugs, each half the size of a man's head. Winter had to use both hands to lift her drink. Khandarai beer was thick and dark, and bitter enough to take the uninitiated by surprise. It wasn't her favorite, but she'd gotten used to it. Both Bobby and Feor stared into their mugs as though they weren't sure what to do with them, and Winter took a swallow to provide an example. Neither followed suit, and she gave an inward sigh.

"I don't remember very much after that," Bobby said. "Bits and pieces. I kept waking up and wondering if I was dead yet, and then I'd open my eyes and see the smoke still drifting up and think, *No, not yet,' and then close them again. Once I remember the pain getting worse, so much worse, and I thought that had to be the end. Only I woke up afterward, and I felt . . . okay. Good, even."

Winter, who was watching for it, saw the corporal's hand stray to her side, where the wound had been.