Stephano bowed. “I will take my leave, then, Madame. I will be in touch. Who do I see about the money?”
The countess extended her hand for him to kiss.
“My secretary, Emil,” she said, adding, with a hint of a smile, “The young man you insulted.”
While Stephano was back in the antechamber, forced to endure Emil’s sneers while waiting for his mother’s money, one of the men he and the countess had been discussing was also being forced to wait. Only this man was waiting to clear customs, not waiting for an insufferable secretary.
For once, the countess’ spies were wrong. Dubois, the bishop’s “creature,” as the countess had termed him, was not in Freya attending the royal court. His ship had docked at the Rosian port at about the same time the wyvern-drawn carriage containing Stephano and Rodrigo had flown over the dockyards. If Stephano had looked down and Dubois had looked up, the two men would have seen each other.
Seeing Dubois would not have done Stephano any good, for he did not know the man. They had never met. Dubois knew Stephano, however. Dubois made it his business to know everyone who had anything to do with the politics of any of the royal courts.
Once he was through customs, Dubois-known by everyone simply as Dubois-did not waste time. He met with several men who were waiting on the dock for him. He heard their reports and gave them instructions. These meetings with agents concluded, he hastened to a nearby inn where he always kept a horse in readiness, mounted, and rode swiftly through the crowded streets, paying no heed to the curses of those he nearly ran down.
Upon reaching the vicinity of the Bishop’s Palace, Dubois left the horse at the stables of another inn in which he had taken up lodgings, then walked the rest of the way. He did not enter by the main gate. Instead, he went to a small gate located in the wall directly behind the bishop’s private residence. The gate was hidden in some shrubbery, and Dubois had the only key.
The gate led into a small walled-off terrace, still filled with last autumn’s dead leaves, located at the rear of the house. A door with a lock to which Dubois also had the key opened into a long, narrow hallway.
The hall was dark, but Dubois had walked it many times and did not need a light to find his way. At the end of the hall was another door with yet another lock. He opened this door with yet another key and entered a small closet, big enough for him and a single chair.
Dubois walked over to the wall and pressed his ear to it. He could hear voices: the deep, resonant voice of the grand bishop and other voices he did not recognize. He could hear the bishop quite clearly for his chair was near the closet door, which was concealed by a thick, velvet curtain hanging behind the bishop’s chair. The other voices were agitated, less distinct, but Dubois was a master at eavesdropping.
The Abbey of Saint Agnes had been attacked during the night. Many of the one hundred nuns living there had been slaughtered, the abbey burned.
Dubois was shocked at the terrible news and was surprised he had not heard of the attack from his agents, but then he reminded himself that he had only just landed. A devout man, Dubois said a prayer for the dead. He took a seat on the chair and waited with some impatience for the visitors to leave.
In his mid-forties, Dubois was hard to describe. Plain and ordinary to look at, Dubois fostered the appearance of being plain and ordinary. His dress and demeanor were that of a lowly clerk (and a poorly paid lowly clerk at that). What lifted Dubois out of the ordinary was his extraordinary mind. He had only to look at a face and he would remember that person for the rest of his life. He had merely to peruse a document once and he could later copy it word for word, comma for comma. He could repeat a conversation verbatim, though it might have lasted hours. These amazing talents had been noticed many years ago when he was a young man by his parish priest, who had brought Dubois to the attention of the grand bishop.
Ferdinand Montagne was grand bishop of a church that had been struggling with various problems for these past twenty years. Once a power in the world, as the world’s only true religion, the Church of the Breath of Rosia had seen that power wane. The Church of the Breath of Freya had split off and begun calling itself the Church of the Reformation. Its ministers preached that the Church of the Breath of Rosia was rife with corruption, had lost its way, and should no longer be responsible for the salvation of men’s souls.
As if this were not trouble enough, King Alaric, who had once been a devoted follower of church doctrine and friend to the bishop (who had sacrificed a great deal for His Majesty), had started to rebel, to go off on his own. Now he was looking for a reason to end the Church’s control over the magic and take it (and the revenue it provided) for the Crown.
Such a reason existed in the form of a terrible secret. The bishop possessed certain knowledge about the Church, about the Breath of God, about the magic-“the quiet whispers of his words” that was so dreadful, so awful, that should the king find out, he would have the excuse he needed.
Beset by enemies without, wrestling with danger within, the bishop had needed help. He needed to know what his enemies in Freya were thinking, plotting. He needed to know what the King of Rosia was plotting, if not necessarily thinking. His Majesty left his thinking to the Countess de Marjolaine.
The grand bishop required spies. He had a few, but they were not nearly of the caliber of the spies in the employ of the Countess de Marjolaine. Montagne had been impressed with Dubois and had given him one or two small jobs, which Dubois had handled with skill. The grand bishop had provided him with funds to set up an intelligence network. Dubois had handled the task with such success that for the last few years, the bishop had been able to breathe freer and sleep somewhat more soundly at night.
The visitors departed. Dubois heard the door close. He waited another moment to make certain the bishop was alone. The only sounds were the rustle of the bishop’s cassock and the creaking of the chair as he sat down; Montagne was a large man. Over six feet tall, he was massively built. At sixty years old, he was in excellent physical condition, looking more like a wrestler than a clergyman. He wore his gray hair short, his whitish-gray beard and mustache neatly trimmed.
Ferdinand Montagne was ambitious, political, and a true and devoted believer in God-a dangerous combination. He believed that his voice was God’s voice, his will was God’s will, and that everything the bishop did or ordered to be done was for God’s glory.
Dubois silently opened the door of the closet, silently drew aside the folds of the heavy curtain, and silently glided out.
“Good afternoon, Your Grace,” said Dubois in his deferential clerk’s voice.
Grand Bishop Montagne gave a great gasp and a start that caused his pointed, gold-decorated miter to slip from his head and fall to the floor. The bishop twisted around in his chair and fixed his man with a baleful look.
“By all the Saints, Dubois, some day you are going to sneak up on me like that and cause my heart to stop beating. Damn it, you could at least cough or bump into something.”
Dubois smiled slightly as he bent to pick up the miter, brush off any dust, and hand it back to the bishop. Montagne motioned Dubois to set the miter on the desk, then directed him with an irritated gesture to take a seat.
Dubois did not immediately sit down. “I might suggest it would be well, Your Grace, if you were to send the monsignor, your secretary, and his assistants on an errand.”
“And what would that errand be, Dubois?”
“I need to know who has been meeting with the Countess de Marjolaine during the past few days. I need the list of visitors to date, including all her meetings scheduled for today.”
The bishop’s face stiffened, as always when the countess’ name was mentioned. He rose to his feet, his blue, gold-trimmed cassock swishing about his ankles, and went out to speak to the secretary.
Dubois looked about the prelate’s study, taking note of any changes that had been made in his absence. The room was lit by narrow windows, two stories high. Each window was set with beveled, leaded glass. The interior walls were lined with bookcases and rich paneling carved of cherry inlaid with rosewood and precious metals. Two andirons, each taking the form of an angel with sword raised and feet on the heads of writhing demons, stood before the gold-veined, white marble fireplace.
Seeing nothing of interest, Dubois flipped through the papers on the bishop’s desk, his retentive memory absorbing their contents. He resumed his seat as the bishop came back into the room, closing the door behind him and turning the key in the lock.
“I assume you were eavesdropping? You heard the news about the abbey?” the bishop asked grimly.
“I could not help but overhear, Your Grace,” said Dubois. “I cannot imagine who would perpetrate such an outrage.”
