Rossamund could almost sense resentment bubbling under this veneer of fine martial order as they gathered on the Grand Mead.
The weather shared the oppressive mood.There had been frost that morning after a clear, cold night. But as the sun climbed to its meridian, powerful winds blew from south of southeast, their gusts only partly foiled by Winstermill's ponderous walls. Clouds so thick they were almost black arrived on its threatening breath, and the tang of rain and lightning was heavy on the air.
Standing preeminent before the entire population of the manse, Podious Whympre, Master-of-Clerks and next in line of command after the Lamplighter-Marshal, looked out upon all those now under his sway, peacock-proud, and peacock-preened. Laudibus Pile, Witherscrawl and his genuflection of sycophants stood close behind.
Wooden screens had been pegged to the ground with guy ropes and stakes to spare Whympre and his tail any ruffling buffets of wind. His audience simply endured and, during the course of the pageant, many hats found wing in the gusts and crashed into the northern wall or sought the broad meadows of the Harrowmath.
'Our beloved Lamplighter-Marshal has been recalled to the Considine,' Whympre began with clerkly sobriety. 'The Emperor is concerned for the proper administration of his beloved highroad and seeks an accounting from our own faithful Marshal. A Most Honorable Imperial Secretary'-murmurs through all ranks-'arrived from High Vesting bearing the directive of the subcapital late yesterday evening with a sis edisserum marked by the Emperor's own Chief-of-Staff.' He took a breath, waiting for the troubled rumbling of the assembly to still. 'Therefore, our dear, dear Marshal was compelled to leave at first change of watch this morning and may well be gone for an extended time.'
Though the lighters and auxiliaries already knew the Lamplighter-Marshal had departed, there was nevertheless a small roar of dismay at this final confirmation. It was unheard of-powerfully discomfiting to all-and only with the severest reprimands was a pretense of order maintained.
'With his absence,' the Master-of-Clerks continued, 'need must fall to me to take the daily toil of our glorious manse in hand. I shall endeavor to lead in his stead, in a manner truly befitting an outpost of the most Serene and Mighty Emperor. In that capacity I shall be forced to assume the rank of Marshal-Subrogat…' He continued like this for a numbingly long stretch. His loyal aides did the same, extolling the Master-of-Clerks, inflating his virtues, sounding as if they were trying to convince those gathered of the clerk-master's fitness to lead. Within all this gabbling came the first significant announcement: the Master-of-Clerks was to allow vigil-day visits to Silvernook- beginning on that very day. Even as he said this, near a dozen lentums began to roll out from the yard, ready to take those interested in a day on the town. In their delight the wind of many lifted and they began to think their new executive officer a capital fellow after all. A happy mumbling stirred through the prentices, though Rossamund did not share their easily won enthusiasm.
'Button it shut, flabberers, or ye'll all be staying in yer cells for the day!' Grindrod growled huskily, and stillness was purposefully restored. For the entire pageant till now the lamplighter-sergeant had been glaring up at the clerk-master, mustachios bristling in disgust. 'What does he know of lighting?' Rossamund heard him mutter to Benedict.
The Master-of-Clerks mollified them all still further by adding that they could expect roasted mutton with thick gravy for mains and treacle crowdy for puddings, with rich bully-dicey to be served at middens for those left behind. Had it been allowed, all the other prentices and many lampsmen and pediteers and the clerks would have shouted for glee.
'The hearts of the crowd are found in their bellies,' Threnody muttered after they were marched back to the Cypress Walk and dismissed by their unusually subdued officers.
'Perhaps the change of command might be a turn for the good,' a prentice pondered a little too loudly.
'Cleave yer tongue to yer teeth, Gall!' Grindrod bawled, sending the loose-lipped prentice white with fright. 'Ye're as shatterbrained as yer nuncle the lictor! Pots-and-pans for ye tonight and the rest of the long week! The marshal-lighter is as fine a man and officer as anyone could ever hope to share a generation with! And if a single one of ye goes down to Silvernook today, ye'll have my mark as a baseborn runion fink not worthy of a lighter's fodicar!'
All the lantern-sticks were astounded at his outburst. None said another peep about the Marshal's departure-good or bad-for fear of another flaring of temper. Not one prentice took the day in Silvernook either, and if any were disappointed by this, he dared not show it.
Brooding, Rossamund sat on his cot in his cell.Threnody, having invited herself in, was perched on his bed chest, her back against the wall.
'Is it just me,' said Threnody, 'or have the Lamplighter-Marshal's troubles turned out rather nicely for our new — Marshal-Subrogat?'
'I suppose they have,' Rossamund agreed guardedly. 'It cannot be helped that the clerk-master is next in rank.' Mister Sebastipole does have a notion that someone might be seeking the Marshal's ruin. 'How long would it take a message to get from here to the Considine and back?' he asked.
'You would need a fortnight,' Threnody said huffily. 'Why?'
Rossamund scratched at his bandage. 'What has my head turning is Mister Sebastipole saying yesterday that someone in the subcapital must have already heard about the rever-man and was calling for an explanation. Barely a week has passed-'
'You already knew the Marshal was leaving on a sis edisserum and you did not say?'
'It was not my information to tell!' Rossamund returned indignantly.
'Oh truly? Very convenient.' Threnody rolled her eyes. 'Will you always be this dim?'
'I cannot say,' Rossamund countered, an angry rush in his belly. 'Will you always be this rude!' His mouth spoke before his kinder thoughts could marshal themselves to intervene.
Threnody gaped.
'Oi, Rosey!' called Arabis down the steps of the cell row. 'I saw your old middens-chum blubbering on the Mead.'
Rossamund leaped off his cot and put his head out of the cell door. 'You saw what?'
'Aye, what's-his-name-the Numps or somewhat like it.' The older prentice shrugged. 'The daffy cove looked mighty put out by something.'
Numps! Blubbering on the Mead?
Leaving Threnody flabbergasted in his cell, Rossamund was up the steps, down the passage and out on to the Cypress Walk in a twinkling. Before he was clear of the Walk, he could hear a distant, agonized wailing coming from the Grand Mead, and very quickly he recognized it as coming from the throat of Numps. There were rapid steps behind: Threnody was following.
Clear of the manse, he saw-at the farther end of the Grand Mead on the edge of the gravel drive-Numps, hampered between two hefty troubardiers of the Master-of-Clerks' own foot-guards. The glimner was writhing and pulling against their restraint. Rossamund had never seen him so wild and so awfully animated.
Then he saw why.
Upon the gaunt beams of the Scaffold, the great dead tree that stood at the northern end of the manse, great tendrils of still verdant bloom were hanging upon the gaunt branches to dry and slowly die. As Rossamund well knew, glimbloom will not live long out of water, becoming parched and yellow, its tiny leaves finally rotting to slime. Between the ladders and the many, many barrows holding the bloom stood the Master-of-Clerks directing an industrious band of peoneers with remonstrative gusto. Beside him a man Rossamund recognized as the portly works-general stood, shamefaced, determinedly avoiding the sight of the grief-racked glimner while Witherscrawl wrote Phoebe-knows-what in a portable ledger.
The old dead tree was already draped with such a vast amount of bloom that it looked to have wondrously returned to life; and the stuff was so vigorous-green and thick it could have come from only one place: Numps' secluded undercroft.
A shout of anguish escaped Rossamund before he even knew to stop it. He ran the length of the gravel drive, heedless of any shouts or reprimands, groaning, '… This is all my fault, this is all my fault…'
Doctor Crispus ran into the narrow scope of Rossamund's panicked vision, striding fast on his long, stiltlike legs, crying something to the troubardiers that Rossamund could not understand in his rush.With a great waving of
