Vengeance

Lady Ricinus’s head shot around. She stared at her husband, her lips moving.

‘Shut your face, woman,’ growled Lord Ricinus.

‘Can you prove your identity, girl?’ said the justiciar.

‘The mark of my noble house is on me.’ Tali drew up her sleeve.

Those people close enough to see the slave mark gasped and drew away, scowling and muttering.

‘The symbol was burnt into my shoulder as a child with this, the family seal of House vi Torgrist.’ Tali held it up on its chain.

The justiciar, a tall, cadaverous woman with eyebrows like mouse skins, inspected the seal and nodded. ‘I recognise it.’

‘I can also recite the names of every one of my ancestors — ’

‘Not now,’ the justiciar said hastily. ‘Please continue, Lady vi Torgrist.’

At the acknowledgement, Tali’s back straightened and her feet almost left the floor. She wiped her eyes and went on.

‘We Pale are accused of betraying our country,’ Tali said in a ringing voice. ‘And willingly serving the enemy. That is a vicious lie!’

‘How dare you?’ cried a jowly, bejewelled woman from the crowd. ‘Chancellor, this cannot be tolerated.’

He waved her to silence, savagely.

‘My people were given up to the enemy as children,’ Tali said, her blue eyes burning into the jowled woman until she had to hang her head. ‘One hundred and forty-four of the noblest children in the land, given as hostages, and meant to be ransomed, but Hightspall never came. Why did Hightspall abandon its own children to the enemy?’

‘Important questions,’ said the justiciar, ‘but this is not the forum for them. Lord Ricinus, Lady Ricinus, you have been accused of a terrible crime. How do you plead?’

‘Not guilty,’ said Lady Ricinus. ‘And my lord pleads the same way.’

Rix looked around. Where was his father? At the back of the stage, where evidently he had secreted several flasks earlier. His head was tilted back and he was draining the dregs of a flask of brandy.

‘Lord Ricinus?’ said the justiciar. ‘How do you plead?’

Lord Ricinus turned to face him, drawing the bung from a second flask. ‘Pissed!’ he roared. ‘I plead pissed as a lord,’ and laughed like a hyena.

‘My son is insane,’ said Lady Ricinus with quiet venom. ‘He gets it from his father. And the evidence of a child witness is worthless. Children can be made to say anything, made to — ’

‘Made to do anything?’ said the justiciar.

‘The girl is a lying slut,’ cried Lady Ricinus.

‘Curb your viper’s tongue,’ said the justiciar, then turned to the gathering. ‘Can we rely on the evidence of a child who was only eight at the time, or on a picture painted by a man who admits he was blind drunk when he painted it?’

She turned to Tali. ‘Did you see the faces of the killers?’

‘Not clearly,’ said Tali. ‘They were masked.’

‘Masked?’ said the justiciar. ‘Then you have no evidence — ’

‘The woman stood on my mother as though she was rubbish! I heard her ribs break,’ Tali cried. ‘And Rix was there. I saw him.’

‘You saw Lord Rixium there? At the murder scene?’

‘He came out from behind the barrels after the killers went up the stairs. Rix was shaking and his clothes were covered in vomit. He went over to Mama — to my mother. He stared at the blood on his hands, then vomited all over his shoes. They had shiny buckles. He made a horrible moaning sound, like an animal in pain, and raced up the stairs.’

‘Lord Rixium?’ said the justiciar. ‘What do you remember of this?’

‘Nothing,’ said Rix.

‘And yet you painted it?’

‘Yes.’

‘This is a conspiracy,’ said Lady Ricinus. ‘She told him what to paint. They’re trying to cast me down and take my place.’

‘You confined Rix to his tower with guards on the door,’ said Tobry from the edge of the stage. ‘You searched his rooms three times, yet found no trace of her.’

‘Where is the cellar where the alleged murder took place?’ said the high constable.

‘I don’t know,’ said Rix. ‘I’ve no memory of ever having seen it.’

‘This story is a vicious fabrication,’ cried Lady Ricinus.

‘I know where the cellar should be,’ said Tali.

‘Where, Lady Tali?’ said the high constable, a pink-faced globe of a man no taller than her.

‘Below this palace. I smelled it the day I first entered Palace Ricinus, underground.’

‘You smelled it?’

‘I didn’t realise it at the time, though it made my hair stand up. Until I die, I’ll never forget the smell of the murder cellar.’

‘You say your mother was killed in this cellar, but how did she get there when no Pale can leave Cython?’

‘We were led there, underground, by a Cythonian traitor I called Tinyhead. Mama thought he was helping her to escape.’

‘An enemy traitor who, presumably, was paid by traitors to Hightspall,’ said the chancellor, eyeing Lord and Lady Ricinus malevolently.

There was a great stir at this. The palace’s master mapmaker was called and he listened to Tali’s description, marked the area on his maps, then shook his head. ‘I have mapped all the palace passages and know of no such cellar.’

‘That’s good enough for me,’ said the justiciar. ‘And therefore, without any corroborative evidence, I must dismiss — ’

‘It’s said that Axil Grandys frequented a deep chamber below his manor,’ said Hildy thoughtfully. ‘And carried out arcane experiments there. Indeed, that he was working in that chamber when he disappeared.’

The justiciar called for the palace historian.

‘There was such a chamber,’ she said, ‘though it is believed to have been a Cythonian temple, originally.’

‘What?’ cried the chancellor. ‘Why wasn’t it destroyed?’

‘Axil Grandys was the First Hero and the founder of Caulderon, and he ordered it kept. Previously, the Palace of the Kings of Cythe lay on this very spot, but Axil Grandys demolished it after their city was taken and built his own manor in the same place. No one knows why he kept the king’s temple.’

‘High Constable,’ said the justiciar, ‘take these maps and a dozen men with sledgehammers, and find this cellar. Chief Magian, go with them.’

They went out. Tobry came up to Rix, who slumped into a chair with his head in his hands. ‘Please tell me you didn’t switch the painting for the portrait.’

Even Rix’s best friend doubted him. For the first time in his life he was utterly alone.

‘Who else could have done it?’ he said, wanting to throw up. ‘But if I did, I have no memory of it.’

CHAPTER 93

After forty agonising minutes, the floor shook and a series of crashes rumbled up. Not long afterwards the high constable’s party returned and he conferred with the chancellor and the justiciar.

‘Speak,’ said the chancellor, who was warming his hands over the brazier.

‘We found a cellar six levels down,’ said the high constable. ‘It is exactly as Rixium has painted it.’