Vengeance

him, every mouth gaping.

‘Then you hacked that beautiful young woman’s head open.’ He choked. ‘I couldn’t move. I heard a child cry … and then … then you said to Father … I still can’t believe you said it — Find the brat and finish it.’

‘At first I thought you meant me,’ Rix whispered. ‘But Father didn’t cut the little girl’s throat because he couldn’t find her. She didn’t come out until you left me behind with the body.’

‘Lies, lies and more lies,’ mumbled Lady Ricinus through her gag.

‘And after I came up, out of my wits with horror, you gave me a potion. Why?’

‘To make you forget until you came of age,’ said Lord Ricinus, lurching across the stage with tears flooding from his sunken eyes.

‘I was delirious for weeks,’ said Rix, ‘and when I recovered, my memories were gone. But the horror never goes away.’

‘How could any mother do such a thing to her son?’ said Tali. ‘How could any father allow it?’

Lady Ricinus was coldly blank; she would never admit anything. Then the brazier flared as high as the ceiling. Lord Ricinus was holding his second bottle of brandy upside-down over it, the golden fluid feeding the flames. He dropped the empty bottle and looked sideways at Rix.

‘Every word my son says is true. The previous Lady Ricinus, my mother, did the same to me when I was a boy.’

Lady Ricinus tore free, wrenched off the gag and threw herself at him, clawing at his face. ‘He lies!’ she screeched. ‘He did it, not me — ’

The guards dragged her off, bound and gagged her, thoroughly this time.

Her nails had scored bloody marks the length of Lord Ricinus’s ravaged face, but he stood up straight for the first time in years.

‘I was eleven when my parents made me complicit in the killing of a different Pale. They gave me a potion of forgetting until I came of age, then blackmailed me into taking over the family business when my father died. But when it came time to take the next pearl, Tali’s mother’s pearl, I couldn’t do it. Unfortunately, my mother had chosen the perfect wife for me. Lady Ricinus threatened to destroy me and I was too weak to resist. She led and, like a craven dog, I followed. Do you wonder that I drink? It’s the only way I can forget.’

Lord Ricinus looked up at the justiciar. ‘My lady and I are guilty of every crime you accuse us of. And more. She murdered poor old Luzia, and I plotted with her to kill the chancellor.’

On this confession, the brutal years fell from him; for a moment, Lord Ricinus looked noble.

‘I know,’ said the chancellor. ‘Your son informed on her.’

Lord Ricinus stiffened. Lady Ricinus squealed and tried to chew through her gag. The nobles muttered to one another, then studied Rix as though he was muck to be scraped off a boot.

‘Who bought the pearls?’ said the chancellor.

‘I never met the fellow,’ said Lord Ricinus, ‘but his name is Deroe — a minor magian. He must be ancient by now.’

‘Deroe?’ said the chancellor to his chief magian.

‘There was such a magian, Lord, though not of any account. I thought he’d died half a century ago.’

‘What does he want with these pearls?’

‘I can’t imagine.’

‘Find him,’ the chancellor said to the high constable, ‘and get the pearls. They could turn the war our way.’ He rubbed his hands together. ‘This has been a good night.’ He eyed the Ricinuses, mother, father and son with the same contempt, then called the justiciar and the high constable into a huddle.

Tali was making urgent signs to Rix. ‘What is it?’ he said under his breath, putting his body between her and the others so they could not hear.

‘Remember when I first came here, and someone was hunting me with a triple call, Di-DA- doh?Di-DA- doh?’ she murmured.

He nodded. ‘It must have been Deroe.’

‘And he hasn’t given up.’

The chancellor’s little group broke up and the justiciar went to the front of the stage.

‘Lord and Lady Ricinus have been proven guilty of treason in a time of war. Lord Ricinus has confessed to other dishonourable crimes committed at his wife’s behest. They will be hanged from the front gates of Palace Ricinus at dawn — ’

Lady Ricinus chewed through her gag and spat it out. ‘House Ricinus is First Circle. I demand a proper trial where my lawyers can examine — ’

The chancellor’s smile oozed such malice that she broke off, trembling.

He picked up the two thousand-year-old parchment, tore it in half and tossed it onto the brazier. As the sheaf of documents followed it and burst into flame, Lady Ricinus let out a ragged screech.

‘How can your house be First Circle when there’s no evidence?’ he said softly. ‘No evidence of any nobility whatsoever. You will die common traitors’ deaths and your corpses will hang from the palace gates until they rot to pieces.’

Lady Ricinus’s nightmare had come true. Not the public execution, but the public humiliation, and the undoing of her life’s scheming at the moment it had come to fruition. The chancellor’s eyes were ablaze. How he revelled in his vengeance.

‘What about my son?’ she said.

‘He is under age. And by switching that painting with the portrait — ’

‘I didn’t switch it!’ cried Rix, but no one believed him, least of all his own mother. She would go to her death believing that her son had betrayed her. And he had, though not this way.

‘By switching the portraits,’ the chancellor repeated, ‘he brought this filthy matter to light. Rixium survives — assuming he can live with himself. All assets in Lord and Lady Ricinus’s possession are forfeited. And it does not end there.

‘House Ricinus has grown fat on this evil trade for generations. Under law, the whole house stands condemned. Take the heads of all its departments,’ he said to the high constable. ‘They will hang beside their lord and lady, since they must have known evil was at work here, yet stood idly by.’

Rix sprang up. ‘That’s not justice. How could the chief ostler know of such matters, or the head gardener?’

‘Justice lies in the majesty of the law, and the law says all the heads must die with their lord and lady. Let it be done. Seal the palace doors. The remainder of the household will attend the hangings and everyone in this hall will bear witness.

‘The new Lord Ricinus may keep this palace, and such moneys that are his own by right, if they are untainted. The staff will be dispersed and may never return. This Honouring is ended.’

Lord and Lady Ricinus were stripped of their clothes and jewellery, and thrown to the floor. Ropes were bound around their ankles and they were dragged away.

The guests followed, falling over themselves to escape from so tainted a household, but the doors had already been locked.

Tali and Tobry came up but Rix waved them away. ‘Leave me!’

He had been brought up to do his duty, to speak the truth and act with honour. To believe in his country, his house and his family.

But where did duty lie when his sovereign had condemned his family and destroyed his house? What price honour when, for generations, his house had acted so dishonourably? What value truth when his parents’ whole existence, and the truths he had been brought up to believe in, were based on lies?

Everything Rix had believed in was tainted beyond redemption. He had loved House Ricinus and honoured his parents. Now he had destroyed them, and many others, guilty and innocent alike.

And for what?