The files made it clear that both Fox and Farfalla had nearly been indicted on charges of high treason. However, three potential witnesses against them had committed suicide rather than submit to torture. The fact that Fox and Farfalla could command such loyalty made them very dangerous people indeed…
CHAPTER SIX
Name: Thodric Jarl. Birthplace: the islands of Rovac.
Description: world-weary man of 45, brusque in speech and manner; grey eyes, hair and bulky beard; always clad in battle-leathers; infallibly armed. Status: a wanted criminal in Chi'ash-lan; a general on the Reserve List of the Imperial Army of the Witchlord Onosh Gulkan, lord of Saf rak; blood-sworn enemy of the better part of a hundred men; a civil servant in the pay of two hostile states.
Career: soldiered in places as far afield as the snows of the Cold West and Tameran's horselands. After many vicissitudes became combat instructor to the hostage Sarazin in Voice. This sinecure ended when the Rice Empire's ruler sent him north to spy in Selzirk, where he got a real job of work as Master of Combat for the Watch.
Shortly after Jarl started his new job, he was approached by one of the Watch, Qid by name. As Jarl had learnt as yet but little Churl, they conversed in Galish. Qid began by noting that Sean Sarazin was ill, but would join the army on recovery. You think he should do otherwise?' said Jarl.
'Let me speak frankly,' said Qid. 'Some of us in the Watch think the prince is meant for better things.'
The Galish Trading Tongue, a language fitted for commerce rather than courtly use, had no precise word for 'prince'. So the actual term Qid used was 'ral-gunth', literally 'power-born'.
Jarl, unversed in the intricacies of Selzirk's politics, knew but the bare outlines of the game of power and influence in which the principals were kingmaker, Regency, army, law courts, guilds and temples, the Watch, the Secret Service, the Diplomatic Corps and the treasury. But he knew enough to say:
'Ral-gunth? Such talk is unsound and unsafe. Sean Sarazin was not born to power but to service. His fate is to join the army like his brothers.'
'His brothers,' said Qid, 'might think their mother's son as worthy of service as any army. What say? Did they speak of power as all four rode together from Voice to Selzirk?'
They spoke of beer, brothels, hounds, horse, dice and cards,' said Jarl. You are bold, Qid, but a fool. There's no conspiracy to be made in Selzirk. Certainly not between Sean Sarazin and his brothers I' 'You cannot know that of a certainty,' said Qid.
'Have you not heard? Such a conspiracy is now a physical impossibility, for the army has dispersed the brothers.' 'Where to?' said Qid. 'I don't know and don't care,' said Jarl brusquely.
In fact, he had paid good gold to get the details for the latest coded despatch he had sent to Lord Regan with a southbound Galish kafila. Celadon had gone to Shin as a military attache, Peguero was posted to Kelebes to be aide-de-camp to the governor of that town and region, while Jarnel had been given the hopeless task of collecting taxes (unpaid for the last three hundred years) from anarchists dwelling in the marshlands of Tyte. 'Wherever they've gone,' said Qid, 'they'll be back.'
'But not for a while,' said Jarl. 'That gives all who think or talk treason time in which to come to their senses.'
With that, Jarl terminated the interview. What he wanted – or so he told himself – was a quiet life. More of the pasture time he had enjoyed for so long in Voice. Yet, when others of the Watch came to him in secret to say they would throw in their lot with Sarazin if he sought to rule in Selzirk, Jarl had to admit to himself that he was tempted.
Power! That would be his reward if he helped Sarazin win the throne. He had known power before. Had known victory, triumph, glory. However… while serving with the Rovac armies in the Cold West, Jarl had spent years in Chi'ash-lan, city of intrigues. There he had learnt habits of caution which now helped him frame his response to the conspirators:
'I am but a simple solider who is not paid to think. Sean Sarazin's fate is not in my keeping, since he is no longer my student. Whatever his future, I have no part in it. If you must conspire, then conspire with him direct.'
'His years are not those of discretion' was the answer. We dare not approach him direct. Hence we seek his answer to an invitation to power through one of years more mature.'
Well then' said Jarl, suddenly in the best of all possible humours, 'I believe the scholar Epelthin Elkin tutors young Sarazin still. So speak to him if you wish. But, as for me: I have forgotten this meeting already. If need be, I will deny its history, even in the teeth of torture.'
Thus rebuffed, some members of the Watch followed Jarl's advice, and sought to approach Sarazin by means of the good offices of Epelthin Elkin. But the old scholar came to no harm through the warrior's malice, since he was every bit as cunning and cautious as the Rovac warrior. Thinking the conspirators to be, in all likelihood, agents in the pay of the Regency, he dismissed them, saying:
'Sarazin is too young for me to know what he is made of, but I doubt that treason has been bred in his bones.'
That, then, was the state of the Great Game in Selzirk in the dying days of the year Alliance 4324.
Farfalla and Plovey alike watched Sean Sarazin, both fearing that he might be tempted to violence by ambition.
Qid and others of the Watch met often in secret, and, slowly, more and more members of Selzirk's law- enforcement agency were drawn into, conspiracy. The Brotherhood of the Watch – a secret society outlawed for over a hundred years, but flourishing still – discussed Sean Sarazin's potential in cities as far away as Androlmarphos and Kelebes.
Military intelligence, suspecting something untoward was afoot, tried (not for the first time) to infiltrate Watch and Brotherhood both.
The scholarly Epelthin Elkin sent long, detailed reports to Lord Regan on the economic strength of the Harvest Plains. Thodric Jarl, for his part, included a question in his next report:
'Does my lord intend Sean Sarazin to overthrow the ruling order in Selzirk? If so, what help does the south offer? Know this: if my lord commands it, I am ready.'
Finally, Midsummer's Day arrived: the start of the year Alliance 4325. As Sarazin, true to his religion, began the praise-prayers due to the sungod, some of the fiercer spirits in the Watch came to a decision. They would approach Sarazin on the morrow and speak to him. About power. Revolution. Empire. Qid, they decided, would be the man to make the approach.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Jaluba: courtesan born in Galtras Laven (capital of the Rice Empire); free citizen of that empire and resident of the city of Voice.
Description: a woman of sixteen who is much like the damsel fair of whom Ipijima says (to quote him in his native Slandolin): 'voluvolv lintori, la, irafram sulpent ersetina…'
Residence: the Velvet Glove (near the House of Bliss), Street of Incense, songlight side of Voice in the Rice Empire.
When Sarazin satisfied his nagging curiosity by seeking out his father, Fox proved to be a heavyset man as old as Thodric Jarl and bearded likewise, though his beard was not grey but tawny. He was distant, reserved and cautious, preferring to listen rather than speak. Finally Sarazin asked a frank question: 'Farfalla says you sought power in Selzirk. Is that true?'
'I sought power through her, yes,' said Fox. We planned to end slavery in the Harvest Plains.'
Sarazin, thinking this was a joke, laughed heartily. A natural reaction – for the notion was, of course, absurd.
'Oh yes, you can laugh,' said Fox, misunderstanding the cause of Sarazin's mirth. We were fools in the thrall
