Ritva rose and bowed a salute, hand to heart, as she would have done for her own superiors.
“So also says the Lady of the Rangers, and the other leaders of our people, my kinsfolk,” she said. “And my brother Rudi… Artos. .. as well. Are you sure you were never a soldier, Reverend Mother?”
She smiled and shook her head. “Only a foot soldier of Christ, my child. But in this office I have had to make decisions in plenty. Your aunt is a wise lady, if she grasps that, because it is not an easy thing to do. And your High King doubly so, because he is still a young man.”
A slight wince. “It is no easier when lives ride on it.”
Ritva listed the aid that Operation Luthien would need. The Reverend Mother sighed, pushed herself back slightly from the desk, and opened a drawer that proved to hold a typewriter.
“What you need, then, is primarily information and recommendations,” she said, as she inserted a sheet of paper in the roll. “Between us, St. Hilda’s and Rancher Woburn will be able to furnish those.”
Then she smiled; it made her face much younger for a moment, reminding Ritva of Mary’s-which was to say, herself-when they were thinking up some prank.
“In fact, we may be able to furnish unexpected help from above, so to say.”
Ritva nodded. I wish I could be as carefree about this as Mary and I used to be on missions, she thought. But this time it’s not just my life. It’s the life of my home… not just the Dunedain, either. All of Montival.
CHAPTER FIVE
CASTLE ODELL, COUNTY OF ODELL (FORMERLY NORTHERN OREGON) PORTLAND PROTECTIVE ASSOCIATION HIGH KINGDOM OF MONTIVAL (FORMERLY WESTERN NORTH AMERICA) JULY 31, CHANGE YEAR 25/2023 AD
C astle Odell was small compared to the great fortress-palace of Todenangst, but substantial compared to anything else built in the PPA’s territories since the Change; towers and curtain-walls and rearing central keep beneath bright banners. Conrad Renfrew had started it in the second Change Year, right after he was granted the fief to hold as tenant-in-chief, direct vassal of the Crown.
After he’d conquered it for the Association, Sandra Arminger thought.
The carriage of the Lady Regent of the PPA rolled past the tents of the levy’s encampment and men gaped or gathered to cheer as the black-and-gold coach and its escort of men-at-arms and mounted crossbowmen of the Protector’s Guard swept by. More bowed and then waved and called greetings in the town.
Though considering who was in charge before, it’s no wonder he’s always been popular here. Not something that you could say about all our new lords. Mind you, Lady Valentinne had a good deal to do with it, starting with being native to the place. Tina mellowed him, which caused problems with Norman if not with me. He was still angry about the accident and the scars in those days, and she helped him deal with that.
His engineers had used Lenz Butte as the base, rising nearly two hundred feet over the rolling surface of the valley; the little red-tiled town of Odell clung to its base to the east by the road and railway, dwarfed by the castle and the newly completed Cypriot-Gothic cathedral. The slopes below the white-stuccoed ferroconcrete ramparts were terraced gardens. Just now they were a blaze of roses, the scent full and sweet in the warm drowsy summer air through the open windows of the carriage. The clatter of her escorts’ hooves came through as well, then the hollow drumming on the drawbridge; trumpets rang from the gatehouse, and they passed into its gloom beneath the arched ceiling that held the murder-holes and portcullis and out into light once more.
“This is a bit private, Jehane,” she said to her amanuensis as the driver pulled up with a whoa. “It’ll be easier to tell the Lord High Chancellor to act his age and stop being an idiot if it’s all in the family. Keep going on the precis of those reports.”
“Yes, my lady. The Castellan here is currently Lord Ramon Gomez Gonzalez, Baron de Mosier, his family are vassals to House Renfrew. Arms, Gules, a castle of three towers argent, in base a key fessways the ward to the sinister or. His wife is Lady Gussalen of House O’Brian, and they just had their first boy. Named Bertrand. He’s taking the field with the rest of the arriere-ban, and Lord Akers, Baron de Parkdale succeeds him as Castellan then.”
“Lord Akers the elder?”
“Yes, Sir Buzz is down on the southern border with the forces of the Three Tribes and his own menie. They’re screening against the enemy concentrated in the Bend area.”
“Thank you,” Sandra said warmly.
She had most of the same facts at her fingertips, but it was nice to see that Lady Jehane had made such progress. She smiled again, a closed secret curve of her lips.
“My lady?”
“Just remembering how much raiding there was back and forth across that area during the Protector’s War. Castle Parkdale was built to guard against the Three Tribes. Time, politics and war make strange bedfellows.”
A varlet leapt down from behind the carriage to open the door and fold down the step. Sandra gathered the pearl-gray silk skirts of her cote-hardie and let Tiphaine d’Ath hand her and Jehane down. The courtyard was bright, and she blinked for a moment amid the stamp and clatter of destriers and coursers and rouncys, the rattle and gleam of armor. The interior walls all glowed with color as well, climbing roses twined through light lath trellises, until they seemed to flame and shimmer in green and crimson and white and pale pink. There was another clank and thump as the soldiers present all brought their right fists to their chests and bowed, which was protocol for fighting-men under arms in a public venue.
The roses are Tina’s work, Sandra thought. And she does it very well. She hasn’t much head for politics but she’s not stupid at all.
“Baron de Mosier,” she said to the dark-faced nobleman who saluted Tiphaine and bowed Sandra through into the gate of the keep.
He had a neatly trimmed black mustache and goatee. Which makes him look like Evil Spock from the Mirror Universe. And nobody here but Conrad and possibly Tina would have the least idea of what I was talking about if I said that.
“How pleasant to see you again,” she went on. “I trust that Lady Gussalen is well, and young Lord Bertrand?”
“She is very well, God be praised, and thanks be to my patron St. James, to whom I have lit many candles,” the man said, trying to hide his flush of pleasure as he crossed himself. “My son is also well, my lady Regent.”
“The Grand Constable and I wish to see my lord Count Renfrew. We’re expected, you needn’t have us announced.”
“He and the Countess and their children are in the solar, my lady Regent,” the baron said, looking a little dubious at the informality but obedient nonetheless. “We were expecting them down momentarily. This way-”
“I’m sure you’re extremely busy with getting the garrison ready to march, Lord Ramon,” she said with a smile.
“That is so, my lady,” he said as he took the hint.
“Though if you could show my lady-in-waiting Lady Jehane to the reception chamber?”
“I’ll see to it at once, my lady Regent. God give you good day.”
The escort from the Protector’s Guard fell back as well, when Tiphaine raised one pale brow at their commander.
“I think I can take care of the Lady Regent, Sir Tancred,” she said dryly at his hesitation.
The Baroness of d’Ath was like a slender silver statue in a full suit of plate, and her fingers rested on the pommel of her long sword. The grip had scales of dimpled black bone; they were cut with twelve small notches, and each had a tiny piece of silver wire hammered in for emphasis. Those represented only the noble Associates she’d killed in formal duels, of course. Mostly on Sandra’s clandestine orders; a few had just been people she thought needed to be dead.
“Certainly, my lady Grand Constable,” he said, saluting stiffly.
Though you can feel their paranoia burning, convinced that Cutter assassins with curved knives are lurking behind the tapestries, Sandra thought. Or possibly that the Lord High Chancellor and his family will strangle me and
