'You need more bad news? Or more defiance?'
'Never mind. How much longer will this take?'
'This being?'
'Castreresone.'
'That's up to them. Isn't it? If you're determined to limit casualties and damage.' The staff insisted that the White City could be taken whenever the Captain-General ordered it. But thousands would die and the city itself might be destroyed.
'I'm not in a hurry. Yet.'
'You could offer terms. Sublime isn't here.'
'Still no respect for our master?'
'Not in our lifetime.'
'Don't be too public about it. Society types are everywhere. Popping up faster than these Connectens can murder them.'
'I have trouble remembering that the rest of the world runs different than our little slice here.'
'Don't. You have a family. Where's Bechter? I haven't seen him for days.' Bechter was always underfoot when that was inconvenient.
'Making the rounds of the siege works. He has experience from the Holy Lands.'
'Have you reeruited any solid sources? Anywhere?'
Consent shook his head. Looked vaguely defeated. 'The Devedian and Dainshau communities won't talk. They're getting out. Going to Terliaga, Platadura, anywhere where the Society won't be able to follow.'
Hecht was baffled. Peter of Navaya, Lion of the Chaldarean Reconquest, openly accepted Unbelievers into his dependencies. And insisted that they be treated well.
Consent said, 'Peter saw what you accomplished in Calzir.'
'If so, he saw in it an affirmation of policies he had in place. He had a lot of Pramans with him in the Calziran Crusade. Now he's recruiting in Shippen and Calzir. And getting a good turnout.' He heard that two thousand Pramans from Shippen had been ferried to Artecipea to further Peter's ambitions there.
Hecht felt a little thrill of apprehension. Bone and the company were on that island.
'I see Bechter. You still want him?'
'Yes.'
Lifeguards orbiting him, Hecht moved a dozen yards, to gain a different perspective on the barbican protecting Castreresone's main gate, doing its job now as a mountain of rubble. Work gangs hauled the rubble off for use as ammunition.
Only the more ferocious of the expanding community of Society hangers-on dared complain about the Captain-General's efforts to reduce the White City. And they did. He tempered their fury by offering them weapons and the privilege of leading the assault wave. No takers so far.
'Captain-General, you wanted to see me?'
'Sergeant. Yes. I've been wondering. The man in brown. Seen him lately?'
'Not in weeks, sir. Is it important?'
'No. I just hadn't seen him either, myself.'
'Have you ever figured him out?'
'No. I do think I know who he is, now. Or was.'
'Was, sir?'
'He might be a ghost.' Or a minor ascendant. A notion Hecht was not ready to loose into the public domain.
Bechter frowned. That failed to conform to his Brotherhood vision of how the world should work.
'Yet another conflict between what we want to be true and what we have to suffer,' Hecht said. Those conflicts tormented everyone but the Patriarchal Society for the Suppression of Sacrilege and Heresy, these days. Faith had begun to creak under the strain.
The Society thought God was testing faith by dealing contradictory evidence.
Piper Hecht wondered why God-anybody's God- would bother. The God of the World ought not to be so petty.
Bechter said, 'Prosek is back.'
'Tell me.'
'He was just coming in when I heard you wanted me. I just had time to say hello. And make sure he didn't attract attention.'
'I thought he was dead.' There had been little communication with Plemenza. That little had not been optimistic. The falcons had been destroyed, their crews injured, and Prosek lost. The pass was open but the fate of the monster remained uncertain. It might be lying up somewhere, recovering.
Princess Helspeth's having opened the pass had generated a political storm inside the Grail Empire.
Hecht suffered troubled nights.
'I need to see him as soon as he's able.'
Gervase Saluda and the Principate from Aparion, with minimal courtesy, demanded an audience. After lurking in the background for weeks, acting as Collegium spies. Hecht expected an argument about access to Drago Prosek.
The Principates surprised him.
Saluda, never warm since he had assumed the Bruglioni seat in the Collegium, said, 'We've received a suggestion from Brothe that it may be time to be a little more aggressive toward Castreresone.'
Not subtle, Gervase Saluda, hinting that Sublime had grown impatient. 'Really? I think he'd let me know directly if he was. He hasn't been shy about that yet.'
Saluda observed, 'This siege can't go on forever.'
'Nor will it. In fact, I'm authorizing you to go up there and talk them into giving up. Right now.'
Both were startled. There had been no negotiations whatsoever, even sub rosa. 'Terms?'
'I trust you to be sensible.' He just wanted them gone. Bechter had Drago Prosek ready to report. Anyway, Hecht was sure that the White City did not yet despair enough to contemplate surrender.
Queen Isabeth remained poised just twenty miles away. And her brother had begun to stir behind her.
Gervase Saluda gave Hecht one long, penetrating look as he departed.
Hecht shrugged.
'Rough trip?' he asked Prosek.
'Yes, sir. Not attracting attention. Especially after I crossed the Dechear. We're not popular out there.'
'Where anyone cares. Sit. Be comfortable. Sergeant, bring the man whatever he wants. So. Tell the tale.'
Titus Consent entered as Bechter left. He made Prosek uncomfortable. But Prosek began after an encouraging gesture from his commander.
'Why didn't you go back to the others?'
'I didn't trust them. That Princess. She was probably straight. The ones around her… I figured they'd do what they did. Once we took care of their monster.'
'That being?'
'They locked everybody up. Gonna force them to explain firepowder and how the falcons work. And how to make them.'
'I see.' Hecht smiled. 'And you're the only one who could tell them anything.'
'Pretty much, sir. Those guys aren't ignorant. They know the theory-just not the practical knowledge.'
Typical of soldiers. Indifferent to why something worked, so long as it did when the arrows started flying.
Prosek continued. 'On the up side, sir, they'll get decent medical care. Which most of them needed. Both falcons committed suicide. I made sure the firepowder was used up.'
'The monster. The Instrumentality. What about it?'
'We didn't kill it. But I don't think it'll be a problem again. It can't be much more than what it was when it was still a man. And it's badly crippled. It could barely crawl.'
'Good. Good. I'll ask Principate Delari what it all means. Then we have to figure out how to make these
