14. THE BODYGUARD
'Loose!'
The small catapult bucked, the arm — indeed not much bigger than a man's outstretched arm — flicked forward and thudded against the hide cushion on the weapon's tall cross-beam. The stone burred away through the air, arcing over the lower terrace and down towards the garden below. The projectile hit alongside one of DeWar's cities, embedding itself in the carefully raked soil and kicking up a big puff of red-brown dust that hung for a while in the air, slowly drifting off to the one side and settling gradually back to the ground.
'Oh, bad luck!'
'Very close!'
'Next time.'
'Very nearly, General Lattens,' DeWar said. He had been sitting on the balustrade, arms crossed, one leg dangling. He jumped off on to the black and white tiles of the balcony and squatted by his own miniature catapult. He pulled quickly and powerfully on the round wheel which ratcheted the creaking, groaning wooden arm back until it settled about three-quarters of the way towards the horizontal rear cross-member. The arm bowed fractionally with the strain of the twisted hide at its base trying to force it forward again.
Lattens, meanwhile, got up on to the same stone rail DeWar had been sitting on. His nurse held on tightly to the back of his jacket to prevent him from falling. Lattens raised his toy telescope to his eye to survey the damage done in the garden below.
'A little to the left, next time, my lad,' UrLeyn told his son. The Protector, his brother RuLeuin, Doctor BreDelle, BiLeth, Commander ZeSpiole and the concubine Perrund sat attended by various servants on an awninged platform raised to about the same height as the balustrade and overlooking the scene.
Lattens stamped his foot on the stonework. His nurse held him tighter.
Perrund, veiled in gauzy red, turned to the Protector. 'Sir, I'm sure the nurse holds him well enough, but it makes my bones ache seeing him up there. Would you humour one of your older ladies' timid foolishness by calling for a step-ladder? It would let him see over the rail without having to climb on to it.'
Foreign minister BiLeth frowned and made a tssking noise.
UrLeyn pursed his lips. 'Hmm. Good idea,' he said. He beckoned a servant.
The entire terrace of the garden two storeys below had been divided into two and modelled to resemble a landscape in miniature, with hills, mountains, forests, a large walled capital city, a dozen or so smaller cities, twice as many towns, many roads and bridges and three or four rivers flowing into a couple of small, about bath-sized lakes on each side and then on into a large body of water which represented an inland sea.
The sea was in the shape of two rough circles which just met in the middle, so that there was a short, narrow channel connecting the two great lakes. Various of each territory's towns and cities lay on the shores of the two smaller lakes, with even more on the coasts of the two lobes of the sea, though in each case one territory had many more settlements round one part of the sea than the other, DeWar's territory having the most round the lobe of water nearer to the balcony and the two catapults.
DeWar secured the triggering post on his catapult and carefully unhitched the winding mechanism, then selected a stone from the pile between the two model weapons and, once Lattens had climbed down from the balustrade, loaded the stone into the cup at the end of the machine's arm. He repositioned the catapult according to chalk marks on the black tiles, stood, eyes narrowed, to survey his target area, squatted to adjust the catapult's 'position once more, then took the stone out of the cup and reconnected the winding mechanism to let out a little of the strain before re-latching the triggering post.
'Oh, come on, DeWar!' Lattens said, jumping up and down and shaking his telescope. He was dressed as a noble general, and the servant who was tensioning and repositioning his catapult was in the uniform of a Ducal bombardier.
DeWar closed one eye and made a fearful grimace as he turned to the boy. 'Har,' he said, in a voice a rather unsubtle actor might employ when asked to impersonate a worthy rustic, «beggin» the young massur's pardin to be sure, sor, but I has got to be doin' me adjussmints, don't ye know, har!'
'Providence, the fellow's a fool indeed,' BiLeth muttered. However, UrLeyn laughed, and BiLeth found it in him to affect a smile.
Lattens squealed with delight at this nonsense and put his hands to his mouth, nearly sticking his telescope into his eye.
DeWar made a few final adjustments to his catapult, then, with a look round to make sure Lattens was well out of the way, said, 'Fire, me boys!' and flicked the triggering latch away.
The rock whistled into the blue sky. Lattens howled with excitement and ran to the balustrade. DeWar's rock landed almost in the centre of one of the smaller lakes in Lattens' territory. The boy shrieked.
'Oh no!'
DeWar had already landed a hefty projectile in the other small lake on Lattens' side, swamping all the towns and the single city on its shores. Lattens had hit one of DeWar's lakes too, but not the other. The rock sent up a great tall fountain of water. The waves from the impact rippled quickly out, heading for the shore. 'Aargh!' Lattens cried. The waves made landfall, causing the water first to retreat from the miniature beaches and ports and then rear up and wash against the flimsily made buildings of the lake-side towns, washing them all away.
'Oh, unlucky, young sir, unlucky,' Doctor BreDelle said, then in a low voice to UrLeyn added, 'Sir, I think the boy grows over-excited.'
'Fine shot, DeWar!' UrLeyn called, clapping. 'Oh, let him be excited, Doctor,' he said to BreDelle in a lower voice. 'He has spent long enough swaddled in his bed. It's good to see a bit of colour in his cheeks again.'
'As you wish, sir, but he is still not fully recovered.'
'Mr DeWar would make a fine bombardier,' Commander ZeSpiole said.
UrLeyn laughed. 'We could use him in Ladenscion.'
'We could dispatch him forthwith,' agreed BiLeth.
'Things go better there, don't they, brother?' RuLeuin said, letting a servant refill his glass. He glanced at BiLeth, who assumed a grave expression.
UrLeyn snorted. 'Better than when they were going badly,' he agreed. 'But still not well enough.' He looked to his brother, then back at his son, who was anxiously supervising the loading of his own catapult. 'The boy grows better. If that keeps up I may take it as my signal to assume command of the war myself.'
'At last!' RuLeuin said. 'Oh, I'm sure that would be the best thing, brother. You are our best general, still. The war in Ladenscion needs you. I hope I may accompany you there. May I? I have a fine company of cavalry now. You must come and see them train some day.'
'Thank you, brother,' UrLeyn said, smoothing a hand over his short grey beard. 'However, I am undecided. I may ask you to stay on here in Crough and be my regent, in equal partnership with YetAmidous and ZeSpiole. Would you rather that?'
'Oh, sir!' RuLeuin reached out and touched the Protector's arm. 'That would be a singular honour!'
'No, it would be a treble honour, brother,' UrLeyn told him with a tired smile. 'ZeSpiole? What do you say?'
'I heard what you said, sir, but I can scarcely believe it. Would you honour me so?'
'I would. If I depart for the borderlands. It is still not certain yet. BiLeth, you will advise my trio of proxies as well as you have me on matters foreign?'
BiLeth, whose face had taken on a frozen expression when he had heard what the Protector was proposing, let his features relax somewhat. 'Of course, sir.'
'And General YetAmidous is agreeable?' RuLeuin asked.
'He will stay if I ask him to, or like you he will gladly come to Ladenscion with me. I could use each of you in both places, but that cannot be.'
'Sir, excuse my interruption,' the lady Perrund said. 'The ladder.'
A wooden library step-ladder was carried forward by two servants and deposited on the balcony's tiled surface near the viewing platform.
'What? Ah, yes. Lattens! UrLeyn called to his son, who was still fussing over the degree of tension in the catapult and the size of rock to throw. 'Here. This might be a better observation point for you! Position it as you see fit.'
