sets of the game of 'Monarch's Dispute' sold in Tassasen these days came in boxes which, to those who could read, proclaimed the game they contained to be 'Leader's Dispute', and held revised pieces: a Protector instead of an Emperor, Generals in place of Kings, Colonels instead of Dukes, and Captains where before there had been Barons. Many people, either fearful of the new regime or simply wishing to show their allegiance to it, had thrown out their old sets of the game along with their portraits of the King. It seemed that only in the Palace of Vorifyr itself were people more relaxed.
DeWar lost himself studying the position of the pieces for a few moments. Then he heard Perrund make another noise, and looked up again to see her shaking her head at him, eyes glittering.
Now it was his turn to say, 'What?'
'Oh, DeWar,' she said. 'I have heard people in the Court say you are the most cunning person they know in it, and thank Providence that you are so devoted to the General, because if you were a man of independent ambition they would fear you.'
DeWar shrugged. 'Really? I suppose I ought to feel flattered, but-'
'And yet you are so easy to play at Dispute,' Perrund said, laughing.
'Am I?'
'Yes, and for the most obvious reason. You do too much to protect your Protector piece. You sacrifice everything to keep it free from threat.' She nodded at the board. 'Look. You are thinking about blocking my Mounted piece with your eastern General, leaving it open to my Tower after we've exchanged Caravels on the left flank. Well, aren't you?'
DeWar frowned deeply, staring at the board. He felt his face flush. He looked up again at those golden, mocking eyes. 'Yes. So I am transparent, is that it?'
'You are predictable,' Perrund told him softly. 'Your obsession with the Emperor — with the Protector — is a weakness. Lose the Protector and one of the Generals takes its place. You treat it as though its loss would be the end of the game. I was wondering… Did you ever play 'A Kingdom Unjustly Divided' before you learned 'Monarch's Dispute'?' she asked. 'Do you know of it?' she added, surprised, when he looked blank. 'In that game the loss of either King does indeed signify the end of the game.'
'I've heard of it,' DeWar said defensively, picking up his Protector piece and turning it over in his hands. 'I confess I haven't played it properly, but-'
Perrund clapped her good hand on her thigh, attracting the frowning stare of the watchful eunuch. 'I knew it!' she said, laughing and rocking forward on the couch. 'You protect the Protector because you can't help it. You know it's not really the game but it would hurt you to do otherwise because you are so much the bodyguard!'
DeWar put the Protector piece back down on the board and drew himself up on the small stool he sat upon, uncrossing his legs and adjusting the positions of his sword and his dagger. 'It's not that,' he said, pausing to study the board again briefly. 'It's not that. It's just… my style. The way I choose to play the game.'
'Oh, DeWar, Perrund said with an unladylike snort. 'What nonsense! That is not style, it's fault! If you play like that it's like fighting with one hand tied behind your back…' She looked down ruefully at the arm in the red sling. 'Or one hand wasted,' she added, then held up her good hand to him as he went to protest. 'Now just you never mind that. Attend to my point. You cannot stop being a bodyguard even when playing a silly game to pass the time with an old concubine while your master dallies with a younger one. You must admit it and be proud — secretly or not, it's equal to me — or I shall be quite thoroughly upset. Now, speak and tell me I'm right.'
DeWar sat back, holding both hands out wide in a gesture of defeat. 'My lady,' he said, 'it is just as you say.'
Perrund laughed. 'Don't give in so easily. Argue.'
'I can't. You're right. I am only glad that you think my obsession might be commendable. But it is just as you say. My job is my life, and I am never off-duty. And I never will be until I am dismissed, I fail in my job, or — Providence consign such an eventuality to the distant future — the Protector dies a natural death.'
Perrund looked down at the board. 'In a ripe old age,
as you say,' she agreed before looking up at him again. 'And do you still feel you're missing something which might prevent such a natural end?'
DeWar looked awkward. He picked up the Protector piece again and, as though addressing it, in a low voice said, 'His life is in more danger than anybody here seems to think. Certainly it is in more danger than he appears to believe.' He looked up at the lady Perrund, a small, hesitant smile on his face. 'Or am I being too obsessive again?'
'I don't know,' Perrund said, sitting closer and dropping her voice too, 'why you seem so sure that people want him dead.'
'Of course people want him dead,' DeWar said. 'He had the courage to commit regicide, the temerity to create a new way of governing. The Kings and Dukes who opposed the Protector from the start found him a more skilled politician and far better field commander than they'd expected. With great skill and a little luck he prevailed, and the acclamation of the newly enfranchised in Tassasen has made it difficult for anybody else in the old Kingdom or indeed anywhere in the old Empire to oppose him directly.'
'There must be a 'but' or a 'however' about to make its appearance here,' Perrund said. 'I can tell it.'
'Indeed. But there are those who have greeted UrLeyn's coming to power with every possible expression of enthusiasm and who have gone out of their way to support him in most public ways, yet who secretly know that their own existence — or at the very least their own supremacy is threatened by his continued rule. They are the ones I'm worried about, and they must have made their plans for our Protector. The first few attempts at assassination failed, but not by much. And only your bravery stopped the most determined.of them, lady,' DeWar said.
Perrund looked away, and her good hand went to touch the withered one. 'Yes,' she said. 'I did tell your predecessor that as I had stepped in to perform his job he ought to do the decent thing and attempt to fulfil mine one day, but he just laughed.'
DeWar smiled. 'Commander ZeSpiole tells that story himself, still.'
'Hmm. Well, perhaps as Commander of the Palace Guard, ZeSpiole does such a good job keeping would-be assassins away from the palace that none ever achieve the sort of proximity that might call for your services.'
'Perhaps, but either way they will be back,' DeWar said quietly. 'I almost wish they had been back by now. The absence of conventional assassins makes me all the more convinced there is some very special assassin here, just waiting for the right time to strike.'
Perrund looked troubled, even sad, the man thought. 'But come, DeWar,' she said, 'is this not too gloomily contrary? Perhaps there are no attempts on the Protector's life because no one of moment any longer wishes him dead. Why assume the most depressing explanation? Can you never be, if not relaxed, then content?'
DeWar took a deep breath and then released it. He replaced the Protector piece. 'These are not times when people in my profession can relax.'
'They say the old days were always better. Do you think so, DeWar?'
'No, lady, I do not.' He gazed into her eyes. 'I think a lot of nonsense is talked about the old days.'
'But, DeWar, they were days of legends, days of heroes!' Perrund said, her expression indicating she was not being entirely serious. 'Everything was better, everybody says so!'
'Some of us prefer history to legends, lady,' DeWar said heavily, 'and sometimes everybody can be wrong.'
'Can they?'
'Indeed. Once everybody thought the world was flat.'
'Many still do,' Perrund said, raising one brow. 'Few peasants want to think they might fall out of their fields,
and a lot of us who know the truth find it hard to accept.'
'Nevertheless, it is the case.' DeWar smiled. 'It can be proved.'
Perrund smiled too. 'With sticks in the ground?'
'And shadows, and mathematics.'
Perrund gave a quick, sideways nod. It was a mannerism that seemed to acknowledge and dismiss at the same time. 'What a very certain, if rather dismal world you seem to live in, DeWar.'
'It is the same world that everyone inhabits, if they but knew, my lady. It's just that only some of us have our eyes open.'
