Demansk headed it off. 'I'm not talking about simple risks, Sharlz Thicelt.' He waved his hand in a dismissive gesture. 'Boarding operations, battle-that sort of thing. I'm talking about the kind of risks that might leave you, someday, immured in a dark cellar. Dying slowly on a stake, with no one knowing you are even there except your executioners.'
Thicelt's face cleared. 'Ah. Politics. ' He ran a long-fingered hand over his shaven skull. Then the wry smile returned. 'And why not? Any common pirate can rob and plunder and rape and kill. It takes a great pirate to do politics. '
He squared his shoulders and tapped his chest with a finger. 'Here, Justiciar Demansk, you see a great pirate. One of the best! So. What are to be my new responsibilities?'
'I'm not sure yet, as far as the long term goes. In the short term, I need a captain for a sea voyage.' He matched the wry smile with one of his own. 'I do know your new title, on the other hand. Special Attendant. '
' 'Special Attendant.' ' Thicelt rolled the odd words around in his mouth. ' 'Special Attendant.' It has a nice vague sound to it. Splendid! Vague titles are a damnation for a workman; a boon, for the overseer.'
'Exactly,' said Demansk. 'And for the overseer's master.'
He looked at his son, pointing at the steam ram. 'And?'
Trae shrugged. 'We can run it easily enough, Father, as well as fire the cannons. The damage has all been repaired. I think I understand how everything works-even, more or less, why it works. But I hope you're not planning to use it for your mysterious 'sea voyage.' I wouldn't trust this tub in open waters for more than a few hours, and then only in fine weather. Even Sharlz wouldn't.'
The former pirate captain scowled. 'A 'tub,' as you say. The damn thing gave me nothing but grief, except in battle. Where'-he grinned at Demansk-'it was a terror to my enemies until that unspeakable imbecile Prince Tenny insisted on taking command.'
Having been one of Thicelt's enemies in that sea battle, Demansk couldn't help but agree. The infernal steam ram, with its armored shell and its cannons, had wreaked havoc among Demansk's own ships. But Prince Tenny, the oldest son of King Casull of the Isles, had been aboard the ram. He had forced Thicelt to abandon the captain's cunning tactics and try to mix it up directly with the Confederate forces.
The Confederate navy was notoriously clumsy, with none of the superb seamanship of the Islanders. But no one in their right mind ever tried to 'mix it up directly' with Confederate naval forces. Those forces consisted mainly of marines, who were the world's experts at turning a sea battle into a land battle. Demansk himself had led the boarding operation which captured the steam ram-and its captain, in the bargain.
Prince Tenny had been killed in the course of that boarding operation, with a dart through his guts. Demansk could still remember Sharlz Thicelt spitting on the corpse with fury.
'I've got other plans for the steam ram,' said Demansk. 'You'll have a good seagoing vessel for your voyage, Special Attendant Thicelt, have no fear of that. In fact, your very first assignment is to select the ship in the first place. I'll give you the money to buy it.' Again, he waved his hand. 'I'll expect you not to skim more than a modest sum off the top.'
Thicelt grinned. 'And then?'
Demansk hooked his thumb at the ram. 'If it's working, does it need you to captain it?'
Thicelt shook his head. 'Any good captain can manage the thing, with some training.'
'Good. Because what I really need is an admiral. '
All the good cheer left Thicelt's face. He studied Demansk very carefully. Then: 'An honest pirate, as I said. So I will not lie. The 'price' involves costs as well as rewards. There is only one reason you would need an 'admiral,' and that is to conquer the Isles.' The man's long face grew longer still. 'I have family on those Isles, Justiciar Demansk. Political loyalties are nothing to me. Family… is a different thing. People get hurt in conquests. Killed and ravished and maimed. Their property taken and themselves sold into slavery.'
Demansk nodded. 'I wouldn't expect your loyalty under such conditions. Nor would I even want it, to be honest.' He reached out a hand and seized the taller man by the shoulder. 'I can promise you this, Sharlz Thicelt. If you let me know where your family lives-and especially if you can get word to them ahead of time-I will see to their safety and well-being.'
He dropped the hand and shrugged. 'I can't promise that none of their properties would be damaged or taken. In war…'
'Who knows?' Thicelt completed the thought. 'Property can always be replaced. Especially when one of the family members is a 'Special Attendant.' '
He nodded his head. The gesture had a very formal aura. 'It is done, Justiciar Demansk. A bargain, and an honest one.'
'And what about me, Father?' asked Trae. 'What do you plan for me?' His youthful face was creased with confusion. 'And what is all this business about, anyway?'
Demansk spent the rest of the evening explaining. Trae and Thicelt were his only companions through that long discussion, and Demansk decided to allow Thicelt to remain for all of it. He had known from the beginning that he was taking a risk by employing Thicelt. He had done so because he needed the finest admiral he could get his hands on. And he was quite certain that the canny King of the Isles had chosen his very best captain to command the steam ram.
Still, it was a risk. With what he learned in the course of that evening's discussion, Thicelt could sell the information to any one of Demansk's enemies-and come out of the sale a rich man as well as a free one.
But risks have to be taken, at times. And Demansk had always been of the philosophy that there was no point in postponing them. Eventually, he would have had to tell Thicelt, anyway. And there was simply no way to keep under close guard a man whom he intended to load with so much power and authority as well as responsibility. So… may as well find out quickly.
By the end of the evening, however, Demansk's lurking fears were allayed. Thicelt, clearly enough, was the kind of man who enjoyed a genuine challenge. No one simply seeking to gain information for a later betrayal would have pitched into the discussion and the planning so eagerly-not to mention advancing so many excellent suggestions himself. Demansk suspected that the man's insistence on his piratical nature was due more to Islander custom than anything else. A role, as it were, rather than the man himself.
As a servant led him to the sleeping chamber where he would spend the night, after the discussion was over, Demansk found himself thinking about that 'role.' Not so much Thicelt's alone, as those of millions of men. When all was said and done, what Demansk planned to carry out was a gigantic 'mixing of roles.'
All of the Confederacy's decay, he thought, could in the end be reduced to that. The great realm forged by Vanbert had settled into layers, like sludge rotting in a pool. It was time to 'mix it up. ' Break classes as well as nations, and churn new life into the mix.
And so it begins, he thought, as he lay down on the couch and closed his eyes. Verice Demansk, the head of one of Vanbert's oldest and most illustrious families, was already 'mixing it up.' It was not an accident, he now realized, that outside of his immediate family the first recruits to his conspiracy were a former peasant and a pirate.
He chewed on the thought for a while. Then, fell to sleep much more easily than he would have suspected. And why not? His own ancestors had been peasants; and pirates, too, for that matter. 'Land pirates,' of course. Vanberts were not natural seamen.
Chapter 7
'I can't stay long,' he told Helga. 'I've got to get back to the capital in time for the Council session, and I've got to visit the siege of Preble along the way.'
Helga looked down at the baby nestled in her lap. 'Are you listening?' she demanded. 'No, you're sleeping- lazy little sot! When your grandfather's giving you such excellent lessons in duplicity!
'This is lesson Number 64, too,' she added, clucking her tongue with motherly distress. ' 'How To Appear Deeply Concerned By Grave Matters of State.' You'll never be a successful politician without it.'
Demansk's lips quirked. As much as Helga's tongue often annoyed him, he had long ago decided that, on
