Done by my hand at Holmgarth Posthouse,
this 22nd day of Tenthmoon, in the year of
Ranulf, 368.
With humble salutations…
Stalwart dipped his quill in the inkwell and sighed. He had barely begun his job and the eastbound stage left in an hour. He was writing his first report. He would rather duel to the death any day.
Pursuant to Your Excellency’s instructions, I made haste to Holmgarth. I arrived late last night. I gave your warrant to Sir Tancred. The noble knight offered most gracious aid.
The old man was frail now, but his mind was still sharp. He had already retired, for the hour had been late, and he had looked with deep suspicion on the exhausted juvenile vagabond who came staggering into his bedchamber, dripping mud and flaunting a cat’s-eye sword. The moment he finished reading the Chancellor’s letter, though, he had ordered food and drink for his visitor. He had summoned his two sons and directed them to do anything the stranger said, without argument or delay. The elder, Elred, was courteous and silver-haired, keeper of the inn adjoining the stable. Sherwin was a rougher character; he ran the livery business and was also the county sheriff. Stalwart would be dealing more with him.
After a solid night’s sleep, he was just starting work, so what more could he possibly put in his report?
I can easily observe horsemen arriving in the stables. But the stagecoach and private carriages usually stop at the post inn to disembark passengers before entering the yard.
Perhaps he should not whine about his problems, but he was proud of the solution he had discovered for this one, and it would show Lord Roland that he had achieved something already.
I asked the innkeeper to hire workmen to tear down and rebuild his porch. This construction blocks the front entrance to the inn. Now all traffic will come first into the yard and stop at the rear door. I most humbly request that your lordship will approve the expense.
A simple two-day carpentry job might have to be dragged out for weeks. If they made Stalwart pay for it out of his Guard wages, he would be poverty-stricken for the next hundred years.
Another clatter of hooves brought his head up as a two-horse gig clattered and squeaked past his window. The passenger was an elderly, plump woman, but he kept watching until he had a clear view of her driver—Silvercloak would not sneak past him disguised as a servant!
Two horsemen rode in, three departed. Another carriage…The post yard was still shadowed but starting to bustle as the sun came over the walls. Men and boys were walking horses, feeding them, currying them, mucking out stables, wheeling barrows, saddling, harnessing. Their breath showed white in the morning chill, and fresh dung on the paving stones steamed. There had been ice on the water troughs at dawn. A farrier’s hammer clinked.
Standing at an important crossroads, Holmgarth was one of the busiest posthouses in all Chivial, employing scores of people. Every day hundreds of horsemen hired remounts there and a dozen coaches changed teams. The King boarded horses there for his couriers and the Blades. As if to demonstrate, a horn blew in the distance and men started running. Moments later a royal courier thundered in past Stalwart’s window. By then a horse had been led out and was being saddled up for him. In moments he went galloping out through the archway again. Show-off!
Could Silvercloak disguise himself as a courier—or even a Blade?
The yard was large enough to hold two stagecoaches and their eight-horse teams. It was shaped like a letter E, its east side the back of the inn, and three long alleys leading off to the west, flanked by rows of stalls. There was only one gate and the walls were high, because valuable horses must be well guarded.
In tomorrow’s report, I shall describe to your lordship my arrangements for catching the
Sir Stalwart pondered a good way to spell “malefactor” and wrote “felon” instead. He had no idea yet what those arrangements were going to be. The iron-barred window of the cashier’s office was right by the yard entrance, designed to give a clear view of anyone trying to sneak a horse out without paying. The cashier on duty was Mistress Gleda, Sherwin’s wife—a plump, ferocious-looking woman with a visible mustache and a deep distrust of this upstart boy who had taken over half her worktable. Fortunately she was kept busy handling money and tokens brought to the window. Keeping track of all the horses going in and out must be a huge job.
If she was asked, Stalwart was her nephew, visiting dear Aunt Gleda.
This seat gave him a clear view of anyone arriving. So far so good. He would certainly see Silvercloak if he came, but putting a collar on him was going to be a lot harder. To sound an alarm—ring a bell, say—would alert the quarry as much as the posse. Then the quarry would either escape again or cause a bloodbath.
Roland had dropped a hint—
As your lordship graciously advised, these stables are built of solid masonry. Any stall could serve as a cell.
But if Silvercloak was so smart, how could he be lured inside and locked in—alone, with no hostage to threaten? The answers would have to wait for tomorrow’s report. Lord Roland would understand that there had been no time to write more in this one. Now to sign it and then seal it. Blades used the inscription on their swords as their seals. Stalwart’s was Sleight—in mirrorwriting, of course.
The door at his back creaked open, and the office was suddenly full of Sherwin. The Sheriff’s well-worn leathers bulged over the largest barrel belly Stalwart had ever met, even larger than the King’s. He had the biggest hands, too, and a jet-black beard fit to stuff a pillow. At his back came a rangy man, younger and clean-shaven.
“This here’s Norton,” the big man growled. “Nephew. Can’t find me, talk to him. He’ll be your sergeant, like. This is Sir Stalwart, Norton.” He made that last remark seem surprising.
Stalwart rose and offered a hand to the newcomer, whose horny grip did not crush as it might have done. “Please don’t use that title, not ever. My friends call me Wart.”
“‘Pimple’ would be better,” said Sherwin, looming over him like a thunderstorm. He had very dark, very glittery eyes. His face—the part visible above the undergrowth—was deeply pitted with old acne scars.
“Looks like you know more about pimples than I do. Glad to have your help, Master Norton.”
Norton just nodded, but he had not disapproved of the pimple riposte. Sherwin’s wife sniffed in an amused sort of way, and Sherwin showed no offense. Perhaps he had just been testing a little.
“We picked out seventeen men for you,” he said, “all good lads in a roughhouse.”
“Not outsiders?” Stalwart sat down to show that he was in charge.
“You already said you didn’t want outsiders. They all work here. Some all the time, some sometimes. I’m not stupid, sonny.”
“Will they keep the secret?”
“I don’t hire stupids, either. You want all of us on duty every day, all day? King’ll pay for that?”
Oh, why, why, why had Stalwart not asked Lord Roland how much money he could spend?
“We’ll work something out.”
“Work it out with Gleda there. You won’t cheat her.”
Stalwart held fast to his temper as the fat man sneered down at him over his jungle of beard and mountain of lard.
“I don’t cheat anyone.”
“And if this killer you want is so dangerous, how much danger money will you pay them?”
“How much do you usually pay them? You’re the sheriff, so I’m told. We’ll cover costs the way you usually do.”
Mistress Gleda uttered a disagreeable snort behind Stalwart’s back.
“You want me call the lads in so’s you can tell ’em what this outlaw looks like?” her husband demanded. “How’re you goin’ to tip us off when you see him? What d’we do then?”
These were exactly the questions baffling Stalwart, but he was not about to admit this to his troops. “I’ll explain all that later. I must finish this letter first. Then I want to take another walk around.”
If he was still stymied at noon, he would have to ask for help.
“Why’d Lord Roland send a boy to catch a dangerous killer?”
Stalwart gave the fat man what he hoped was a cold stare. “Because it takes one to know one, I suppose.”
“You, Pimple?”
“Me. But I only kill traitors, so you should be safe, shouldn’t you?”
Before Sherwin could counter, another coach rumbled past the window and headed for the inn door. But the inn door was some way off, and now there were men and boys and horses everywhere, blocking the view. With a yelp of panic, Stalwart jumped for the door, ran outside, and dodged through the crowd. When he got close enough to see the heraldry on the carriage, he almost fell over a wheelbarrow of horse dung being pushed by a skinny, chilled-looking boy.
An octogram and a waterfall? Those were the arms the King had granted to Emerald after the Nythia adventure—a very rare honor for a woman.
He didn’t trip. He just stood and stared with his mouth open as the porter opened the coach door, lowered the steps, and stepped back to let the occupants emerge.
Stalwart had never met Emerald’s mother, but he did recognize the woman descending. She was not Emerald’s mother.
She was not Silvercloak, either.
Silvercloak would have been less surprising.
And the youth in shabby, ill-fitting clothes shuffling along behind her? Yes, Stalwart knew that face also, although the close-cropped hairstyle was new. Fortunately both newcomers disappeared into the inn without noticing him standing there like a lummox.
How many unexpected tricks did Lord Roland have up his sleeve?
This one was almost unthinkable. She was crazy! Why had she ever let him talk her into that?
He wandered back into the cashier’s office and flopped down on his stool. Norton and Sherwin had left, fortunately, and Mistress Gleda was dealing with a procession of grooms and customers. Stalwart’s report, which he had stupidly left lying there, had been moved and therefore read.
More horsemen trotted into the yard and he craned his neck to watch them go by. He had not, as he had thought earlier, solved even the first of his problems. This window would not let him see everyone who arrived, because the coaches unloaded too far away and the crowd would often block his view. So he was right back at the beginning again.
Except he now owed someone for the cost of the inn’s new porch.
He must close his report to Lord Roland. He added one more paragraph.
I respectfully advise your lordship that your gracious lady wife passed through Holmgarth this morning with a companion known to me. I judged it fitting that I not address them.
I have the honor to be, etc., your lordship’s
most humble and obedient servant,
Stalwart, companion.