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She hadn’t been able to find a single merchant headed to Hamstowe. No one was going up the northwest highway now. There were all sorts of dark stories of soldiers “liberating” the goods of passing merchants, so savvy travelers went far out of their way to avoid the place. Unfortunately, that was where Lily’s contact was located, so that was where she had to go.
“I swear to the gods, I’m never doing this again,” she thought, as she stepped off the boat onto the town dock. “Next time, I’ll go see the diplomatic legate and beg him to use his couriers.”
And yet, for a den of thieves and villains, Hamstowe was something of a disappointment. It certainly didn’t seem any more dangerous than it had three weeks earlier, when Lily and Pellus had passed through. In fact, it seemed so staid and sedate that Lily wondered if the rumors down in Formacaster had been completely wrong. So she approached a fisherman on the docks and asked him if there were soldiers camped near town.
“Oh, yes, ma’am,” he said. “There’s a bunch of those savages in the south woods, and east of the town, too. Don’t go there if you value your life or your virtue, ma’am.”
Lily cared nothing for her virtue—she had lost it so long ago that she barely remembered when she’d had it. As for her life, she sometimes thought that she didn’t care much for it, either. So she thanked the man and headed around the town to the right, toward the southern woods, where she would find out how dangerous these soldiers might be.
She found their camps easily enough—it would have been difficult to miss them, in fact. If this was supposed to be some kind of conspiracy, the conspirators weren’t doing a very good job of keeping it secret. Many of the men had coats of arms or banners outside their tent. According to Lily’s notes (which she had reviewed before taking the boat up here), these symbols were unique to a knight or nobleman, and served to identify him on the field of battle. She wished someone could have given her a guide to all the different coats of arms, though. No doubt to someone versed in the symbolism, they meant a good deal, but to her, they might as well have been painted scrolls of Shangian characters.
Lily could see why merchants were going out of their way to avoid the place. It was somewhat disconcerting to walk down a road and have a couple hundred heavily-armed men turn to watch you pass. A few of them leered, but that was no worse than what she had encountered back at Wealdan Castle. None of them tried an assault on her virtue, though two of them proposed to rent it for a while. Lily laughed at them and walked on, past dozens of tents, and back around in a circle to the town.
She turned, surveyed the scene with hands on her hips, and thought, “Is that it?” Lily had seen the vast encampments of Immani legions, with their neat, geometrically precise rows of barracks, and this seemed pretty paltry by comparison. By Immani standards, this was barely enough men to launch a scouting party, let alone overthrow a government.
She sat down on a stump on the outskirts of town and composed a message to the Prefect explaining what she had seen and giving rough estimates of the number of men. She signed it “Scriptora LS,” as she always did. Then she added a postscript telling what Pellus was up to in Formacaster. He had been snoring in bed, badly hung-over, when she left him, and frankly she doubted he would ever notice she had been gone. With this finished, she sealed the letter with her brass lily seal, and walked over to the Oxcart Inn.
“Can you give this to Miss Oakley, please?” she asked, holding the letter out to the innkeeper.
“You can give it to her yourself,” said the man, pointing through a low archway into an adjoining parlor. “She’s at work today. Trust me; I’m as surprised as anyone.”
Lily went through the arch, away from the crowd of locals in the common room, and found the girl on her tiptoes, dusting the top of an old curio cabinet. She was slim, with long legs and a very attractive figure that her simple cotton servant’s dress couldn’t disguise.
“Miss Oakley?” Lily said. “I’m sorry to bother you, but—”
Then Miss Oakley turned and grinned at her. Lily let out a gasp, and the letter fluttered to the floor.
“Hello, Lily. I couldn’t let you have all the fun,” said the girl.
No, not a girl. Prefect Moira Darrow—one of the most renowned and feared sorceresses in the world, as deadly as she was beautiful. She was nearly a century old, but could have passed for Lily’s age. Originally one of the Myrcian court hillichmagnars, she had fought in the Loshadnarodski War and then run off to the Empire with her lover, Legate Servius Faustinus, to overthrow the emperor.
She was also Lily’s employer, and the woman who had arranged for Lily and Pellus to make their journey to Myrcia. She had been the one, two years earlier, who had originally suggested to Pellus that he might wish to make the “lovely Miss Serrana” his regular mistress, rather than renting her for occasional parties. In a very real sense, Moira Darrow had made Lily what she was today. If it hadn’t been for her, Lily would have still been a slave, still been living in misery and shame. Lily didn’t simply love Moira—she practically venerated her.
“Ma’am...what are you doing here?” gasped Lily.
“Oh, a little of this, a little of that,” said Moira. “Faustinus and I thought one of us ought to take a look personally.”
“So you’re coming to Formacaster?” The idea of working with her heroine made Lily almost giddy with anticipation.
“Well...not as such.” Moira gave a guilty little grin. “Faustinus wanted me to go, because he’s not exactly welcome at the Myrcian court anymore. But the thing is that I’m not really welcome, either.”
“I can’t believe that!” cried Lily. “I’ve heard women at court talking about how much they miss you.”
The beautiful Prefect was remembered less for her magysk skills than for being fun at parties and for her love of beautiful clothes.
“Ah, yes. Those were the days,” said Moira. “But if you’ve been around the castle, you’ve surely met Lady Jorunn Unset.”
“The court hillichmagnar? Yes, ma’am. I’ve met her.”
“She was my Lareowess. My magy teacher, in other words. We’re not on very good terms since I left. In fact, if she knew I was here, she’d...well, let’s say she wouldn’t make me feel very welcome.”
Lily crossed her arms and scowled, offended on Moira’s behalf. “I knew there was a reason I didn’t like that woman.”
“Yes, she has a real knack for making enemies. Anyway, it’s lovely to see you.”
“And to see you, too, ma’am.” They shared a hug—one that didn’t last nearly as long as Lily would have liked. Then Moira fetched two mugs of ale from the bar and led Lily over to a low window seat that overlooked the dusty inn yard.
Moira lifted a finger, and the letter Lily had dropped floated into her hand. “Let’s see this report you were going to send me.”
“I wish I had something more interesting,” Lily confessed nervously, as Moira read through it. “If you’ve been here at Hamstowe, there’s probably nothing in there you didn’t already know.”
Moira got to the postscript of the letter and laughed. “So, Pellus is having trouble making friends in Myrcia? It looks like he’s managed to dash even the miniscule hopes I had for him as a diplomat. Ah, well. All he had to do was give you a pretext for being there, and he’s done so.”
It made Lily feel much better to hear Moira say that. She had started to worry that Pellus’s failures were somehow her fault. But as long as Moira was happy with her work, Lily was happy, too.
Folding Lily’s report and sliding it under her apron, Moira said, “What about this letter from Lady Follerberg claiming that Faustinus is the father of little King Edwin? Have you managed to get a look at it?”
“No, ma’am. It’s being kept in the Lord Chancellor’s office. I’ve heard plenty of rumors of what it says, though.” She put a reassuring hand on Moira’s arm. “Don’t worry, ma’am. I’m sure it’s a lie. I can’t believe Legate Faustinus would do something like that.”
“Oh, I could,” laughed Moira. “But you’re right to assume he didn’t. Empress Vita speaks very highly of Queen Rohesia’s character. Clearly someone is trying to get the queen out of the way. How did the letter get to the council? Who found it?”
Lily sipped her ale thoughtfully, then said, “I’ve heard a lot of rumors. But the one that sounds most credible to me is that someone pushed it under the door of Baron Corbin. He’s on the privy council, and he’s a good friend of Baron Broderick Gramiren.”
Moira said the captain general’s name in chorus with her, nodding. “He was the other candidate for regent, and he lost to the queen. He’s a very dangerous man, Lily. Be careful. Faustinus is pretty sure he was the one who killed Prince Maxen.” Moira pronounced this accusation with an air of extraordinary gravity.
Unfortunately, try as she might, Lily couldn’t remember who Prince Maxen was. She was just now getting a handle on who all the living members of the court were. She hadn’t even started learning the dead ones yet. “I’m sorry, ma’am,” she said, her face burning, “but I haven’t had a chance to study all your notes quite yet. I read them every night, but...well, there are so many of them, and I’ve been rather busy.”
“Oh, don’t worry,” said Moira, settling back against the window. “This was...oh, Holy Finster, it was twenty years ago now. Seems like yesterday. Anyway, during a court visit to Leornian, the direct heir to the throne, Prince Maxen Sigor, was assassinated. Poisoned to death. He was the only legitimate son of King Ethelred, and his death meant the crown went to Ethelred’s younger brother, Edgar.”
“And Edgar is the one who died a few weeks ago,” Lily put in, trying to prove she had been paying attention.
“Exactly.” Moira scooted a bit closer, and her voice fell to a low purr. “The official story is that Maxen was poisoned by his insane mother, Queen Merewyn—the one they locked up in a tower for rebelling against Ethelred, you know. But Faustinus was at Leornian when it happened, and he’s absolutely, positively sure Broderick was behind it.”
“But why would he do such a thing?” asked Lily.
“To get to the throne, obviously,” said Moira. “Now he needs to get Rohesia and Edwin out of the way, and then he needs to get himself legitimized by the church. And from what you’ve written in your reports, it looks to me like he’s well on his way to doing both of those things.”
“So what are we going to do about it? Or...are we going to do anything?”
“Well, as I say, be very careful. But try to do whatever you can to stick up for Rohesia. Her father was the Myrcian diplomatic consul in Terminium for three years when she was a girl, and she was quite close to Empress Vita before she was empress. Rohesia is very familiar with Immani society. She’s well-disposed toward the Empire, and as I’m sure you’ve noticed, that’s a rare thing at the Myrcian court these days. Broderick is positively hostile toward us. Toward the Empire in general, I mean, but also to Faustinus in particular. They really don’t get along at all.”
“So we want Rohesia to stay regent,” said Lily. “Got it.”
“And keep Broderick as far away from power as you can possibly manage.” Moira set down her mug and took one of Lily’s hands. “I know it’s a lot to ask, but try your best. And see if you can’t get Pellus and the diplomatic legate in town to help.”
“The legate hardly ever goes to court, ma’am,” said Lily. “And no one talks to him when he does. As for Pellus, well...I’ll try, but I can’t guarantee anything.” She sighed. “What would really help, ma’am, is if I could use the diplomatic courier system to send you reports. It’s not very convenient trying to find travelers who happen to be going in the right direction. Not to mention, it’s not very secure.”
“Yes, that’s true,” said Moira, frowning. “Faustinus and I have been working on that problem. Hopefully we’ll have a solution soon. But in the meantime, do what you can. And stay safe.”
They shared another hug, which again didn’t last nearly long enough for Lily’s taste, and then Lily headed back down to the docks. She was determined to succeed and get Rohesia back in power. Her own safety was a secondary concern, because she would have rather died than disappoint Moira.