Hamare waved the irrelevance aside. "Karn was asking questions there. He disappeared in the night."

"Couldn't he simply have left?" Litasse wondered.

"Not without taking leave of Ridianne." Hamare sighed. "And if he did slip away, he'd make sure no one called attention to his absence by asking awkward questions. Besides, this friend of Karn's found fresh blood on the grass the next morning, in a hollow by the river."

"I'm so sorry." Litasse knotted her fingers. The hollowness in Hamare's eyes was a painful reminder of the horror of learning her brother Jaras was dead.

"Ridianne turned the camp upside down. They couldn't find anyone with fresh wounds to explain the blood. All had--" Hamare glanced down at the letter again, eyes hooded. "She did discover that Karn had beaten off an attack by some ruffians earlier in the day. We can only suppose they caught up with him in the darkness." He screwed the letter up in sudden fury. "What a stupid, pointless waste of his life!"

"I'll have to tell Valesti," Litasse realised suddenly. "But he had no family, surely?" Did that make it better or worse?

Hamare gazed towards the window, eyes unseeing. "All his family were killed when he was a child. He told me about it once. A great swathe of Marlier and Carluse was laid waste over one summer. All the crops had been burned, all the cattle stolen or killed. There was famine in the autumn and some desperate men decided their wives and children would fare better enslaved or in the Otherworld instead of starving through the winter. Karn said they drove the women and children into a camp full of drunken mercenaries and then started attacking the swordsmen with their cudgels and axes. Karn said he saw his father force his mother onto a mercenary's blade, to be certain she died before him. He doesn't recall anything after that, until he woke in the night in a ditch full of corpses."

"That cannot be true." Litasse recoiled from such a tale.

"Karn wouldn't disappear without telling me what he'd learned. And if someone's had him killed, there's definitely something to be learned." Hamare was scowling, though not at Litasse. "In Vanam, as likely as not."

"You still believe there's something in this tale of an exiles' brigade gathering?" Litasse looked doubtfully at him.

"If not in Vanam, somewhere," Hamare said savagely.

"What could a few bands of hired swords do?" Litasse protested.

"How much better do you think these exiles would fare," Hamare challenged her, "if their bold youths were led by real swordsmen?" His expression darkened further. "I want to know what part Lady Alaric has played in all this. Karn wasn't sure he trusted her. And Pelletria tells me there's fresh rumour that Duke Garnot's doxy has been seen in Carluse."

"What in the name of Poldrion's stinking demons is going on?" Duke Iruvain threw the door open so hard it crashed against the wall. "Hamare?" Irate, he strode up to the table and swept a sheaf of papers to the floor with an angry hand. "You spend all my silver gathering this stable litter? You don't know that there are wizards in Draximal?"

Litasse froze in her chair as the spymaster shouted back, frustrated.

"There's only so much I can discover. Some secrets are kept from everyone." Hamare rose to his feet. "And who's to say this is even true!"

"The men who whipped their horses half to death to bring me the news that Emirle Bridge has burned to its foundations," Iruvain bellowed back. "That the woods along Draximal's border with Parnilesse are ablaze. Every vassal lord along our eastern border tells me he's overrun with clamouring peasants who've risked drowning in the Anock and taking a beating from our militias rather than face magefire burning the roofs over their heads!"

"All of which is as much an unwelcome surprise to Duke Secaris of Draximal and Duke Orlin of Parnilesse," Hamare retorted. "Their private letters are as full of confusion and outrage as any you've had from your vassal lords." He brandished a handful. "They're promising vast rewards for anyone who can bring them the truth of what went on."

"You expect them to admit their own guilt?" Iruvain threw up his hands. "Defying all honour, custom and the Archmage besides?"

Litasse spoke up. "I've had letters from the duchesses of both Draximal and Parnilesse, my lord. They're pleading their innocence, begging me to believe them."

"Which only proves Duke Secaris has enough sense to keep his mouth shut inside his bed curtains." Iruvain waved her away impatiently. "Along with Duke Orlin. Hamare, who's responsible for this outrage?"

"Neither duke." He had no doubt. "Neither would have acted without a plan to follow up such a bold move. Neither would risk every other dukedom uniting against him, with the blessing of Tormalin's Emperor and Caladhria's barons." Hamare threw the letters down. "What do we see? No moves by Draximal or Parnilesse. No mercenaries erupting from ambush, no militias thrown into the fray. Neither side has done anything but panic as chaos burns along their border."

"They've done nothing that you you know of," spat Iruvain. know of," spat Iruvain.

"If there was anything to know, I would have learned it." Hamare was adamant.

"You didn't know one of them was suborning a wizard," Iruvain shouted.

Hamare shook his head. "We don't even know that wizardry was worked."

Iruvain stared at him. "Woods and fields and houses burned for a night and a day, with scarlet fire that couldn't be quenched."

Hamare shrugged. "The Aldabreshi have sticky fire and Misaen only knows what other foul alchemies. One of their warlords visited Emperor Tadriol not so long ago, not for the first time. Who knows what knowledge came north with him?"

Iruvain looked contemptuously at the spymaster. "Do you have the least shred of evidence to suggest an Aldabreshin alchemist has set foot in Draximal or Parnilesse?"

"No, Your Grace, I do not," Hamare said steadily. "Just as I have no shred of evidence that either Duke Secaris or Duke Orlin has attempted to suborn a wizard. Believe me, Your Grace, I would know about that. I make it my business to keep a very close eye on any mage who might be bought or coerced."

Iruvain narrowed his eyes. "Why would you do that?"

"Because there are persistent rumours that barons along the Caladhrian coast are seeking magic to defend them against the corsairs raiding up from the northernmost domains of the Aldabreshin Archipelago." Hamare's voice was determinedly reasonable. "They have made repeated representations to the Archmage and to the Council of Hadrumal. Since the Aldabreshi murder any wizard they capture, they argue these corsairs are just as much Hadrumal's foes. Rumour has it some mages in Hadrumal and a few of those living on the mainland agree. One might be persuaded to act, for the right price."

As far as Litasse could discern, Hamare was telling the truth. He wasn't telling the whole truth, though. Couldn't Iruvain see that?

"Rumour." Iruvain's lip curled. "You spend your days mired so deep in suspicion and supposition that you cannot see what's in plain sight. Draximal and Parnilesse have gone to war!"

"A war that neither side has prepared for! At the very turn of Aft-Summer into For-Autumn? When we could be only half a season from weather that will put an end to all campaigning? At very best, they'll be bogged down by the end of Aft-Autumn." Hamare shook his head, obdurate. "When fighting will outrage the Tormalin Emperor, after both these noble dukes have been so desperate to placate him?"

"Then what is going on?" demanded Iruvain, infuriated.

"Have you never seen a festival trickster pretend a rune bone has vanished from his closed fist only to reappear behind someone's ear?" Hamare bent to retrieve the papers the duke had swept from the table. "Someone wants us looking the other way."

"Who?" Iruvain stared down at him.

"Caladhrians have been selling their harvests for fat profits to Vanam merchants, but there's no sign of that grain reaching their markets." Hamare searched among the papers on the table and found another letter. "Someone has been buying up quantities of cloth and canvas and leather but no one knows where the goods have been shipped. Someone's been quietly making ready for war."

"Draximal or Parnilesse," Iruvain retorted.

"No, Your Grace," Hamare said swiftly. "Vanam."

"Vanam?" Iruvain's incredulity warred with anger. "This again?"

"Let him speak, my lord," Litasse said, irritated.

Hamare slid her a warning glance before continuing. "Every thread I pull on leads back there. Even muckraking rabble-rousers have been printing their lies in Vanam. Accusing Duke Secaris of suborning wizardry. Condemning Duke Orlin for bringing magecraft into Lescar." Hamare held out a crudely printed leaf, then another and another. "I have others fanning the flames of panic with identical tales of supposed atrocities on both sides of the border. I know the style of old. They're all written by a man called Reniack, who's made it his life's work to attack Duke Orlin in pamphlets carried along the high roads and round the taverns by ballad singers and beggars. He was last heard of in Vanam."

Iruvain thumped the table with a clenched fist. "What's your point?"

Hamare threw the papers down. "Now Reniack's condemning all the dukes of Lescar. Declaring that the common folk have suffered so much for so long, for the sake of noble quarrels they have no part in, that their noble lords have forfeited all right to their fealty. Saying bringing magic into battle is the final treachery that cannot be forgiven. He knows what's going on. He knew what was going to happen. All these slanders were printed and ready, Your Grace. They were being shared around the alehouses and the market squares of both Draximal and Parnilesse inside a day of this so-called wizardry."

Hamare reached for a dog-eared missive, a narrow slip of paper curled around the fragment of its seal. "The same treachery is surfacing in Carluse. Guildmasters are no longer content merely to help the common folk send their sons and daughters away in secret. Now they're saying no duke can be trusted. That Duke Garnot would have been the first to use magic if he thought he could get away with it. They're saying so in the very same words that this man Reniack is using in Parnilesse. The selfsame contagion is spreading in Marlier and Sharlac."

"What did you say?" Iruvain stared at him. "About the guildmasters of Carluse?"

Hamare set his jaw. "There have been rumours, for some years now, of disaffection within Carluse. You've heard the tales of these mysterious Woodsmen."

"I've heard Duke Garnot laugh at them," Iruvain asserted.

"I suspect these tales are deliberately spread to cover the truth." Litasse saw that Hamare's calm tone was costing him visible effort. "The truth being a conspiracy among Carluse's priests and guildsmen to send youths and maidens away to family and friends beyond Lescar's borders. They tell the duke's reeves they have died or married away. I also suspect some priests hide coin in their shrines when Duke Garnot sends his mercenaries collecting levies."

"You knew such treachery was undermining one of Triolle's allies and you said nothing?" Iruvain said slowly.

"I cannot burden you with every rumour, Your Grace, not until I have satisfied myself as to the truth of them." Hamare's attempt at humility was unconvincing.

"Satisfied yourself?" Iruvain's voice was cold. "You take too much on yourself, Master Hamare."

Litasse shifted in her chair. "Carluse is no friend to Triolle."

"I say who our friends are!" Iruvain rounded on her. "And you are Triolle's duchess. I'll thank you to remember that!"

"Duke Garnot's missing whore is niece to a priest deeply implicated in these plots, Your Grace," Hamare said loudly. "She fled to Vanam where she had dealings with this agitator Reniack. Where rumours persist that a band of exiles is preparing to raise arms against Lescar."

"Rumour?" Furious, Iruvain threw an inkwell at Hamare. "Is rumour burning the far banks of the Anock? If you continue to waste my time with this nonsense of Vanam, I'll have you whipped to your senses!"

"My lord!" Litasse sprang to her feet.

He glared at her. "What are you doing here, my lady wife?"

She stiffened as she saw his anger cool to be replaced with sharp curiosity.

"I'm looking for some truth amid all this frenzy, just like you," Litasse said with asperity. She kept her eyes fixed on Iruvain, not daring to look at Hamare. "I have had as many hysterical letters from our vassals' ladies as you've had from their lords, my husband."

Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Hamare, black ink splashed across his face and the white collar of his shirt.

"It's a shame our vaunted intelligencer has lost his way so completely amid this blizzard of paper." Iruvain's scowl dared Hamare to speak. "But his failings are my concern, not yours." He gestured towards the door, his face hard. "Calm your servants, my lady, and forbid all foolish gossip until we really know what's going on in Draximal!"

What did he expect her to do? Stand over every scullion up to his elbows in greasy water? Follow every chambermaid around the castle to make sure they didn't speculate over their dusting? But Litasse had never seen Iruvain so furious. She nodded a prudent farewell. "Of course, my lord husband. Master Hamare, good day to you."

A bruise was darkening his cheek where the inkwell had struck him. He didn't smile but his eyes warmed to her. "My lady."

Iruvain didn't even do her the courtesy of opening the door before he turned on Hamare again. "Show me everything you have had from Draximal and Parnilesse in the past three days."

Litasse opened the door for herself and went out. She would have stopped on the far side, stooping to listen at the keyhole if need be--could Iruvain have been serious when he'd threatened Hamare with flogging? But two men from Iruvain's personal guard stood outside, imperfectly concealing their curiosity. What had they overheard?

"Your Grace." One of them bowed.

Was she imagining the insolence in his face? "Good morning."

"My lady." Valesti was waiting by the stairs, keeping her distance from Iruvain's attendants. Litasse could see she was as keen as the swordsmen to know what Hamare had said.

"We have letters to write." Litasse hurried down the stairs. "Send word to the stables to have couriers ready."

If Iruvain wouldn't listen to Hamare, she would at least do the spymaster the courtesy of taking his arguments seriously. Whatever was afoot, he had convinced her that this strife in Draximal was only part of some wider threat. Was there something going on in Vanam? She was inclined to think so now. If Iruvain wanted proof, she would do all she could to obtain it. She knew vassals whose ladies had cross-border ties that strained their loyalties. She knew which ones quietly traded with the furthest-reaching merchants. If they couldn't tell her what she needed to know, they might well know who else to ask.

It was only a pity that Duke Garnot of Carluse seemed to be as much a victim in all this as Duke Secaris of Draximal or Duke Orlin of Parnilesse. But that still didn't mean Duke Garnot wasn't the villain she knew him to be.

"What did Master Hamare say, Your Grace?" Valesti followed so close that she trod on Litasse's silken hem.

"Nothing of consequence." Litasse didn't dare look at her, in case the maidservant read the lie in her eyes.

She would tell her later. Whatever there had been between Karn and Valesti was done, wasn't it? She couldn't afford the delay the foolish woman's tears might cost her. It would be best to get her letters on the road before Iruvain finished berating the spymaster. What His Grace her husband didn't know about need not concern him.

Chapter Twenty-Eight.

Aremil Beacon Lane, in Vanam's Upper Town, 4th of For-Autumn of For-Autumn

How soon would early risers find the mornings starting to darken? For-Autumn would quickly see night's bells encroaching on servants' duties. Though at least it was a long half-season this year--forty-eight days.

Aremil carefully unlatched the shutters. The waning Greater Moon and the last shaving of the Lesser Moon were still visible in the pearlescent sky. He smiled as he recalled Tathrin's frustration with the vagaries of the calendar. Given that the Solstices and the Equinoxes marked fixed points in the year, why couldn't the intervals between them be divided equally as well? Why did the turn from winter to spring or summer to autumn have to be decided by the erratic phases of the two inconveniently synchronised moons?

Aremil's face turned solemn again. What could they possibly achieve in forty-eight days? Did Captain-General Evord plan on fighting right through the Equinox and the Autumn Festival? How long would the weather stay fine into Aft-Autumn? Fine enough for warfare? It was almost enough to persuade him to nail a prayer to the door of Dastennin's shrine. Or should he beseech Talagrin's favour? Why bother, when he had scant faith in any god or goddess?

He folded the wooden panels into the sides of the window embrasure and looked at the silent street. Those who could sleep would still be in their beds as the echoes of the darkness's final hour floated over the rooftops. Those who weren't setting out on a journey so urgent that every daylight hour must be spent on the road today.

He heard cautious footsteps on the stairs.

"I'm in here," he said quietly. It wouldn't do to wake Lyrlen.

"You're awake?" Branca entered the sitting room. She wore a plain green gown and a grey travelling cloak hung over one arm.

Aremil smiled crookedly. "I wanted to say goodbye."

"You couldn't sleep?" Branca looked at him.

He hesitated. "That too."

Every time he'd closed his eyes, he'd pictured the bodies Tathrin had tripped over on his nightmarish flight through the panicked town. He'd felt Tathrin's disgust at the jovial unconcern of Sorgrad and Gren when they'd caught up with Arest. Regrouping, making only a perfunctory count of the men who had died, the mercenaries had laughed as they'd drunk themselves foolish on purloined spirits, all the while mocking the peasants they'd so easily terrified. Only Tathrin and the newcomer, Reher, had stood silently apart, seeing no cause for celebration.

More disquieting still, Aremil knew he had only seen that chaotic night through Tathrin's subdued recollections. How much worse had it really been? How far had mage-kindled fires spread through the parched trees and fields? As Tathrin and Sorgrad had waited for Gren and Reher to rejoin them, the skies on the far side of the river had been black with smoke.

Branca pursed her lips. "I'll make us both a tisane."

"That would be welcome," Aremil admitted. Getting himself out of his bed in the back room was one thing. Dressing himself was quite another. With the hottest summer nights now past, the dawn was none too warm.

As he tucked his chilled feet under the hem of his chamber robe, he heard Branca stealthily filling the kettle. The scrape of the grate told him she was rousing the slumbering fire with a scatter of fresh coal. Aremil tensed. Thankfully, there was no sound of Lyrlen rousing.

Branca came back, pushing the door closed. "Being able to share Tathrin's thoughts over so many hundreds of leagues is all very well until he encounters something we'd rather not know about."