He went nowhere that night. Nowhere that Anna Mozilla did not take him.

He began his rounds immediately after returning to the Bruglioni citadel. After dealing with several minor annoyances, he snapped, "You have to figure these things out for yourself, Mr. Phone. I won't be here to think for you forever."

Madam Ristoti would not be cowed. "Mr. Hecht. What about my request for more help? I have too many mouths to fill and too few hands to do the filling."

"You're allowed three new people. You know what you need. You hire them. Don't thank me. Thank my Deve accountant. He can talk Paludan into anything. Paludan thinks numbers are magic. You also get a sixty percent increase in your purchasing budget. So serve something besides turnip stew."

Madam Ristoti grinned. "They liked that, did they?"

"Exactly as much as you expected."

"A rare show of sympathy, men."

"Sympathy had nothing to do with it. Uncle Divino told Paludan that he was going to lose staff if he fed them that slop. The city is getting ready to go to war. There are alternate opportunities for the working cla.s.ses."

"There you are, sir."

"Polo. I wondered how long it would take."

"Sir?" Polo did not understand that his allegiance to Princ.i.p.ate Bruglioni was obvious.

"It's all right," Else said.

"Uh... Paludan wants to see you. He isn't happy. But I don't think it's your fault."

"Guess we'd better see what he wants, then."

The citadel had changed. Cleaning was nearly complete. Cosmetic restoration was well underway. Halls that had been gloomy and barren of human enterprise swarmed with rustic Bruglioni returnees.

Polo led the way to Paludan's personal suite. He whispered, "His mistress might be there. Pretend not to see her."

"He has a mistress?" Else had discounted the rumors because he thought there would have been more talk if they were true.

"Everybody gets a mistress once he reaches a certain station. It's one of the ornaments of status. The higher your status, the finer your mistress. When you get real big, you have two mistresses. The Patriarch has three! They've given him four or five children. But the cognoscenti think he prefers boys."

"Aren't priests supposed to be celibate?"

"That's a rule that'll be honored only in the breech until the Carillon of Judgment."

"Really? Where do the women come from?" Why did Rodrigo Cologni not take himself a few mistresses? He would be alive today.

Polo shrugged. "Wherever a man finds them. Princ.i.p.ate Doneto sleeps with Carmella Dometia, the wife of his man Gondolfo. He's been doing that since Carmella was twelve. He arranged her marriage. He fathered both of her children. He makes sure that Gondolfo's life is good, though Gondolfo spends most of it as the Benedocto factor in the Eastern Empire. Where, no doubt, he has a mistress of his own."

Polo added, "And, like soldiers, women also come to Brothe seeking their fortunes."

"So there's no shortage of exploitable workers, soldiers, or s.l.u.ts."

Polo felt no empathy. "Men sell their muscle. Women sell their s.e.x. If they're beautiful, personable, and can please a man, they'll do well." He rapped on Paludan's door. "Polo, sir. With Captain Hecht." Hearing an invitation that Else did not, Polo opened the door.

If Paludan had a woman with him he had disguised her cleverly. "Captain Hecht. Thanks for coming." Like Else had a choice.

Paludan had begun acc.u.mulating people skills, despite himself.

"Sir."

"The sad day has come. The one I wasn't looking forward to but which I can't prevent."

"Sir?"

"Divino says it's time to move you. So you can concentrate on getting ready for the war. I don't want you to go. That'll leave me out of excuses. Uncle Divino will throw your name in my face every time I let something slide."

"All I ever did was what you hired me to do."

"Sure. And it's all turned out for the best."

"I hope so."

Paludan pulled himself together. What he had to say was difficult. "We'll miss you, Captain. I never found your presence comfortable but it was always positive. You injected hope and ambition into the family. That was a precious gift. Go to the Collegium confident that I'll behave like a grown-up with real responsibilities."

Else nodded. "Of course."

"And thank you for not creating a situation that would've cost me my only real friend. You had him in your power."

Well. Paludan could strike the occasional spark of surprise.

"I did what seemed best. I've enjoyed my stay here. The challenges were tough but not insurmountable."

"Your new job will present challenges you're better suited to handle."

"It's the work I was raised and trained to do, sir. Just between us, though, I don't enjoy it. Though I am good at it."

"You'll make your mark. Here. Take this. A mark of my grat.i.tude for awakening this house." Paludan handed him a doeskin bag. "Myself, in particular."

"Thank you, sir. Though I'm not sure it's deserved."

Paludan shrugged. "Be that as it may. Polo! Come here."

"Sir?"

"Get ready to move. There's a major planning meeting this afternoon. Uncle Divino wants Captain Hecht settled in beforehand."

Else was not surprised that Polo would accompany him. That colorless little man would be within a stone's throw as long as Piper Hecht was involved with Princ.i.p.ate Bruglioni and the Collegium.

ELSE CONSIDERED THE DOESKIN PURSE WHILE POLO FINISHED loading their possessions. He eased off the drawstrings carefully.

"How much did he give you?" Polo asked.

"There's some of those tiny little gold pieces, like fish scales. And a handful of silver. All of it foreign."

Polo grinned. "He didn't change all his stripes, did he?"

Else offered Polo two silver coins and one little gold piece no more substantial than a scale off a carp. Polo made them vanish instantly. He said, "Paludan doesn't know but I've been working on this since yesterday. That's when the Princ.i.p.ate told me we'd be moving."

"Which would be where?"

"The Chiaro Palace. Isn't it amazing?" Polo babbled about the Chiaro Palace vast, rich, labyrinthine, a city curled up inside the Mother City. A holy city well and truly saturated with everything unholy.

Else dug out the one item the purse must have been intended to convey.

That was a plain gold ring. Or, not so plain, he discovered as he turned it in the available light.

Characters were engraved on the ring. They could be seen only when the light struck it at certain angles. When held just right those characters stood out boldly, in black, as though in calligraphy.

A magic ring?

Certainly. But what kind of magic ring? It came without instructions. Maybe he was not supposed to notice.

Its ultimate source must be Divino Bruglioni. But why so obscure a means of delivery?

Perhaps Princ.i.p.ate Divino was worried that someone inappropriate would notice if the ring changed hands another way. Though Else was pretty sure that he was not supposed to notice the engraving. Maybe n.o.body who lacked a special wrist amulet would. Or maybe the ring was just another lump of gold and the engraving had to do with plighted troth five hundred years ago.

"What's so fascinating about that ring, sir?"

"I'm not sure. It's relaxing, fiddling with it."

"Oh. Clemency in used one of those big purple freshwater pearls. And my father had a smooth round stone from the Holy Lands. So maybe it makes sense."

"It's well worn. I'm not the first to play with it." He started to drop it into a pocket. And got the distinct impression that it did not want that.

He slid it onto the ring finger of his left hand, which seemed to satisfy it.

THE CHIARO PALACE WAS VAST, A SMALL CITY IN ITSELF. ELSE'S new suite was a dozen times the size of what he had enjoyed in the Bruglioni citadel.

"These rooms are huge, Polo! Nomad tribes could camp in here." It was too big. It made him uncomfortable.

He did like being so close to the wellspring of western power, just a stone's throw from the mad Patriarch.

He was where Gordimer and er-Rashal could have hoped he would be only in their wildest imaginings.

He wandered the apartment in search of obvious wrongness.

He found nothing. But he had expected to find nothing. These people would be subtle.

"Polo, see about stocking our larder. I'm going to lie down till I have to go show the Patriarch how to conquer the world."

Polo suggested, "We could have your woman friend come in to cook. She could live in."

"I don't think so."

"There're baths. If you want to use them." Polo leered.

The Chiaro Palace baths were legendary.

"Really?" Else suspected that, like most things ordinary people never saw, the Chiaro baths were much less wicked than imagined. "You'll have to show me later."

"I'm only saying. I don't know my way around. I've only been here once, when Princ.i.p.ate Bruglioni had me come see the apartment."

Else prowled the suite again, paying special attention to the room Polo had designated his work area. He wanted Polo out of the way. "Get busy with the food and supplies situation."

How often would he get to see Anna, now? Success brought its own complications.

ELSE MADE HIMSELF COMFORTABLE IN HIS NEW WORKs.p.a.cE. He studied the ring from Paludan's purse. The gift made him nervous. If gift it was. Might Paludan have been unaware of its presence?

Magic rings lurked large in folklore and legend alike. They served no one well.

Rings of power figured in the myths of the pre-Chaldarean cults of the north and of the cold swamps whence Piper Hecht supposedly sprang. Else learned what he could about that far culture whenever he had a chance. Someone asked him about his homeland almost daily, mostly out of curiosity. He dared not be wrong. Someone would notice.

He glared at the gold band. "Are you Grinling, the ring that was forged for the All-Father by the Aelen Kofer?" The Trickster stole that ring and hid it in the belly of the king of the ice bears. The hero Gedanke challenged the king of the ice bears to a battle with the king bear's liver at stake because a soothsayer told Gedanke that only a taste of the liver of the king of the ice bears would save the children of Amberscheldt from a deadly plague. Gedanke found Grinling when he went after the ice bear's liver.

Grinling bore a curse because the All-Father failed to give the Aelen Kofer everything they demanded in payment. The ring always betrayed anyone who wore it. Including Gedanke himself when the All-Father sent the Choosers of the Slain to reclaim Grinling. Arlensul fell in love with Gedanke, bore him a son, and, thus, sealed all their dooms. "If you are Grinling, ring, I don't want you near me."

Grinling's full tale was dark and cruel. It included rape, murder, incest, and a deadly squabble between the Old G.o.ds and the even older G.o.ds who came before. G.o.ds so grim they terrified the current Instrumentalities of the Night Character by character Else deciphered each word etched into the ring. Careful angle shifts betrayed additional characters etched in almost the same places as others already revealed. Then he discovered more inscriptions on the inside. He recorded everything painstakingly. And sighed with relief after his tabulation of the Grinling myth.

None of the inscriptions were in the northern heathen stick characters.

He did not understand what he transcribed. The writing on the outside could be precla.s.sical Brothen. The interior inscription was in a different language and alphabet, in characters so tiny Else could not imagine them having been etched by hand. Many were too worn to record accurately.

He wished he could escape to the Deve quarter. Gledius Stewpo would know somebody who could tell him what the ring was all about.

THE CHIARO BATHS RESEMBLED SOMETHING FROM THE FANTASIES of wicked eastern potentates. Wine and females were plentiful-though the girls were not there for sport, apparently. Else did not see any of that. He did see wrinkled old Princ.i.p.ates being slithered over by litters of hairless, well-oiled youngsters.

A naked youth approached, "I'm Gleu, sir." Gleu had a strong accent "I'll help with your clothing."

"This is my first visit, Gleu. How does it work?"

"There aren't many rules, sir. You go to the hot baths-or to the cold, if that's your preference-and choose the girls you want to bathe you. Or the boys, if that's your preference. You don't touch. Unless you're invited. If you do you'll be fined. Second time, they'll fine you again and bar you for two weeks. After the third time you'll be banned forever. Your behavior can even bring you under the lash. So says the Holy Father."

"So there was a time when other rules existed."

"Yes, sir."

Service in the baths was a form of social welfare for orphans and abandoned children. Attractive children, of course. They received food and shelter. Their service needed be no more demeaning than they desired. Clearly, though, if their standards were relaxed their tips would be larger.

"Them that save carefully can be well off when they leave." Those who did not earn good tips or take care often graduated to service in the lowest cla.s.s of brothel. "You will want girls, won't you?"

"Yes."

Gleu took Else to a room where several score girls, from seven to eighteen, of varied race, waited to help the princes of the Church and their a.s.sociates bathe and relax. Else hesitated.