209 - The favour agreed on in conversation

Annike and I exchanged stories of what the Arkans had done to us, though mine was more about Yeola-e. She didn’t look like the sort of person you play for pity to. Still, she patted my hand like a mother when I was done, and said, “Your whole heart is in this war. It truly will be all or nothing for you.” Then, her eyes turning back into the clawprince’s: “Which makes you a good bet.”

She would speak with her son Vyasiv, who had more means, she said. She warned me away from three people who could not be trusted, and spoke of others whose hate for Arko was incorruptibly pure. “If you wish,” she said, “I shall write on your behalf to Mikhail called Farsight.” The name I recalled clearly. He was as close as the Praetanu had to a leader, one of the wealthiest people in the city. The door was open.

“What does Mikhail have against Arkans?” I asked her.

“The same thing all Brahvnikians down to the house-mice do, which you know, and a personal matter, more recently. Zingas Mikhail has four beautiful daughters, of whom he is immensely proud and dearly fond, in the strict way of old-house Zak, you understand. Are you familiar with the Thanish goatherd song?”

I had to say no. “Well… it is an insult-song,” she said. “There is a verse… well, you aren’t faint of heart, so I need not paraphrase, just translate. ‘Your daughter’s run away to Yeola-e; was her father’s love too close?’”

I understood; one who rapes not only a child, but his own. “Nothing to an Arkan, of course, but to a Zak, those are words that can only be overstruck in red,” Annike said. “Edremmas Forin, one of our Arkan members, sang it to Mikhail… in council.”

Having watched them in session, I could imagine it: the stunned silence falling over the ancient oaken chamber, the Zak lord, who’d had courtly manners bred into his family for a millennium, freezing as if run through. How do Arkans expect to stay powerful in the world, I thought, doing such things?

“Knowing what I know of Brahvnikian customs,” I said, “I would have thought that would bring a challenge.”

“It did. Edremmas, who is soft and fat, designated a champion. Mikhail would accept only Edremmas himself. He called him a coward to his face, but the Arkan just shrugged it off. Stalemate.” The Zak must be seething, I saw, frustrated of revenge that way. No doubt he was looking for another.

My appointment with him was made for the next morning; people seemed to understand that I was in a hurry, as the precious days of summer passed. I could feel every one turn, in the pit of my stomach. But while I was meeting with prominent Brahvnikians to shake them down, Esora-e, Krero and the others were recruiting, and this was going well already, as they put out the word quietly in the Knotted Worm and places of that ilk.

It was risky, with Arkan spies abounding, but our prospective hirelings were our best protection. Brahvniki was a port, so the battle of Haiu Menshir was common knowledge, showing me to be the thing that sell-swords like the most, aside from reliable payments: a commander likely to lead them to victory rather than death. They began signing on in scores, then hundreds.

Mikhail’s house was next to the Kreml, the citadel and palace where the Praetanu sits. His house was a small palace in itself, with walls and sentries and stonework carved F’talezonian style, like lace. At the main gate, which had brass hinges with spars a forearm long and polished to a fire-gleam, I spoke the password I’d been given, and we were let in, and had to speak the password three more times at various torch-lit gates and portals, the last one of which I went through alone.

Past that door, I was met by a dark-eyed girl with long dark hair who I would have thought was eight or nine by her height, but had the shape and manners of a fourteen or fifteen-year-old. One of the beloved daughters, I saw. She led me in by the hand, which I saw was a formal gesture of hospitality, through a maze of ornate wood-carved passages and stairways, the touch of her tiny fingers elegantly tender on mine. “We’ve never had a king visit before,” she said, in a way that showed that it was nothing untoward nonetheless.

Deeper in—the innermost rooms seemed to be underground—everything became subtly smaller, built for the short race that Zak are, so I had to duck first under lintels and then under ceilings.

Finally we came to a door made of tiny glass panes, sparkling like crystals, in the pattern of a phoenix rising from flames. I had to duck my head and bend my knees to get through it. Beyond in a room full of books and curios lit by a bright fire, waited Mikhail.

I remembered his face, a little. He was sitting in a velvet chair, but I guessed his head would come up to my collar-bone, if that. Edremmas, being Aitzas, was probably tall; such a challenge takes a certain courage. There was that in the Zak’s wide jaw and piercing black eyes that you would not want to cross.

“Welcome, young semanakraseye; let me look at you,” he said, making me feeling like a child in front of a visiting great-uncle, being measured, only I was too big and gawky instead of too small.

He was not one for long pleasantries; he shared the salt almost as soon as I’d sat down. “So,” he said. “Your nation’s in ruins, your people nine out of ten in chains, you have nothing but loans and need more; I have money, want more, hate Arkans and feel they have too much power in this corner of the world. I am clear one where we both stand, yes?”

I had to smile. I always liked bluntness. “I wouldn’t even have loans if I had nothing else, Teik Mikhail,” I said. The Zak style for addressing an equal seemed right here. “Not things you can count in your ledger-book, but they win wars. The funds I acquired while escaping from Arko, the allies I have united, the mercenaries I am already hiring, the victories I’ve either had a hand in or led, my ability, and the faith people have in me because of it.”

“But weren’t you in the House of Integrity in Haiuroru for half a year, rather recently?” he said, his bright black eyes unwavering.

“I was,” I said, fixing them with mine. “Now, as you can see, I am not.”

That was only the beginning. He got my full story out of me by grilling me like a tutor examining a student, and I saw it was best to let him. He had done his homework too, knowing the names of my war-teachers and friends and even the slaver Daisas. He showed nothing, not smile nor frown, to let me know what impression I was making.

When he knew all he wanted to, he said, “The Benaiat has loaned you twelve thousand at five per cent, and Vyasiv Gar’s Child fifteen hundred at seven. I generally do joint ventures, not loans, and once swore I’d never loan for under ten, but this is a special matter. I’ll give you five thousand at seven. But that is predicated on getting the alliances on paper which aren’t already. I am a businessman, not a politician like the Benaiat, or impulsive like Vyasiv. I haven’t got where I am by taking foolish risks.

“Further, I want a favour. I know you are not above arranging an assassination, semanakraseye, if the ultimate benefit accrues to Yeola-e.”

I didn’t need to ask who. “The daughter of yours I met seems thriving,” I said, running one finger along the arm of my chair to show him my hands weren’t shaking. “That is too precious a bond for anyone to blaspheme.”

I saw the first trace of feeling yet in his eyes. Part of it was resentment that I even knew; that had been the worst of it, that it was so public. “Five at seven contingent on alliances is certainly a fair loan,” I said. “But assassinations are generally done for flat fees, not loans.”

“Take it or leave it,” he said, just like that.

I sat back to think, and inwardly smooth my own ruffled feathers. “I know nothing of Edremmas,” I said, “except his name and that he is no noble and that he is likely to guard himself well. How would I found out about his habits, his house, where he goes, what sort of an escort he takes?”

No great surprise, he had a dossier, much of which, fortunately, was in Enchian. As I sat poring over it, wondering whether the Worm was the best place to hire assassins as well as mercenaries, he suddenly said, “Shchevenga, you killed Inkrajen with your own hand, didn’t you, when you were only fifteen? That would prove something… I’ll make it eight thousand at seven if you do it yourself.”

I drew myself up, looking at him hard, and realizing I’d been hoping for a chance to. The Zak have a word, zight, meaning face or pride, and it is an integral part of all dealings. “I don’t think so, Teik Mikhail.”

“You doubt you are able?” He leaned forward, a grin playing on his lips. Dealing was his life, I saw, as fighting is a warrior’s.

The opening I’d left purposely, as a warrior does. “No,” I said. “Of course I could. But when I killed Inkrajen, I was not yet semanakraseye. You are thinking I cannot afford to have zight; but in truth I can’t afford not to have it.” His eyes showed agreement to that. “It’s a matter of personal risk, too; I carry all my people’s hopes now, though of course that cannot preclude risk entirely. But, if you don’t mind me saying so, I’m worth more than three thousand ankaryel at seven per cent annually.” I let him chew on that for a bit, which he did impassively, then added, “For three as a flat fee, as well as the five at seven, I’ll do it.”

A smile flashed across his face, the kind of smile that you can tell means the person likes you. “It would be done where I could witness it myself,” he said. “Not that I don’t trust you, semanakraseye…”

We had a deal, it seemed, so I smiled and said, “Not to worry, I understand. You want to see him die.” It needed only the hand-clasp, the papers that said only “the favour agreed on in conversation,” and the Saekrberk. Krero was going to love me for this.

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