The Merchants' War: Book Four of the Merchant Princes Read online

  The formal gardens in the grounds of the Thorold Palace had been a byword for splendor among the aristocracy of the Gruinmarkt for decades. The hugely rich clan of tinker families had spared no expense in building and furnishing their residence in the capital: individuals might dress to impress, but stone and rampart were the gowns of dynasties. Some might even think that Egon had brought his court to the captured palace because it was (in the aftermath of the fighting that had damaged the Summer Palace) the most fitting royal residence in the city of Niejwein. Rows of carefully cultivated trees marched alongside the high walls around the garden; rose beds, fantastically sculpted, blossomed before the windowed balconies fronting the noble house. A pool, surmounted by a grotesque fountain, squatted in the midst of a compass rose of gravel paths: beyond it, a low curved building glinted oddly through the falling rain. The walls were made of glass, huge slabs of it, unbelievably even in thickness and clear of hue, held in a framework of cast iron. Green vegetation shimmered beyond the windows, whole trees clearly visible like a glimpse into some fantastic tropical world. Egon strode towards it, not once glancing to either side, while his guards nervously paced alongside, eyes swiveling in every direction.

  Innsford hurried to keep up with the royal personage. He cleared his throat: “Your Majesty, if the tinkers suspect you are making free with their former estate—

  Egon rounded on him with a grimace. “It’s not their estate,” he snapped. “It’s mine. And don’t you forget it.” He continued, moderating his tone, “Why do you think everyone around me dresses alike?” His ill-humor slipped away. “Yes, they can send their assassins, but who is the assassin to shoot first? And besides, I will not stay here long.”

  They were at the orangery doors. “Where does your majesty wish his court to reside?” the duke inquired, almost casually.

  “Right here.” Egon flashed him a momentary grin. “While I play the King of Night and Mist.” He glanced over his shoulder at Sir Markus. “I need a beater for the royal hunt. Would you fancy the title of general?”

  Markus, a strapping fellow with an implausibly bushy mustache, thrust his chest out, beaming with pride: “Absolutely, sire! I am dizzy with delight at the prospect!”

  “Good. Kindly make yourself scarce for a few minutes. You too, Carlsen, I’ll have words with you both shortly but first I must speak in confidence with his grace.”

  The orangery doors were open and the guards completed their study: Egon stepped over the threshold, and the small gaggle of courtiers followed him. Innsford studied Markus sidelong. Some backwoods peer’s eldest son, beholden to Egon for his drinking space at a royal table, ancestral holdings down at heel over the past five decades: more interested in breaking heads and carousing than the boring business of politicking that his father before him was so bad at. And Egon had just casually offered him a post from which he could reap the drippings from the royal trencher? Innsford blinked slowly, watching the two young bloods bounce away into the glazed pavilion, marveling loudly and crudely about its trappings. “A beater for the hunt should hold the title of general?” he asked.

  “When you’re hunting for armies, why yes, I believe that is the custom.” His majesty’s lips quirked slightly, in what might have been intended to be a smile. “If I am in the field at the head of an army, I am clearly looking to the defense of my realm, am I not? Such a grand undertaking will have, I hope, a salutary effect on any secret ambitions the father of my betrothed might hold towards our lands. Leading an army against the tinkers will permit me to burnish my honor, strive for glory, and ensure that those who rally to my banner do so under my eyes so that their claims to the spoils of victory be adjudicated immediately.” Oh, so you don’t trust your vassals with sharp implements out of your sight? Innsford nodded gravely, while Sir Markus beamed like an idiot. A useful idiot, come to think of it. “And the tinker assassins will have little success in striking from the shadows if they do not know, from one day to the next, where I make my bed.”

  The duke nodded thoughtfully. “I am pleased by your majesty’s perspicacity and foresight,” he said carefully, thinking: Sky Father! He’s sharp. If Egon was going to go into the field at the head of an army, he was going to slay about six birds with one stone. Hunting down the tinker Clan’s holdings in the wild would compel them to confront him on his own terms, while making it difficult for their assassins to stick a knife in his ribs. An army in being would prevent the neighbors from getting any ideas about picking off a province here or a holding there. Meanwhile, Egon had rung a bell to make his backwoods vassal dogs salivate at the thought of loot: now he would go into the field to gather the leashes of the men they had released for service. He could simultaneously claim the lion’s share of the spoils he’d promised, while maintaining the appearance of generously disbursing loot to his followers. Handled carefully it would raise him to the stature of a true warrior king—somebody only fools or the truly desperate would scheme against—without the attendant risks of declaring war on one of the neighboring kingdoms. If it worked—“I see much in your plan to commend it.” Innsford paused. Egon had come to a halt in front of a bench at the center of a circle of low, dark green trees. Small orange fruits glimmered among their shadowy branches. “But you did not summon me here to tell me this.”

  “Indeed not.” Egon inhaled deeply, closing his eyes for a moment. Innsford sniffed, but his sinuses—chronically congested, the aftermath of a broken nose in his youth—stubbornly refused to disclose the cause of Egon’s blissful expression. The king opened his eyes: “I have some—problems. I believe you might be able to assist me in their resolution.”

  Ah. Here it comes. Innsford had lived through the reign of two kings before this young upstart: nevertheless, his stomach tingled and he felt a shiver of fear, as if a black cat walked across his future grave. “I am at your command, your majesty.”

  “While I am on campaign, I must look to the good cultivation of my earthly field.” Niejwein and territories, Innsford translated. “I must also look to the good administration of my army. Who am I to trust, in the halls of power while I am elsewhere?” For a moment the royal gaze fell on Innsford, unblinking and cold as any snake. “His grace of Niejwein is under threat from the tinker knives if he stays in the capital whose name he bears: perhaps he would be safer were he to undertake a pilgrimage to the southern estates? His eldest son will be all too pleased to look to the house hold’s duties in his father’s absence, while his grace could earn my gratitude by looking to the good management of those provinces.”

  Innsford stiffened. But Niejwein’s your man! he thought indignantly. Then he unpacked Egon’s plan further. Niejwein’s too powerful, here. Send him away from his power base while keeping his son—inexperienced—as a hostage, and he can serve your ends safely. Is that what you plan? “You have a task in mind for me.” It was an admission, but denying any awareness of the deeper political realities would merely suggest to Egon that he was too stupid to be of any use. And Innsford had a nasty inkling that being pigeonholed as useless by King Egon was unlikely to be conducive to a peaceful and prosperous old age. Especially if one was of high enough birth to conceivably be a threat.

  “Indeed.” Egon smiled again, that disturbing smirk with a telltale narrowing of the eyes. “Laurens—the next Duke of Niejwein, I should say—is none too bright himself. He’ll need his hand holding and his back watching.” The smirk faded. “The defense of Niejwein is no minor task, your grace, because I am certain the tinkers will attempt to retake the city. Their holdings are not well adapted to support a war of maneuver, and they are by instinct and upbringing cosmopolitans. Furthermore, Niejwein is the key to their necromantic trade with the land of shades. There are locations in this city that they need. I must assign an army to the defense of the capital, but I would be a thrice-damned fool to leave it in his grace of Niejwein’s own hands. Will you take it?”

  “I—” Innsford swallowed. “You surprise me.”

  “Not really!” Egon sa
id lightly. “You know as well as I the value of a certain—reputation.” His own reputation for bloody-handed fits of rage had served well enough at court to keep his enemies fearful. “Should you accept this task, then this palace will be yours—and your son Franz? He is well, I trust? I will be needing a page. Franz will accompany me and win glory on the battlefield, and in due course he will inherit the second finest palace in the land from his father’s prudence in this matter.”

  Innsford stared. “I wo-would be delighted to accept your gracious offer,” he forced out. You’re going to leave me in charge of this death trap while you take my son as your page? The audacity was offensive, but as an act of positioning it was a masterstroke: rebel against the king and Egon would already hold his firstborn hostage. But meanwhile… thoughts whirled in his head. “You expect the tinkers to try to retake the city, my liege?” he asked: “Is there sound intelligence to this effect?”

  “Oh, indeed.” Egon’s reply was equally casual in tone, and just as false. “I have my ways.” He smirked again. “Well, truth be told, I have my spies.” He chuckled dryly. “You understand more than you can politely say, my lord, so I shall say it for you: I trust no one. No one. But don’t let that fool you. The rewards for being true and constant to my service will be great and in time you’ll come round to my way of thinking, I’m sure. It is no blind ambition that desires my impression of your son: I have a nation to rid of witchcraft and nightmares, to make fit for men such as your son to live in. He will eventually play a privileged role at court; I would like to meet him sooner rather than later. But now—” He gestured at the orange grove around them. “—I have arrangements to make. There is a war to conduct, and once I have seen to my defense I must look to my arms.” He took another deep breath. “If success smells half so sweet as this, I shall count myself a lucky man.”

  The bench seat stank of leather, old sweat, gunpowder, and a cloying reek of fear. It rattled and bounced beneath Mike, to the accompaniment of a metallic squeaking like damaged car shock absorbers. His leg ached abominably below the knee, and whenever he tried to move it into a less painful position it felt as if a pack of rabid weasels was chewing on it. His face pressed up against the rear cushion of the seat as the contraption swayed from side to side, bouncing over the deep ruts in the cobblestone surface of the road.

  Despite the discomfort, he was calm: everything was distant, walled off from him by a barrier of placid equanimity, as if he was wrapped in cotton wool. They’ll kill me when they find out, he told himself, but the thought held no fear. Wow, whatever Hastert stuck me with is really smooth.

  Not that life was entirely a bed of roses. He winced at a particularly loud burst of gunfire rattling past the carriage window. One of the women on the other bench seat rattled off something in hochsprache: he couldn’t follow it but she sounded scared. The old one tut-tutted. “Sit down, you’ll only get your head blown off if you give them a target,” she said in English.

  More hochsprache: something about duty, Mike thought vaguely.

  “No, you shouldn’t…”

  The distinctive sound of a charging handle being worked, followed by a gust of cold air.

  Crack. The sound of a rifle firing less than a meter from his ear penetrated Mike’s haze. He pushed back against the seat back, rolling onto his back just as a particularly violent pot-hole tried to swallow one of the carriage’s rear wheels, and the shooter fired again: a hot brass cartridge case pinged off the back of the seat and landed on his hand. Curiously, it hurt.

  “Ow—” He twitched, shaking the thing off, wincing repeatedly as the woman in the fur coat leaning out of the carriage window methodically squeezed off another three shots. What’s the word for…? “My leg, it hurts,” he tried.

  “Speak English, your accent’s atrocious,” said the old woman. “It won’t fool anyone.”

  Mike stared at her. In the semi-darkness of the carriage her face seemed to hover in the darkness, disembodied. Outside the window, men shouted at each other. The carriage lurched sideways, then bounced forward, accelerating. The shooter withdrew her head and shoulders from the window. “That is all of them for now, I believe,” she announced, with an accent of her own that could have passed for German. She glanced at Mike, mistrustfully, and adjusted her grip on the gun. The real moon, outside, scattered platinum highlights off her hair: for a moment he saw her face side-lit, young and striking, like a Russian princess in a story, pursued by wolves.

  “Close the window, you don’t want to make a target of yourself,” said the old biddy from beneath the pile of rugs. “And I don’t want to catch my death of cold.” A cane appeared from somewhere under the heap, ascending until it battered against the carriage roof. “Shtoppan nicht, gehen’su halt!” She was old, but her lungs were good. She glanced at Mike. “So you’re awake, are you?”

  Answering seemed like too much of an effort, so Mike ignored her: it was much easier to simply close his eyes and try to keep his leg still. That way the weasels didn’t seem to bite as hard.

  A moment later, the cane poked him rudely in the ribs. “Answer when you’re spoken to!” snapped the Russian princess. He opened his eyes again. The thing prodding his side wasn’t a cane, and she might be pretty, but she was also clearly angry. Is it something I did? he wondered hazily. “Where am I?”

  “In a carriage,” said the old woman. “I’d have thought that was obvious.” She snorted. “The question you meant to ask is, how did I end up in this carriage in particular?”

  “Jah: and, how am I, it, to leave, alive?” The Russian princess gave his ribs a final warning poke, then withdrew into the opposite corner of the cramped cabin, next to the old woman. Mike tried to focus: as his eyes adjusted he saw that under her fur coat she was wearing a camouflage jacket. The rifle—he focused some more—was exotic, some sort of foreign bullpup design with a huge night vision scope bolted above its barrel. Blonde bombshell with fur coat and assault rifle. His gaze slid sideways to take in the older one, searching for reassurance: she smiled crookedly, one eyebrow raised, and he shuddered, déjà vu spiking through his guts as sharply as the pain from his damaged leg.

  “That’s enough, Olga,” the old lady said sharply, never taking her eyes off Mike. “We’ve met, in case you’d forgotten.”

  Oh shit. The penny dropped: that’s the entire mission blown! He stared at her in mortified disbelief, at a complete loss for words. His mind flashed back to events earlier in the evening, to a hurried snatch of conversation with Miriam, the way she’d stared at him in perplexity as if she couldn’t quite fathom the meaning of his reappearance in her life: now he felt the same scene repeating, horribly skewed. “You were—” he paused. “Mrs. Beckstein. Well…” His lips were as dry as the day when Miriam had casually suggested they stop off on their way to the restaurant to say hello, just for ten minutes, so you’ve met my mother—“I’m surprised. I thought you’d adopted Miriam? What are you doing here?”

  Olga, the Russian princess as he’d started thinking of her, glared at him malevolently: her rifle pointed at the floor, but he had no doubt she could bring it to bear on his head in an eyeblink. But Mrs. Beckstein surprised him. She began to smile, and then her smile widened, and she began to chuckle, louder and louder until she began to wheeze and subsided into a fit of coughing. “You really believed that? And you saw us together? What kind of cop are you?” Something else must have tweaked her funny bone because a moment later she was off again, lost in a paroxysm of thigh-slappingly disproportionate mirth. Or maybe it was just relief at being out of the fire-fight.

  “I do not see the thing that is so funny,” Olga said, almost plaintively.

  “Ah, well, but he was such a nice young—” Mrs. Beckstein began coughing again. Olga looked concerned, but given a choice between keeping Mike under observation and trying to help the older woman—“Sorry, dear,” she told Olga, when she got her voice back. “That’s how Miriam described you.” She nodded at Mike. “Before she changed her mind.”
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  Mike closed his eyes again. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, is this a fuckup! He winced: obviously demons were feeding his leg-weasels crystal meth. “He’s called Mike,” Mrs. Beckstein continued remorselessly, “Mike something-beginning-with-F, I’ve got it in my diary. And he works for the Drug Enforcement Agency. Or he used to work for the DEA. Do you still work for the DEA, Mike?”

  He opened his eyes, unsure what to do: the painkillers were subsiding but he still felt unfocused, blurry about the edges. “I’m not supposed to talk—”

  “You will talk, boy.” Mrs. Beckstein glared at him, and he recoiled at the anger in her expression. “You can take your chances with me, or you can make your excuses to my half-brother’s men, but you are going to talk sooner or later.” She glanced at Olga. “Sometimes I can’t believe my luck,” she said dryly. She turned back to Mike, her expression harsh: “What have you done with my daughter?”

  “I—” Mike stopped. Time seemed to slow. My brother’s men. Jesus, she’s been one of them all along! How deep does this go? He shuddered, his guts churning. Until now he’d known, understood in the abstract, that Miriam was involved with these alien gangsters, narcoterrorists from Middle Earth: even meeting Miriam, dressed up for a medieval wedding in the middle of an exploding castle, hadn’t really shaken what he’d thought he knew. But Miriam’s mother was a different matter entirely, a disabled middle-aged woman living quietly in a small house in New England suburbia—they’re everywhere! He swallowed, choking back hysterical laughter. “I don’t know where she went. She said she had a, one of the lockets, got it from a friend. Said she’d be in touch later. There was a perp in black, tried to stab her so I shot him—”

  “Why?”

  “Orders.” He cleared his throat. “They told me, talk to her. Offer her whatever she…well, anything.”

  Mrs. Beckstein glanced at the Russian princess: evidently her expression meant something because a moment later she turned back to him. “You’re colluding with Egon.”