The Autumn Republic

Tamas spurred his horse back to Olem. “The laundress is going with us.”

“Yes sir. It’s almost the appointed time.”

Tamas gave a silent prayer of thanks that Olem had accepted the news without comment. “Send a man ahead. Vlora, you have command until I return. If anything happens, kill Ipille’s Privileged first, and then Ipille.”

“Yes sir.”

Tamas led his delegation across the lonely field to the outskirts of the town, where they waited for their messenger to return and tell them that Ipille was already in the chapel. They dismounted and left their horses tied beside one of the small houses, then walked the last hundred yards of the journey.

Two of the Kez royal guard flanked the chapel. Tamas looked them up and down-they wore gold on black, with gray trim. Their feathered, flat-top hats were tipped forward, chin straps hugging their jaws. Dark, unflinching eyes gazed back at Tamas, and he wished he had his powder cabal with him. The Kez royal guard was not to be trifled with. He doubted even Olem’s Riflejacks measured up to them.

“I’m here to see your king,” Tamas said.

One of them snapped a nod and turned sharply on his heel to open the chapel door. Olem left two men, one for each of the Kez, and then went first, followed by Lady Winceslav and Nila. Three of Tamas’s generals, two colonels, and a lawyer who had come along with Lady Winceslav filed inside.

Taniel hung back, a sour look on his face as if he’d swallowed a lime whole.

Tamas waited patiently for Taniel to finally come forward. “It’s time to end this,” Tamas said.

A muscle jumped in Taniel’s jaw. For a moment, Tamas thought his son’s discipline would fail him, but ever the soldier, Taniel gave a sharp nod and headed in, leaving Tamas to steel his own emotions before he followed to complete the delegation.

The chapel was poorly lit by a single window on the eastern side. It was one large room, only about twenty feet by thirty. The pews had been stacked along the walls and a large table brought in, covered with a gold cloth and a small feast of fruits and desserts. Candelabras had been lit and artwork hung along the walls-no doubt, additions made by Ipille’s retinue to give some semblance of royalty to the place.

A small group of politicians occupied the far end of the table. Field Marshal Goutlit sat on one side with a pair of generals Tamas did not recognize. On the other was a thin woman with delicate, birdlike features in the official tan-and-green robe of the Kez royal cabal. Beside her sat a pale, limp-looking fellow named Duke Regalish-Ipille’s closest adviser. A few other noblemen stood along the back wall.

Ipille himself sat at the head of the table.

He’d grown morbidly obese since the last time they had met, the night Tamas had tried to kill him. Once a dapper lion of a man, he sat stuffed into a chair that would have been big enough for a pair of grenadiers. He wore swaths of cloth; thick, bristling furs draped over his shoulders, trimmed with gold, and on his fingers rubies that would make an Arch-Diocel blush.

“Tamas.” Ipille’s voice sounded like the inside of a bass drum, and his jowls shook when he spoke.

“Ipille.”

A chair scraped the stone floor, and Duke Regalish shot to his feet. “You will address his august majesty as ‘Your Royal Highness.’ He is a king, you common cur, and you will treat him as such.”

“Shall I put this dog down?” Olem asked, his hand resting on the hilt of his smallsword.

Tamas let his silence speak for him, letting Regalish stand quivering with indignation until Ipille turned his head toward his adviser. “Sit down, my good duke. Your whimpering will have no effect on Tamas. He is a man of iron. Iron does not bend. It only shatters.”

Tamas clasped his hands behind his back and tried to focus through the pain in his side.

Ipille’s fat fingers drummed heavily on the oak table as Olem made his way silently around the room. He bent to lift the tablecloth, then strolled around the table, looking over each of the advisers with a studious eye, ignoring their baleful glares.

“What is this, Tamas?”

“Precaution.”

“We’re here under a flag of truce, are we not?”

“Come now, Your Moribund Majesty. You took your precaution by arriving first. I take mine now.”

Ipille’s deep chuckle forestalled another outburst from Regalish.

Olem finished his search and gave Tamas a nod, and Tamas gestured to the chairs on his end of the table. “Ipille, I will introduce Lady Winceslav-I believe you’ve met. My son, Major Taniel Two-shot. Privileged Nila of the Adran Republic Cabal. Members of my senior staff.”

“Charmed,” the king said. “You know Regalish. I believe you killed his uncle. Some of my advisers back there,” he said with a dismissive wave. “Field Marshal Goutlit. Magus Janna.” Another of Ipille’s deep chuckles. “We’re both scraping the bottom of the barrel when it comes to Privileged, are we not? Sad times.”

Tamas gestured for his companions to sit, then took his own place at the opposite end of the table from Ipille. “I’d wager on my own companion in a fight.”