The Curse of Chalion

Cazaril stood back from him as ashes puffed, and frowned. "You're Roknari. Aren't you of the Quadrene faith?"

"No, my lord," said Umegat serenely. "I've been a devout Quintarian since my late youth."

"Did you convert when you came to Chalion?"

"No, when I was still in the Archipelago."

"How... came it about that you were not hanged for heresy?"

"I made it to the ship to Brajar before they caught me." Umegat's smile crimped.

Indeed, he still had his thumbs. Cazaril's brows drew down, as he studied the man's fine-drawn features. "What was your father, in the Archipelago?"

"Narrow-minded. Very pious, though, in his foursquare way."

"That is not what I meant."

"I know, my lord. But he's been dead these twenty years. It doesn't matter anymore. I am content with what I am now."

Cazaril scratched his beard, as Umegat traded for another bright bird. "How long have you been head groom of this menagerie, then?"

"From its beginning. About six years. I came with the leopard, and the first birds. We were a gift."

"Who from?"

"Oh, from the archdivine of Cardegoss, and the Order of the Bastard. Upon the occasion of the roya's birthday, you see. Many fine animals have been added, since then."

Cazaril digested that, for a little. "This is a very unusual collection."

"Yes, my lord."

"How unusual?"

"Very unusual."

"Can you tell me more?"

"I beg you will not ask me more, my lord."

"Why not?"

"Because I do not wish to lie to you."

"Why not?" Everyone else does.

Umegat drew in his breath and smiled crookedly, watching Cazaril. "Because, my lord, the crow picked me."

Cazaril's return smile grew a trifle strained. He gave Umegat a small bow and withdrew.

Cazaril was just exiting his bedchamber on the way to breakfast, some three mornings later, when a breathless page accosted him, grabbing him by the sleeve.

"M' lord dy Cazaril ! The castle warder begs you ‘tend on him at once, in the courtyard!"

"Why? What's the matter?" Obedient to this urgency, Cazaril swung into motion beside the boy.

"It's Ser dy Sanda. He was set upon last night by footpads, and robbed and stabbed!"

Cazaril's stride lengthened. "How badly was he injured? Where does he lie?"

"Not injured, m'lord. Slain!"

Oh, gods, no. Cazaril left the page behind as he clattered down the staircase. He hurried into the Zangre's front courtyard in time to see a man in the tabard of the constable of Cardegoss, and another man dressed as a farmer, lower a stiff form from the back of a mule and lay it out on the cobbles. The Zangre's castle warder, frowning, squatted down by the body. A couple of the roya's guards watched from a few paces back, warily, as if knife wounds might prove contagious.

"What has happened?" demanded Cazaril.

The farmer, in his courtier's garb taking, pulled off his wool hat in a sort of salute. "I found him by the riverside this morning, sir, when I took my cattle down to drink. The river curves—I often find things hung up upon the shoal. ‘Twas a wagon wheel, last week. I always check. Not bodies too often, thank the Mother of Mercy. Not since that poor lady who drowned herself, two years back—" He and the constable's man exchanged nods of reminiscence. "This one has not a drowned look."

Dy Sanda's trousers were still sodden, but his hair was done dripping. His tunic had been removed by his finders—Cazaril saw the brocade folded up over the mule's withers. The mouths of his wounds had been cleaned of blood by the river water, and showed now as dark puckered slits in his pale skin, in his back, belly, neck. Cazaril counted over a dozen strikes, deep and hard.

The castle warder, sitting on his heels, pointed to a bit of frayed cord knotted around dy Sanda's belt. "His purse was cut off. In a hurry, they were."

"But it wasn't just a robbery," said Cazaril. "One or two of these blows would have put him on the ground, stopped resistance. They didn't need to... they were making sure of his death." They or he? No real way to know, but dy Sanda could not have been either easy or safe to bring down. He rather thought they. "I suppose his sword was taken." Had he ever had time to draw it? Or had the first blow fallen on him by surprise, from a man he walked beside in trust?

"Taken or lost in the river," said the farmer. "He would not have floated down to me so soon if it had still been dragging him down."

"Did he have rings or jewelry?" asked the constable's man.

The castle warder nodded. "Several, and a gold ear loop." They were all gone now.

"I'll want a description of them all, my lord," the constable's man said, and the warder nodded understanding.

"You know where he was found," said Cazaril to the constable's man. "Do you know where he was attacked?"