Four and Twenty Blackbirds bv-4 Read online

  He gave her a look of startled admiration. "I don't know, my Lady Bishop," he replied with new respect. "I did consider that solution, but it doesn't seem to match the circumstances. Shall I continue?"

  She gestured at him to do so, and continued to listen to his descriptions, not only of the chain of murder-suicides in Haldene, but similar crimes that he had uncovered with patient inquiry over the countryside. They began in a chain of villages and towns that led to Haldene, then moved beyond.

  Beyond—to Kingsford, which was the next large city in the chain, if the pattern was to follow the Kanar River.

  He came to the end of his chain of reasoning just as she came to that realization.

  "Interesting." She watched him narrowly; he didn't flinch or look away. "And you think that Kingsford is now going to be visited by a similar set of occurrences? That is what brought you here?"

  "Yes, High Bishop," he told her, and only then did he raise a hand to rub at his eyes, wearily. "I do. And now I must also make a confession to you."

  "I am a Priest," she said dryly. "I'm rather accustomed to hearing them."

  She had hoped to invoke at least a faint smile from him, but all he did was sigh. "I fear that I am here under somewhat false pretenses. Iwas a constable of Haldene, but I'm rather afraid that I am no longer. I began investigating this string of tragedies over the objections of my superiors; I continued against their direct orders. When they discovered what I had learned, they dismissed me." He waited to see if she was going to react to that, or say something, and continued when she did not. "I would have quit in any case, when I saw where this—series of coincidences—was heading." He smiled, with no trace of humor. "There is a better chance that the King will turn Gypsy tomorrow than that my superiors would permit me to take leave to inform authorities in Kingsford about this. After all, the plague has left Haldene; it is no longer a problem for those in authority there."

  "I . . . see." She wondered for a moment if he was going to ask her for a position. Had all of this been manufactured just to get her attention? "Have you gone to the Captain of the constables in Kingsford?"

  "I tried," he replied, and this time hedid smile faintly. "He's not an easy man to get to."

  "Hmm. True." In fact, Captain Fenris was the hardest man tofind in Kingsford, but not because he was mewed up in an office behind a battery of secretaries. It might take weeks before Tal was able to track him down. "I believe that at the moment he is on double-shift, training the new recruits. He could be anywhere in the city at any given moment, and his second-in-command is unlikely to make any decisions in a situation like this."

  "More to the point, I'm hardly going to get a glowing recommendation from my former superiors in Haldene, if his second-in-command were to make an inquiry about me," Tal pointed out. "They'll probably tell him I'm a troublemaker with a history of mental instability."

  Honest. And he hasn't said a word about wanting a position.

  "I will admit that I'm becoming obsessed with this case," Tal continued, and then she saw a hint, just the barest glimpse, of something fierce and implacable. It gazed at her out of his eyes for a moment, then vanished. "Who or whatever is behind this, I want it stopped."

  "And you want from me?" Ardis spread her hands. Now, if there was going to be a plea for anything, she had given Tal an opening.

  He hesitated. "I want—authority," he said finally. "Credentials. Not a great deal, just enough that if anyone asks me why I'm snooping around, I can say I'm acting on your behalf and with your knowledge. Of course, I'll keep you informed every day, even if I find nothing, and I won't actuallydo anything unless it is to stop a murder in progress. I won't search houses or people, I won't try and haul anyone off to gaol, I won't threaten or bully. I'll just observe and ask questions."

  Ardis graced him with her most skeptical look. "And that's all you want?"

  "Well, obviously I'dlike to have all of the Kingsford constables working on this, I'dlike the services of a mage, and I'dlike four or five personal assistants," he replied a little sarcastically. "But I'd also like to be made Captain of the constables, stop this madness before it infects Kingsford, and be rewarded with the Grand Duke's daughter. Obviously none of this is possible, so I'm asking for the least I need to continue to track this case."

  "And what had you planned to do to make ends meet?" she asked bluntly. "I assume you aren't independently wealthy."

  He shrugged. "I was working on the case in my off-time anyway. I have enough muscle and experience to get a job as a private guard, or even a peace-keeper in a tavern. I can still work on it in my off-time, and without being harassed for doing so, if I can just get minimal credentials."

  So, he's willing to support himself in a strange city just so that he can continue following this—whatever it is. He's right. He's obsessed. I wish more people would become that obsessed when it is necessary.

  "Let me assume for the moment that there reallyis a—force—that is causing these deaths. It occurs to me that alerting the entire constabulary to this case might also make that force go into hiding," she said aloud, not quite willing to answer his request yet.

  "That could easily be true," he agreed. "Which is, unfortunately, a good reasonnot to inform Captain Fenris—or at least, to ask him not to inform the rest of the constabulary. And it also occurs to me that this force knows a great deal about how both investigation and magic operate." He raised one eyebrow at her. "It hadn't escaped my notice that every one of the suicides was eitherby means of running water orunder running water—even the jeweler."

  Now she was surprised, for she had thought that last horrific case had all been perpetrated indoors. "How could the jeweler—"

  "He worked with acids, and he had a kind of emergency downpour rigged in his studio," Tal replied. "He had a pipe coming down from his rooftop cistern that ended in the ceiling of his studio, with a valve on the end that was operated by a string with a drain beneath it. After he drank his acids and poisons, he staggered over beneath the pipe and pulled the string. When he was found, the cistern was empty—the initial investigation missed that, because by then the floor was dry." He looked at her expectantly.

  "Obviously I don't have to tell you that running water is the only certain means of removing evidence of magic." She tapped the ends of her forefingers together and frowned. "This is beginning to form a picture I don't like."

  "Because most of thehuman mages are in the Church?" Tal asked quietly.

  Surprised, but pleased at his audacity, she nodded. "There is the possibility that it is not a human, but frankly—what you've told me fits no pattern of a nonhuman mind that I am aware of. At least, not a sane one, and the nonhuman races are very careful not to allow their . . . problems . . . to escape to human lands."

  "Just as we are careful not to let ours escape to theirs," he corroborated. "Still. Elves?"

  She shook her head. "Elves take their revenge in a leisurely fashion, and an artistic one. This is both too sordid and too hasty for Elves to be involved."

  "Haspur aren't mages, nor Mintaks, nor Deliambrens," he said, thinking out loud. "It could be someone from a very obscure race—but then, I'd have known about him; he'd stand out in those neighborhoods like a white crow. What about Gypsies? I've heard some of them are mages."

  Again, she hesitated. "There are bad Gypsies—but the Gypsies are very careful about policing their own people. If this is a Gypsy, he has somehow eluded hunters from among his own kind, and that is so difficult that I find it as unlikely as it being an Elf. I have information sources among them, and I have heard nothing of—"

  She stopped in midsentence, suddenly struck by something. Her cousin's letter—

  Tal waited, watching her expectantly.

  "I was about to say that I have heard nothing of this," she said very slowly, "but I have hadsome distressing information from my sources. The victims—have they by any chance been Free Bards or Gypsies?"

  Again, she got a startled look from him. "I can only
speak for the cases in Haldene; I didn't get much detail on the ones in the other towns and villages, and frankly, I didn't spend much time investigating when I learned that the murders were going in the direction that I had feared. No Free Bards, and only one Gypsy," he told her, licking his lips. "But—perhaps this will seem mad to you, which is why I hesitated to mention it—every one of the dead women was either a musician of sorts, or posing as one."

  Ardis pursed her lips. "So. There is a link between the victims, even when they seem disparate in everything but their poverty."

  I don't like this. I don't like this at all.Ardis was not aware that she was frowning until she caught a brief glimpse of worry on Tal's face. She forced her expression into something smoother.

  "I believe you, Tal Rufen," she said at last. "Anyone planning to hoodwink me would have concocted something less bizarre and more plausible."

  The constable's visible relief conjured at least a tiny smile onto her face. "So you'll vouch for me if I have trouble getting information?" he asked hopefully.

  "I'll do more than that." She pulled the bell-cord that summoned Kayne from the next room. When the novice arrived, eyes brimming with suppressed curiosity, Ardis motioned for her to sit down as well.

  "Tal, this is Novice Kayne, my personal secretary. I suspect you will be working at least peripherally together." They eyed one another warily; a grayhound and a mastiff trying to decide if they were going to be friends or not. She hid her amusement. "Kayne, I am making Tal one of the Abbey Guards, and my personal retainer." She smiled a bit wider as they both turned startled eyes on her. "Please get him the appropriate uniforms and see that he has housing with the others. A room to himself, if you please, and a key to the garden doors; his hours are likely to be irregular. He is going to be a Special Inquisitor, so draw up the papers for him. No one else is to know of that rank for the moment except you and the Guard-Captain, however. To the rest, he is simply to be my Personal Guard."

  Kayne's eyes danced with excitement; this was obviously the sort of secret she had hoped to be privy to when Ardis appointed her to her post. "Yes, High Bishop. At once. Guard Rufen, have you any belongings you wish me to send to your quarters?"

  "I have a pack-mule in your courtyard, and a riding-mule," Tal said dazedly. "I left them tied to the post there."

  "I'll see that they are taken care of." She rose quickly to her feet, and looked briefly to Ardis for further instructions.

  "You can come back for him here," Ardis said. "Oh—and draw out his first quarter's pay, would you?"

  "Of course, High Bishop." The young woman left in a swirl of rust-colored robes and anticipation.

  Ardis settled back in her chair, secretly a little pleased to have so startled the stone-faced constable. "There are times when it is very useful to have no one to answer to but one's own self. So, Guard Rufen, you are now a Special Inquisitor. That means that no one can hinder you in whatever you wish to ask or wherever you wish to go. That which is told to you is under the same veil of secrecy as the Confessional; you may tell it to no one except your direct superior, which is myself, since you are the only Inquisitor the Kingsford Abbey now boasts. Within reason, and Kayne will tell you when you have transgressed those bounds, you may requisition anything you need from the Abbey resources. That includes bribe-money—"

  She laughed at his shocked expression. "Oh, come now, Inquisitor Rufen—do you take me for a cloistered unworldly? You will have to bribe people; often only money will loosen the tongue when not even threat of eternal damnation will have an effect. Simply tell Kayne what it is for, and keep strict accounts."

  "Yes, High Bishop," he said faintly.

  "Come to Kayne for whatever you need," she continued. "Report to me once a day if you have anything new to report, to Kayne if you have nothing. Take your meals in the Abbey or in the city, as you prefer, but meals in the city will have to come under your own expenses. Wear your uniform as you deem advisable;always within the Abbey, but outside of the Abbey, you may choose to wear civilian clothing. As a Special Inquisitor, your duty is to investigate whatI deem necessary, not religious irregularities. Those are for the General Inquisitors, of which this Abbey has none. The city constables will not interfere with you when you show them your papers—but in any event, once they know you by sight, they won't bother you. I'll tell Fenris only that you are conducting an investigation for me. Only Duke Arden's men might continue to impede you, and they won't after I send my cousin a little note. The people who will know your true rank will be myself, Captain Fenris, Captain Othorp, Duke Arden, and Novice Kayne. Any questions?"

  Tal Rufen still looked as if he had fallen from a great height onto his head. "Ah—just one," he said, finally. "Why?"

  As an answer, she tossed him her cousin's letter—for those who did not know Talaysen—or Gwydain, the name he had been born with—the contents were innocuous enough.

  Tal read it through quickly; that answered one of her questions: he was obviously not only able to read, but fairly literate.Which means he may well be an amateur scholar of history. I shall have to be sure to let him make free with the Abbey library. He got to the last paragraph, and she watched him as he read it through twice.

  He looked up at her. "This Talaysen—this is—?"

  "Free Bard Talaysen, Master Wren, Laurel Bard, and advisor to the King of Birnam."

  "And the leader of the Free Bards, as well as a person respected and admired among the Gypsies. I see." He handed the letter back to her. "I think we can probably assume that most, if not all, of the murders he speaks of bear the same signature as the ones I told you about."

  "I would say so." She put the letter away in her desk. "You also asked for a mage; I can offer you two. The first is a fellow Justiciar who also has some other abilities—he can touch minds, and sometimes read the past from objects. His name is Arran, and he just happens to be another cousin of mine."

  The corner of Tal's mouth twitched a little at that; the first hint that he had a sense of humor. "Are you related to half the Kingdom?" he asked.

  She sighed. "Only a third. Oh, not really, but sometimes it feels as if I am," she replied feelingly. "Especially when they all seem to have favors they want granted."

  "Well, it looks as if you are granting another," he observed cautiously.

  She shook her head. "No. That wasn't what I meant when I handed you that letter. I would have done this if Talaysen hadn't sent that letter and that request. It was simply a confirmation of everything you told me, with the additional information that there were more victims than evenyou knew about. It is the duty of the Justiciar to see that all creatures have justice. Generally, miscreants are brought before us, but it is fully within our power to order investigations when the secular authorities are moving too slowly."

  "Or not at all," Tal muttered bitterly, giving her a brief glimpse of how deeply his anger ran that he had not been heeded.

  "Or not at all," she agreed. "It is our duty to see to it thatnothing impedes an investigation that needs to be made. Not even when suspicion indicates a suspect within the Brotherhood of the Church."

  Another startled glance from Tal made her nod. "This isn't the first time I have suspected a Priest-Mage of wrongdoing," she told him with brutal frankness. "The only difference is that all the other times I at least had actual suspects. Now I have only the—what did you call it?—the signature?"

  "The signature," he confirmed. "The methods and the victims change, the settings change, but the signature stays the same. There are some very basic needs being addressed here. A great anger is being fed, and I suspect there is some—" He hesitated.

  "Sexual link?" she asked shrewdly. By now he was over being shocked or surprised by anything she would say, and nodded.Probably due to the fact that I suggested it could be a Priest. "If itis a member or former member of the Brotherhood, that would not be a surprise. Sometimes the appearance of chastity is used as a disguise rather than being part of a vocation. Sometimes it is used as an e
scape. Sometimes it is a symptom of a great illness of the spirit, rather than being embraced joyfully."

  He nodded, his face very sober. "Domination, manipulation, and control; that's what drives these murders, for certain. Maybe revenge."

  "With the ultimate control being, of course, the control of the victim's life and death." She nodded her understanding. "Not one constable in a hundred thousand would have reasoned that out. I do not think my confidence is misplaced."

  She would have said more, possibly embarrassing the man, but Kayne returned at that moment. "Your belongings are in your quarters, as are your uniforms and your first-quarter pay, Inquisitor Rufen," she said as she came in the door. "Your mules are in the stables, and you will have just enough time to clean yourself and change into a uniform before dinner, where you will have an opportunity to meet the rest of the Abbey Guards. And by the time you are ready for dinner, your papers will also be ready and I will bring them to your quarters." She beamed at both of them, and Ardis rewarded her.