4. N #3
“Allow me to offer an alternative, if you don’t mind.” she continued. “I may know someone … or to be more precise … I may know of someone … and perhaps solve two problems at once.”
“Go on,” he said.
Andaleisia considered a moment, shaping her thoughts.
“My father’s business involves placing low-borns in highborns’ houses. I know he uses tutors and coaches to prepare candidates. They teach the lower orders proper speech, civilize the dropped vowels and gutter-speak. He has a few, I think, who also ferret out backgrounds,
so he doesn’t place a servant who is a thief … or, worse yet … indiscreet … in a highborn house.”
“Go on,” he replied.
“I can speak to my father, and see if a tutor with the right skills can be engaged for this. Teach her … umm, it … how to speak properly, and while doing so, ask the questions you need asked and learn what you need to know.”
He let his skepticism show.
“You can start with the tutor,” she said. “Give it a few days, and if it doesn’t work, then you can always go with the truncheons.” She shrugged. “You know the saying. You catch more vermin with sweet bait than you do by chasing them about the room with a club.”
He opened his mouth to make a tart reply when they heard the soft chimes of the all clear. “Let’s go see what got broken this time.”
Lord Haldeen waited on the patio outside his study, watching as the Household crews worked to clean up the debris.
The day had dawned clean and clear, and promised to be cool.
He heard the servant approach, a soft scuff of the shoe to alert his master.
“Milord,” the underbutler said, “the candidate is in your outer office, as you directed. I have given her tea, and made her comfortable.”
“Thank you,” he replied, “I’ll find my own way, thank you. Please close the door on your way out.”
The servant bowed and withdrew. Haldeen checked the alarms for any ambient magic she might be using.
No lights or winks. No sign of background spells, no illusions to enhance beauty, or sweeten the words.
He frowned. He’d expected her to have something.
He slid the bracelet onto his wrist. It would give him a tingle if she used close-in magics.
It occurred to him in passing that more than one lord had been assassinated in circumstances like this …
but it had been decades since that sort of business.
Besides, King Alliard and the nobles needed him. He turned on his heel, leaving the rising sun and blossoming morning garden behind him, and crossed the room to enter the outer office from the side door. “Good morning, lady. Please sit when you are ready.”
He took his seat behind his work-table, and opened the leather folder with her reference letters, as she took the seat across from him, showing every bit of grace and poise as someone from a much, much higher station in life.
So far, so good. “I’m surprised, but pleased, that you were able to respond so quickly. How do you call yourself?”
“Nora,” she replied. “Short for Kilfenora. My father liked the old stories.”
He noted she had a straightforward and focused way of speaking, and her accent betrayed nothing of her birth or social class. Good. If she could teach that … and quickly … that would cover the subject’s most glaring flaw, the horrendous gutter-speech.
“I was removed from my posting to attend to you here.” He saw the slight thinning of her lips. And not happy about it.
“Yes,” he replied, “you came highly recommended.” He allowed himself the small fib. He really had had no idea who would be sent. He just knew that calling in this favor would require payment. “This is a very important, very sensitive task, and it requires some delicacy, and considerable speed.”
Nora furrowed her brow. “Delicate and fast typically don’t work well together. It’s usually one or the other. A bit more about the assignment, then?”
He passed her the thin sheaf of papers, and sat back while she read. He saw that she did it carefully, refusing to be rushed, even though her social better sat a few feet away.
After a time, she looked up. “You want to know everything I can possibly extract? Political, military, economic … everything?” One eyebrow twitched ever so slightly. “This is a mere female. You’re unlikely to learn much of importance.”
“Yes,” he replied. “And … I would have said you might be surprised, but I suspect you know better than I how very much females learn by observation and gossip.”
The eyebrow twitched again. “Does the Military Committee know about this? I should have thought this would include their interests.”
He shook his head, “No. This is more of a private project.”
She gave a small shake of the head and stood.
“I think there has been a mistake. I have no desire to get caught up in Lords’ business. You are asking for a target package as a private citizen, the sort usually done for a city. This is the sort of thing that gets the Military Committee excited.
And with that come large fellows with big arms and limited senses of humor asking difficult questions.”
“Please,” he said, “a few more moments. I assure you that everything here is being done for the good of the city, and I am operating in my official capacity as the Lord Gatekeeper. Please, sit.”
Her expression remained wary. She didn’t sit, but she didn’t bolt either.
Good enough. He continued. “I have two needs. I have a subject that needs to understand, and to be understandable, so when we ask questions we know that what is said matches what is heard. And I assure you, this will in no way cross over into anything the Military Committee takes an interest in.”
He paused. “At the moment, I frankly doubt that anyone in the military would be able to make out what she is saying. And when military men don’t understand someone, they tend to assume that louder and louder shouting will get them the answers, rather than patience.
Before I can even consider turning her over to the Military Committee, she needs to be comprehensible.”
Nora sat, “All right, and the more known upfront, then the less to ask later.” She held the documents out, “This is impressively vague on who ‘she’ is. Care to enlighten?”
He paused, and looked at his notes. “Before we do that, a few questions. To determine fitness for the position.”
Her eyebrows went up, and she spoke carefully. “When I was told I had been dismissed from my previous post, and told to attend to you here, I took it to mean I would be starting work. Am I to understand this is not the case?”
“Provided I find you acceptable, then you will be offered a position in my household.”
“And if not, then I am without a ration.” she replied. She kept her voice flat and calm, a statement of fact. Seated, she made an elegant little bow. “Then ask your questions, my good lord.”
He smiled, in control, and liking it. “According to your references, you spent two years as a contract concubine.” He watched her blink in surprise. His father-in-law was VERY good at ferreting out secrets.
She drew a ragged breath. “Yes. But that is in the past. When my contract was up, I was promised anonymity and a fresh start.” She gave him a sharper look. “I don’t know how you found out, or why it’s relevant.”
He gave her a thin smile, the one he’d practiced …
one part menace and one part understated humor.
“It’s relevant because I too have secrets I wish to keep. This is a very delicate matter, and I can’t afford tale-tellers, so best establish early on where we stand. You hurt me, I retaliate with what I know about you. Understand?”
“I understand you perfectly,” she replied tightly.
She was angry, but controlling it well. He admired her control, the sort that Andaleisia could never manage, flitting as she did between mousy compliance and angry tirades.
Nora was attractive in a way that Andaleisia was not, young and pert, and her prior occupation got the male part of his brain going down paths that were rather distracting at the moment.
“And so,” she said, as the silence built, “you need me, badly enough to have me excused from my posting and cornered here, for some kind of dubious task that you assure me is completely legal, but which you’ll nonetheless blackmail me into staying quiet about.”
She gave him an expression that looked half smile, half grimace. “Does that about sum it up?”
He glanced at his alarms again. His next words would incriminate him, if this all went badly, and there turned out to be a record.
His office had been well protected, shielded from all known forms of magical listening, clairvoyance, and other remote sensing.
She would have to be wearing something. No blinks, no lights.
No ambient. No record. Just her word against his … and his money.
“More or less,” he replied. “But we style terms first. Once you are under contract, then details.”
He saw her chew through the implications, then stand. “If you brought me here as your concubine, then good day.”
He smiled. “No, it’s a different job. But, terms first.”
She took a deep breath. He guessed he was not the only one rehearsing his lines.
“Given the risk, the time, and the remainder of the contract I had, I want three months guaranteed work. Four full months rations … that is, sixteen full eight-days …. One hundred twenty-eight full ration bars to … to start. In advance. That way if I get into this,
I won’t have to worry about being forgotten when it’s time to draw my ration later.”
She paused, ticking through a mental list.
This part he could read like a book. “I’ll want an eight-day at a time after that, and two eight-days rations if I’m to be dismissed without notice.”
Her eyes studied his face, trying to gauge his reaction.
“I want a room of my own, not in a dormitory. I want a room commensurate with the status of a teacher. I want new gowns, unders, and shoes, most of mine have been worn for more than five years. I want access to the same library your wife uses, in my free time. Every eighth day off.
And a door with a stout lock. A bolt I can draw.”
He didn’t even pretend to bargain. Let her think she left rations on the table. “That’s quite a list. Done.”