Chapter 80: Empress' brutal opinion (3)

“Right. The guards claim that she didn't leave by the door.”

“They would though wouldn't they.”

“Sir, if I may?” Sir Thomas stepped forward. “Regardless of whether or not Lady Francesca left the room on her feet or carried off her feet. She didn't leave the room by the door.”

“Why so sure?”

“She would have been noticed.”

“What makes you so sure...”

“Well uh...” The young man actually blushed. “The Lady Francesca was...”

Kerrass nodded. “Francesca was beloved?”

“Yes sir,” the young man seemed relieved. “Very....beloved. Yes, that was the word.”

“So even if one, or two of the guards on watch were corrupt. Someone in the corridor would have seen something.” Kerrass asked him.

“yes sir. Especially at night. These rooms were filled with the personal attendants of Her majesty and Lady Francesca was a favourite of the Empress so...”

You are reading on fantasylibrary.ink

“Is a favourite,” I heard myself comment.

“Yes sir. Sorry sir.”

“Already with a past tense.” I muttered. My stomach was churning and I wanted to be sick.

“Truly Sorry sir.”

“Don't worry about it Sir Thomas. It was a good point. By the door though, if you please.” Kerrass told him.

Sir Thomas marched back to his place.

“The lad has a crush on my sister.” I commented. I felt a headache coming on.

“He is not alone.” Kerrass commented. “A significant number of the guard have a crush on her. When the Empress decides to allow men to court your sister, there will be a queue of knights to request her hand in marriage.”

“They'll have to fight me for it.”

Kerrass clapped me on the shoulder. “So let's work the problem as we would work any other problem. The door is locked which means...”

This chapter is from fantasylibrary.ink

I sighed and tried, again, to make my brain throw off the hair shirt that it had been wearing for such a long time. I scratched my ear.

“Magic?”

“The Sorceresses say no gate or teleportation has taken place in any other place than the platform where it was set up.”

I nodded. “Windows,”

“Are mostly locked on orders of the guards precisely for reasons like this. Far too many eligible young ladies have been seduced into leaving their rooms for even the most innocent of reasons.”

“Innocent?”

“Yes. Seductions and such like. There are a particular kind of Lord that make it a game to try and take the virginity of as many of the Lords or ladies of the court as they can. They keep score and exchange notes by the end of the parties.”

“I never got invited to that kind of party.” I commented faintly. I was trying to picture my young and innocent sister in such gatherings.

“She's not so innocent any more,” Kerrass commented, reading my thoughts.

A thought surfaced from among the soup that was my thought processes at the time. “You don't mean she...”

“Nah. But she knows what kind of thing happens and is clever enough to play them off against each other.”

I shook my head. “I feel like I barely knew her.” I heard my own use of the past tense. I swore briefly and fiercely.

“You will Freddie. We just need to think through it. So Windows? Try them all.”

I did so to discover that only the one that I had opened earlier and two others would open. The rest seemed as though they had been sealed by a strange metallic method that meant they couldn't be opened. Kerrass examined them all. In one case he leant right out and climbed up onto the sill so that he could look up and down the wall before climbing back in.

“I could climb it but your sister would struggle by herself and it would certainly be noticed. Unless... Thomas?”

“Sir?”

“There's a walkway above here and presumably a way onto the roof. Is there any way to check that anyone has tied a rope on or set up a harness and lifting system?”

“No-one's reported anything sir?”

“No. But those guards spend a lot of time looking outwards rather than some dust or something at their feet. Check would you? Don't let anyone test it or muck around with it if they find anything. They should guard it fiercely and then send word for me.”

“Yes sir.” He turned and muttered a few words to one of the guards who was still standing next to the wall.

He saluted and stomped off, armour jangling.

Kerrass returned to me. “So, if not windows then what?”

“She was never in it?”

“Possible, and we will explore that if we don't find anything here. But she was witnessed going into the room.”

“By the same kind of witnesses that watched the door to make sure she didn't get out?” I snarled.

“Valid point, but there were many more them at the time and of much higher rank. The Empress was in that group who wished her a good night.”

“Fucking wonderful.”

“They were making plans as I remember, for the morning and for the future.”

“Shit,” I took a deep breath as Kerrass waited expectantly, he was walking round the room examining the walls, knocking at odd places. Of course I know now what he was doing but at the time my brain just refused to wake up and work.

I stared at him for a long moment. “I'm sorry Kerrass, my brain isn't working.”

“I know Freddie, take your time.” He turned and started closing curtains and plunged the room into darkness.

“If it can't be the door.” he prompted as he worked, “and it can't be the windows or magic then what...”

“Some form of other passageway?” I felt absurdly pleased as he nodded. “Off to the edge of the room please.”

I did as I was told. Kerrass moved to the centre of the room and took a glass bottle from his belt and threw it at the floor. Extremely fine silver dust exploded into the room and began to spread throughout the room.

“Unfortunately Elven corridors and elven construction makes their secret doors much more difficult to find than the average human construction.” He stopped and waited for the dust to spread out properly. “Now let's see.”

Everyone has seen this in one form or another. Specks of dust dancing in beams of sunlight. That was exactly what Kerrass was doing. He prowled around the room, slowly, taking his time, just letting his eyes drift and see things, looking for eddys and currents of air flow.

“Here we go.” He said standing before a particular patch of wall that I couldn't distinguish from any of the other equally plain patches of wall. He tested a few stones, leaning on them and pushing them in before shaking his head. “Normally there's a charm or something...”

“Kerrass,” I said. “Kerrass, time's wasting.”

“I know.” He looked back at the wall and sighed before shrugging. “Ah well, The Empress told me to hunt the girl and failing all else, hopefully, she will protect me against the Duchess.”

He stood back, braced his legs and gestured at the walls. Air exploded from his hand in a buffeting wave.

Dust emerged from masonry cracks in the walls. A brick fell backwards into open air, but it didn't let sunlight through. Instead there was only darkness.

“Once more with feeling,” Kerrass muttered before gesturing again. This time the wall fell down with a crash and a crumbling of masonry. Dust billowed out.

“Fuck me,” It was the young knight from the door.

Kerrass edged forward, hand raised to his sword strap. The other had waving the remains of the dust were waved away from his face as he edged forwards.

I was still feeling woolly and blinked stupidly at the debris for some time before the fact that Kerrass had managed to find something got through to my brain. I turned to Sir Thomas who was shouting through the open door for guardsmen and that the door into my sisters room to be blocked.

“Send someone to get my spear.” I ordered. The lad had no reason to listen to me or to do anything that I might have ordered but he took it as such. I turned back to Kerrass.

I've often thought about my reaction to my sister's disappearance and how it all worked. I made jokes and commented instantly but when I tried to make any kind of conscious decision and this was one of the instances.

I was unarmed, unarmoured and absolutely unprepared for action. But I stepped forward to back him up. He sensed it on some level and waved me backwards as he stepped forward.

He was right to do so. I knew it was foolish to do so and there was even more than a little bit of a thought that I shouldn't follow him into the gap. But somehow, my brain was just not working.

Fortunately Kerrass was thinking for both of us and he waved me back.

He stuck his head through the hole before slowly and cautiously climbed through the hole. He stomped around a lot and there was some rattling that came from the opening. After a small amount of time a small section of the wall swung outwards and Kerrass emerged from the shadows back into the room. He played around for a little while until he found a lever behind one of the wooden panels on the wall.

“Right then,” Kerrass drew his sword and looked at me. “Don't get too hopeful Freddie. This could just be a most unremarkable hidden corridor.”

“Yes, but...”

“It's just one answer amongst many potential answers. We still don't know if this is useful information. Just don't get your hopes up.”

A young page had come into the room and walked up to Sir Thomas with the scabbard that had been

fashioned for my spear. The Young knight waited a moment before approaching and holding the spear out. He was still giving orders. I didn't hear all of them but it seemed to be along the lines of “secure the room, don't let anyone in.” That kind of thing.

I fitted the two parts of the spear together and moved forward to back up Kerrass. The corridor led to a spiral staircase which seemed to be hidden in one of the modern columns. We climbed up but we did so slowly and carefully, Kerrass bent down to examine the floor and the lower walls.

“Clean,” he commented at one point. “With a small amount of background magic, presumably to keep it so clean.”

“Seems a little frivolous to me.” I commented, looking over his shoulder.

“Fucking elves,” he said with feeling. “All it means is that we don't have any tracks to work with.” He sighed. “Still, little windows to let light in so we're not completely blind. Take our time. Slowly now.” We moved forward gently.

We came to a spiral staircase that went up and down. It seemed to be hidden in one of the decorative columns that festoon the castle. It went up and down.

Kerrass gestured, “Call for Sir Thomas,”

I did so and the lad came running.

“What's up?” Kerrass asked.

“The roof.”

As it turns out those rumours about having rooms closer to the roof really are the easier ones to secure.

“And down?”

“The next floor down is a smaller one with lower ceilings that are set aside for personal servants and the like.”

“I'm going to leave that there without commenting on it for now.” I said. “What's further down?”

“More guest rooms, smaller, normally reserved for visiting merchants rather than any kind of serious diplomats but at the moment they are filled with nobles.”

“What ranks?”

“Dukes, Duchesses and the odd client king.”

“Where are the rest of the client Kings kept?”

“In another wing.”

“How well are the lower floors secured?”

“Well secured. The guard aren't idiots.”

“They managed to lose my sister.” I snarled. I was surprised at the amount of fury in my voice.

“I know that ignorance isn't an excuse,” Sir Thomas said, unperturbed by my anger. “We've mapped many of the secret and hidden passages when we arrived but in a palace as old as this. We simply didn't know that this was here.”

“Dereliction?” Kerrass asked.

“I swear, not on our part sir.”

“The knights Errant?”

“Possibly sir, although if I'm honest, I don't think it would be active. If someone knew about these corridors, at all which is not guaranteed with respect to the Knights Errant. It's possibly even likely that someone just forgot.”

As an aside to those readers who don't know how Toussaint works. Toussaint has no real standing army as I have mentioned before. Instead they have the Knights Errant. These knights are responsible for the security and safety of the realm. As such there is no guard system. If Toussaint or the “royal” family of Toussaint needs guards then she just says that there is a need for half a dozen men and suddenly the court is ringing with the sounds of big, strong and muscled men in huge and shiny armour filling the air with ringing cries of “I swear to the heron that you will be safe,” or words to that effect. Then she picks her favourites of those men that volunteer and they serve until the Duchess or, more often, they decree that the task is completed.

This is beneficial in that those men who fill the ranks of Knights Errant don't need to be paid and do it for the love of the job. They can get by on this on the grounds that Toussaint is never ever going to be invaded unless the political landscape changes beyond all recognition to where it is now.

The downside is that there is no continuation of command. No laws or rules or, really, any kind of oversight. If the task is failed then the failures answer to the Duchess. At worst they are sentenced to death but more often they are exiled which, to the knights, seems to be a fate worse than death as they often beg for death before exile.

The truth meant that there was a very real possibility that the existence of these tunnels and corridors was simply forgotten when the security was handed over from the knights errant to the Imperial guard. There was also the possibility that the knight errants responsible for the security of this part of the castle was angry at handing over command of the corridors to the Imperial guard and withheld information in an effort to undermine the efforts of the guardsmen.

Wars have begun over smaller slights in and around Toussaint.

Kerrass nodded his accepting of the point.

“Up then,” he decided. “If they went down then anyone is more likely to be spotted. If they go up then ropes, ladders, anything could have got them to wherever they wanted to go.

We went slowly and cautiously. Kerrass was sniffing the air from moment to moment.

“Well, if she didn't leave this way then she certainly knew about this passage and used it. The smell of her perfume is here.” He muttered, half to me, half to himself.

“Could that have been faked?” I asked, “Someone comes into her room, splashes the perfume around a bit and maybe on themselves before walking through the corridor in an effort to throw us off the scent.”

“Not really. Perfume changes on contact with the skin, mixing in with all of the other little things that make a human's scent up. Sweat, oils, pheremones and the like which means that some people suit certain scents whereas others do not. This is definitely your sister's scent. The question is, was she carried out this way or did she walk. Lack of dust means that I can't tell.”

We climbed up another stair and I guessed that we were up in the ceiling of the building now. We came to a trap door. Kerrass made a gesture that I know that he refers to as his “Quen” sign. A dancing golden light covered him before he took a deep breath, nodded to me and opened the hatch.

Daylight flooded down and into the stairwell. Kerrass went first hand cocked ready to draw his sword at a moments notice. I stayed in the stair well to give him room but he quickly nodded to me and I climbed out after him.

The roof sloped up above us, the trapdoor had opened into the side of the red tile that made up the roof and we were standing in a gutter that was lined with some kind of metal that clanked as I put my weight on it.

Kerrass looked at me. “Left or Right?”

“You're the expert.”

“Then we shall go left. If it was right then the person would have been more exposed and for longer.”

We followed along. Kerrass seemed uncaring about the height but I would be lying if I said that it didn't bother me. I leant on the roof tiles to my left to make sure that if I was going to lose my balance in one direction or another then it would be to fall into the tiles.

We even found a small group of Imperial Guardsmen who were carefully examining a section of the wall. Kerrass exchanged a few words with them and I got the gist that we were directly above my sister's room.

They had found nothing.

There was a small amount of time as we shuffled past them and went on our way. We came to the trapdoor that the guards had used which was open and under guard. Kerrass gave a password and we were let down into the corridor.

Kerrass looked left and right and sighed.

“Sorry Freddie.”

“Don't say that.... Don't give up.” I felt panic scrabbling at the back of my throat followed by disbelief and then anger. “What's happening Kerrass? I thought that we were going to find my sister.”

“Freddie, Freddie calm down.”

“I can't calm down I...”

“I know Freddie just take a breath. What I was saying was that now that we're here we lose the trail. If trail it was. Now we need to think a bit more.”

“What is there to think about? My sister is gone.” I knew it was a stupid thing to say even as I said it. Kerrass blew his breath out in entirely justified exasperation.

“Freddie, I'm not suggesting we give up. We just have to give up on this method of tracking. Now we need to think it through. Carefully and slowly.”

I sighed and pinched the bridge of my nose.

“I don't want to be careful and slow Kerrass. I want to punch something.”

“I know Freddie, and hopefully you know exactly why that would be a bad idea.”

“I do as a matter of fact but that doesn't help things.

“Right. Well. We've made a good start anyway.”

“Really? I thought we'd found Jack shit.”

“What we found was a secret corridor, that no-one other than, possibly, your sister knew about.” He began ticking the points off his fingers, “We know that she was in that corridor, relatively recently. We also know that the passageway would let her out, outside of her normal guard perimeter. All she would need to do is to dress in a relatively simple dress with a hooded cloak and anyone who saw her would simply assume that she was, like many in her position, out on a stroll to meet a paramour.”

“But Frannie wouldn't do that.” I protested.

“I know Freddie, that point in and of itself is the most significant of everything that we have considered. That is the reason why I've got you with me on this one. What's my rule when it comes to tracking down lost people when it's supposed to involve a monster?”

“That the family or loved ones should stay as far away from you as possible.”

“That's right. Because they run the danger of letting their emotion cloud their judgement. It is only useful in certain circumstances. Those being to inform me of what the missing person would do at any given circumstance.”

We had moved to the side of the corridor where we sat on a bench.

“I agree by the way. Your sister is a lot more resourceful and intelligent than many of the women that turn up at court in an effort to try and attract the eye of some noble or another. Your sister came with the express intention to make friends with the Empress. A task for which she is eminently suited. She listens well, knows when to keep her mouth shut, knows when her input might have a bearing and when to step in and when to step out. I've seen her declare, in a loud voice, that the Empress needed to take a break and marched her out to the practice yards where the Empress proceeded to take her frustrations out on the nearest training dummy. Your sister is a good woman. The Empress dreads losing her to some charming nobleman but won't have the heart to deny your sister anything but.... and this is important.... your sister is aware of how much the Empress leans on her and would not desert her Empress' side for anything. She is a rare woman. So let's apply that here.

“Would Francesca leave the Empress on the day of the Empress' coronation?”

“No, never.”

“I agree. Therefore we have assumed that she was taken against her will. But why else would she have left? We have established that she wouldn't allow herself to be drawn out for matters of the heart but family?”

“Maybe, but she would be much more likely to send messages in this case to...probably Emma followed by Mark.”

“Probably. She would do the same if it was a matter of any of her friends. So who has so much of a command on your sisters mind that she would leave voluntarily. I'm not asking rhetorically I genuinely need your thoughts.”

I mused. I suddenly realised that I was absolutely famished having not eaten anything since the morning. I signalled a passing servant and ordered some brain fuel to be brought.

“The Empress.” I suggested. “But the Empress lives just down the hall. And surely no guard or anyone else would comment on the matter if she went that way.”

“I agree. I don't think that's likely though. The Empress is not one to stand on ceremony. If she wanted to speak to your sister she would have stomped over to your sister's room and talked.”

“But the Empress might be a root cause.” I mused as a plate of Nilfgaardian Garlic sausage as well as bread and cheese was brought to our little table. “We're working on the assumption that Frannie left the room by a secret way on her own and of her own volition here aren't we.”

“Yes. I don't think that some kind of vast conspiracy amongst the guards to allow your sister to leave the room through the door is possible. Either she, or she and her captors used the secret corridor. Your sister is no slouch at combat and is well trained enough to be able to defend herself. The Empress demanded it. There would have been signs of a struggle in her room if she was taken by force.”

“The room could have been tidied.”

“Give me some credit Freddie. But let's allow for that and say that I am so inept that I couldn't see if there were signs of struggle in the room. Your sister would have screamed or shouted and the guards outside would have been notified almost immediately.”

“True,”

“So, she goes through the door. She gets in her room, changes her clothes from her normal clothing types and takes the corridor to the roof and then along until she comes out just over there before making her way....somewhere.” Kerrass waved his hands expansively.

“She did so secretly and quietly,” I said. “Why would she do that. Unless I misunderstand from everything you've told me she's quite important, respected and has no small amount of personal power. If she decided that there was a threat or needed to go somewhere she could have ordered the Imperial guard to take her there without much comment. If she was suitably above suspicion...”

“Which she was,” Kerrass interrupted.

“Then no-one would have thought twice about it. Why so secret?”

We ate a few mouthfuls each and I stopped, mid chew and stared at Kerrass. “She was protecting someone.”

“Blackmail?”

“Maybe. If she had received a message or some other such signal that someone had some damaging information about, let's say, the Empress. Something that would bring down the Empire. She's told to come alone to discuss the matter. If she saw no other alternative then she would go. Playing for time is a long held strategy of my families.”

“And a good one.”

“So what was she being blackmailed about?”

“Does it matter?”

“Well of course it matters. If she was being blackmailed then what she was being blackmailed about would give us the answer to the question of who has her.”

“It might. But what would be more likely to give us the information that we need is if we had the method by which the blackmail was delivered.”

“It would have to be a note.”

“So lets check the fireplace in her room again.”

We scurried back. Kerrass purposefully kept me from going to quick. “Walk slowly,” he said, “appear unconcerned. It's possible we have enemies watching us and we want them to think that we are calm and collected. That we know what we're doing.”

“That's an ominous thought.” I commented. “That most of the times when people look as though they know what they're doing, they're actually pretending.”

“More likely than we would possibly like to admit”

We got through the checkpoints. Kerrass was known to the guard and he couched for me so we soon found ourselves outside my sisters room.

Sir Thomas let us in. There were already plasterers and stonemasons at work on the wall.

“We're looking for papers,” Kerrass told me. Something not in your sister's writing. She's unlikely to have kept a diary with the relevant security concerns. I will check the fireplace.”

I nodded and made my way over to the writing desk. There were indeed many letters from various people asking for news or for a favour or for an introduction. Francesca seemed to have them sorted into a number of different piles according to priority or some other kind of sorting system that I couldn't guess at.

“Might have found something.” Kerrass called. I hurried over and Sir Thomas was alongside me. There was a corner of very rigid paper or card. Most of it was charred and covered in ash so Kerrass was handling it with great care.

“I know this paper.” Kerrass said, “See this colouring here.” He took his gloves off and scratched at the least damaged part of the paper which revealed a pink tint. “This is Messenger paper.”

He passed it over to Thomas who turned it into the light.

“It's a crime to burn this kind of paper,” Thomas commented. “There has to be a reason for it and she will be expected to answer to the Empress for it.”

“How does Imperial paper work,” I asked.

“It's the most careful messenger service in existence,” Kerrass explained. “That doesn't include magi or some other method of messenger. It's used to pass secrets around.”

“Oh,” I said sourly. “Another clue.”