Page 47 of Claiming the Tower (Council Mysteries #1)

B y the following Wednesday, Hereswith needed to be doing something other than being at home. She did not precisely need to be at Dinas Emrys, but there was nowhere else she might reasonably be at the moment. Anywhere in Trellech, well, she was in deep mourning, and should not be socialising.

It was as well she didn’t need to appear in London.

The news from the war was, if anything, even worse than it had been.

There had been a calamitous cavalry charge on the twenty-fifth.

The reports Marcus had passed along suggested two-thirds of them were killed or injured, and apparently due to some miscommunication.

The utter waste of it had roused her to fury over the note this morning.

Being at Dinas Emrys at least meant she had something to do where no one was likely to bother her.

Gervase had made it clear that it would be understood she was in mourning.

She was not obligated to attend any particular meeting or conversation for weeks, at least. Six months deep mourning at a minimum, as the only daughter.

Hereswith was not expected, in other words, but if she appeared, she was welcome to participate.

And yet, the Council came from a time before such customs. And it was not as if one could pause the needs of the larger world for grief, or the show of grief.

Hereswith’s grief was real, but it would be no good for her to lock herself away in a room and weep.

Papa had not approved of that, for one thing.

He’d held to the idea that the best way to remember people was by doing what they’d shared with you.

It was what he’d always told her about Mama, and about his parents.

Perhaps not doing it the way the person mourned would have. Papa certainly would have found himself at home in the library here at Dinas Emrys, but he would not have preferred the range of topics.

And so Hereswith found herself in the library, with a series of questions.

The current set had to do with her predecessor.

The Council kept notes of what was discussed in the meetings, a role that rotated periodically, apparently, but rarely.

Hereswith had always hated those gatherings where the responsibility for notes changed each meeting, because people would handle them so differently.

At the moment, she was reading the notes of the meetings in the year before her Challenge.

She’d been working her way backwards, piecing together discussions from the wrong direction, working from decision to cause.

It was complex and fiddly; she had a dozen scraps of paper with different notes to move around into new places as she tried to make sense of it.

But she was making headway and certainly getting a better sense for the range of personalities.

“Where is...” There was a voice behind her. “Oh, I beg pardon. Hereswith?”

Hereswith turned to find Erasmus Forley behind her.

“Good afternoon. I was just looking at some notes.” He was an astronomer, a generation younger than Papa, so in his seventies now, and with several of his family working in the same field.

They’d not talked much, one on one, but Hereswith knew nothing against him yet beyond what Blanch had mentioned about him being taken with his own interests.

Now, he paused, leaning slightly on the cane he had with him always. “I hope you didn’t feel obliged. Gervase made that clear?” He said it as if he were slightly dubious that the Council Head would have remembered that aspect.

“Oh, yes.” Hereswith almost tacked on a sir, she’d learned to do that as a nod to generational experience in the Ministry.

And she had no problem deferring to experience when it was there.

“But I—” She watched him carefully. She knew he was a widower and had been for a decade and a half, and made a decision.

“I felt better doing something. And Papa always preferred it when I could bring home an interesting tale from the day.”

She had, apparently, taken the right tone. He gestured at the chair opposite her at the table, and she nodded. Once he was sitting, he said, quietly. “As a group, we prefer to be doing. But the assumptions about it.” Then he added, “You don’t need me to tell you some people will judge.”

“They will judge anyway,” Hereswith pointed out. “No matter what I do. So I must, I think, suit myself and what I think is proper.”

It got a bark of a laugh out of him, and a nod. “True, true. And some things must happen at the appropriate time. I was coming in to double check the dates for one of our particular negotiations and rituals. Has Gervase or Blanch explained that to you?”

“No, sir.” This time, the honorific felt proper. “Or rather, they both gestured at something toward the end of November, and then Papa— well.”

“Ah. In that case, as I am here and it is relevant, I shall explain. And then mention to them I have.” Erasmus leaned back. “What do you know about our role as negotiators?”

“That one role of the Council, one of the key ones, is to negotiate those matters related to the treaty underlying the Pact with the Fatae. But no one has been specific about how that happens, what the protocols are, or any of that. All I know from my previous work is that certain categories are entirely the Council’s to arrange, not for the rest of Albion.

Some of the agreements around mining, for example, or river pearls, or specific sites and locations. ”

“That,” Erasmus said, “Is a great deal more than most people start with. I have been saying for years that having someone familiar with diplomatic work would be a benefit. Now, how those agreements are discussed varies. Who is taking on the primary role from among the Council, who appears from the side of the Fatae. It’s always the Council Head, of course, along with three or four others.

Sometimes there is a ritual aspect to it, and then we want a specific number.

Or there are particular offerings to be made, and a Materia specialist is suitable. ”

“That is all as it is done in other diplomacy,” Hereswith agreed with that easily, but then raised an eyebrow. “But of course, it’s not that simple.”

“It would appear to be a great deal of fuss and bother if it were, yes.” Erasmus chuckled, and Hereswith was pleased she seemed to be finding the right approach with him.

There was a narrow road with men of that sort of generation, giving due respect to their experience without having hers dismissed.

“I think in the astronomical metaphor, so you may consider this central act of the Council, the negotiations and maintenance of the treaty with the Fatae to be the sun, around which all else orbits.”

“Astronomy was not my best subject at Schola, but I can indeed follow that much, yes.” Hereswith said it with a smile. “And then, various aspects, reacting to that gravitational pull, but with their own orbit and axis and such?”

“Exactly. Now, hmm.” He paused, as if he were not sure what to say.

“Gervase does well with the administration, and heavens know we need someone who can manage all of that. But he is not, shall we say, a particularly inspired or inspiring leader. To be fair, I’m not sure most of us want that, exactly, in this case.

Competence goes further. But he also— forgets, I think— that other people might want additional information, or have a different perspective. ”

“That is true of many people. Competence, well. I value that. You can work out much of the rest if you start with competence.” The framing of it gave Hereswith some further thoughts as she continued to observe Gervase and several others.

Erasmus considered, then nodded as if deciding. “Would you mind telling me your understanding of how things are? You have little to go on.”

Hereswith gestured. “Four fortnightly meetings, and the first one, everything was entirely new.” Her hand indicated the books she had set out. “That is why I was working my way through the notes.”

Erasmus took them in, tilting his head, considering which pile she’d already explored and which she hadn’t. “Backwards?”

“Sometimes it makes it easier to see the patterns and decisions. And in this case, I wanted to follow the line of what we are apparently doing back to how and when and why it was decided to do that. Going the other direction, it’s both difficult to decide when to start, and there are dozens of threads that go nowhere. ”

“You have a different take on the problem than most. I would have thought you were inclined to be, mmm. Orderly and systematic in your review. This is that, but from the opposite direction.” Erasmus nodded. “Go on, then. Now I am curious.”

“As opposed to simply lending a hand?” Hereswith asked, venturing to nudge the formality just slightly.

He nodded, and she went on. “There have been at least five issues I can count. They are not, it seems, directly related to the Crimea, though that has some impact on the Council’s negotiations in various directions. ”

“The Army, the Navy, how a war riles up people in many ways. You’re young enough not to remember the Napoleonic Wars, the way those shattered lives, but far away, yes?

” Erasmus looked a little shadowed at that.

“It’s a particular type of fear, and one that is harder to deal with for being difficult to name or pin down. ”

“I can see that.” It mirrored much of the history she’d learned at Papa’s knee, the looming idea that the Vikings weren’t here, invading this year.

But they might be in the spring or the year after.

No one could tell. No one had certainty.

Danger and change and chaos could strike at any moment.

That was true all the time, really. Hereswith was not na?ve.

But there were times in Albion’s history when most people might hope the danger would pass them by for a bit.

Or, perhaps that it was so general it was a certain thing, and one could at least plan for the change.

“And that is true of the Fatae, as well. There are mentions of various signs of that— crop failures, markings that are not a problem but are not expected, odd coloured flowers or animals. Or the specific reports about mines and such.”

“Just so. There are some informative patterns in how such things appear— or at least, so I’ve argued. Gervase isn’t convinced, but he allows me to raise the point.”

“Allow?” Hereswith ventured the question. “How does that hierarchy properly work?”

“I would also have thought you someone who preferred a single known leader.” Erasmus settled a bit further back in his chair. “You do not look like a wild warrior woman, bent on upheaval of order and virtue.”

It made Hereswith flash back to the memory of being in bed with Bess, where there was anything but decorum.

She let herself smile, let herself be seen to smile, and that was something Papa would have appreciated a great deal.

“I do not propose the application of woad. Wales, like Scotland, is awfully chilly in the winter. But I do?—”

She hesitated, choosing her words carefully.

“When I decided to make a Challenge, I knew that it meant choosing a path few walked. And knowing there are reasons for that I did not understand and might never understand. I value building community, a collective better than the sum of its parts. I am idealistic in that particular way, like many of Horse House. But I also know that sometimes you need to break a fence or leap it to do what’s needed.

Not blindly or wildly or just because lashing out is easier than discipline.

But because the fence no longer serves.”

“Huh.” Erasmus considered. “I begin to see why Blanch was so interested in you.” He tapped his fingers on the desk. “Look. Let me give you a bit more of an idea of some of the personalities. You’ll want to do your own evaluation, of course. Mine is biased.”

“Of course.” Hereswith inclined her head. “But you are well known for precision in your observations. I’d be a fool to turn down anything you wished to share, even if I measure it again myself.”

That made him chuckle. “Indeed, indeed. When you are making social calls again, I will remember to invite you to supper. You might find some of my family interesting to observe that way. Now, let’s see.

We’ve an hour or so. Where to begin.” It was a rhetorical question.

He began by laying out half a dozen families and interrelationships as they were now, sketching a bit of the history, and coming back to the current concern.

They had to stop before they were finished. Long before. The meeting called, and Erasmus had a few things to pull together for something he handled. Hereswith took a minute or five in her office, before squaring her shoulders and going to the Council room.