Sir Alistair walked to the main castle wing in a silence that held nothing remarkable, because he rarely spoke to himself and even more rarely thought in words. He bore no ill will toward the knight. Hart had asked the right question. Just to the wrong person, at the wrong time.
The palace wing received him with warmer air, high ceilings, and thicker walls, so that the outside noise of the city, filling the midday hours with anticipation of tomorrow's tournament, barely reached here.
Sterling nodded to the sentry at the turn and climbed to the second level by a broad staircase, where the stone banisters had been polished to a faint sheen by generations of hands.
The door to Ulrich Thorne's study stood ajar. Through it came a quiet voice, interrupted by pauses in which the sound of work with papers could be sensed. Sterling knocked twice with a bent knuckle. The voice went quiet.
"Come in."
Entering, Alistair saw two tables, one with papers laid without disorder but visibly in process, the second with an unrolled map of the city and several small figures on it marking guard positions. Walls without decoration, only a plan of Oсkhaven under glass in a frame and the banner of Waldruhm on a wooden holder by the window.
Daylight fell here from two windows, and now it lay across Thorne's table in slanted rectangles, in which the rows of pages with ink notations were clearly legible. Thorne himself stood at the table, one palm pressing down the corner of the map, the other holding a quill. The silver deer pauldron on his right shoulder caught the light and cast a thin stripe across the ceiling.
Beside him stood a lean man, by his clothing easily recognizable as a common laborer, who bowed and immediately withdrew from the study.
Ulrich looked at Sterling, unsurprised by the visit, and set down the quill.
"Alistair. Sit, if you like."
Sterling crossed to the nearest chair but did not sit, stood beside it, resting his palm on the back. His gaze passed over the map with its figures and lingered on the point marking the arena.
"The tournament."
Thorne exhaled quietly through his nose, which for him signified something between agreement and weariness.
"The tournament" — he confirmed.
"Despite what happened in the forest, the people are clearly in the mood to hold it."
He set down the quill and folded his hands, fingers laced.
"People believe it was as it was meant to be. That it was the Mother Goddess's decision."
The Order commander straightened and turned to the window.
"And the foreigner who broke the laws and trespassed on forbidden ground, by their logic, was also sent by the Mother Goddess?" — asked Sterling.
Thorne smiled slightly.
"Time passes. Despite all our efforts to prevent other powers from exerting a negative influence on our culture and our ordinances, they still manage to find their own particular approach, by which the people of Waldruhm increasingly see foreigners as a source of interest rather than a threat or a risk."
Sterling stood at the window with his back to Thorne, looking at the strip of rooftops beyond which the distant white mass of the city wall could be sensed.
"Interest…" — he repeated.
Sterling turned from the window.
"The Trade League sends its agents to study the state of the forest, and two of them die alongside more than twenty of our people. The death of ours is a tragedy and cause for mourning. The death of their people is a separate story, which by tomorrow someone at the market will retell so that it comes out as the newcomers sharing the fate of our brothers, and therefore being bound to us by a common grief."
A pause.
"The Mother Goddess, Ulrich. That is exactly what you're talking about."
Thorne did not argue. He took the quill and carefully placed a small mark on the map beside the arena gates, then set it down again.
"A culture that has been watered long enough with foreign money and foreign stories will at some point begin to grow in a different direction, even if the roots remain the same," he said, looking at the map.
Sterling walked from the window to the table and stopped on the other side, facing Thorne. He folded his arms across his chest, looking at the layout of the map.
"What about Kyle?" — he asked without transition.
Thorne looked up, understanding that Alistair had no wish to continue the previous subject.
"Alive. In good health, insofar as that's possible after what he did to his own nervous system. Her Majesty spoke with him yesterday evening."
"Result?"
"He said enough to become useful. And enough little to remain valuable."
Thorne shook his head slightly.
"A clever man. Not in the sense that I find appealing."
Sterling was quiet for a moment, but then answered.
"His people died in our forest on his orders. Among our knights there are those who believe he should answer for it now, without waiting for Her Majesty to reach a decision."
Thorne looked at him directly and without haste.
"Among your knights, or do you yourself think the same?"
Sterling met his gaze.
"Do I look like a man who acts behind his queen's back?"
Thorne nodded, accepting this without comment.
"Kyle stays in the castle wing under guard until Her Majesty's decision. That's not up for discussion. With you, with your men, with anyone. Tell me about the arena instead. Have you checked the guard schedule?"
Sterling held his gaze for several seconds, then dropped it to the map.
"Checked. Three shifts, eight men per unit, plus four mounted patrols on the perimeter."
Thorne rose from the table and came around to the map on the other side, standing beside Sterling. Together they looked at the city plan in silence for several seconds, each apparently at his own point.
"The survivor is still unconscious?" — asked Sterling.
"According to the last report from the chief physician, yes."
Sterling had not managed to add anything to that, because movement appeared in the study doorway, and both of them looked up at the same moment.
There were two of them. The first, tall, with dark blue close-cropped hair and amber eyes, entered without knocking, with the ease natural to people accustomed to doors opening for them.
A black double-breasted uniform with red trim fit him perfectly. On the left breast shone the Aisengard crest in silver, on the right shoulder ran a decorative gold chain passing to the center buttons, and the face was symmetrical and unreadable.
Behind his shoulder held a young woman, with a straight dark-blue fringe and the same porcelain cast to her skin. She stopped in the doorway, coming no further in, and her amber eyes moved methodically around the study.
Thorne raised his gaze from the map without haste.
"Vector Fray. Lieutenant Schtance" — said Thorne, with diplomatic neutrality that indicated he was not surprised by their presence, though he had not expected it at quite this moment.
Vector John Fray inclined his head slightly, marking a greeting.
"Mr. Thorne."
His gaze slid to Sterling, held for a second.
"Commander."
Sterling looked at him directly, without returning the nod. Nothing intentionally hostile, simply the absence of a gesture that might have been read as welcome.
Fray noticed this, judging by a slight shift of his gaze, and continued, addressing Thorne.
"We've heard about the announced tournament. Tomorrow, if I understand correctly."
"Correct" — confirmed Thorne.
Fray held a brief pause.
"The martial traditions of Waldruhm merit respect. We've heard enough about the knights of the Green Order to watch with interest how they perform in actual combat, rather than in historical accounts. If it doesn't conflict with protocol, we would very much like to observe."
The silence in the study grew slightly denser.
Thorne glanced at Sterling, briefly, just for a second.
Sterling looked at Fray. At the black uniform with red trim, at the gold chain, at the way he stood, with that vertical straightness that for Aisengardians was a baseline state of the body.
Morgiana Schtance behind his shoulder still stood in the doorway without moving, and her silence was working silence, the kind that comes from someone who is listening and remembering.
"The tournament is open to observers. That is a tradition of the kingdom" — said Sterling.
"Seats for honored guests of the crown are distributed by the Hand."
It was an answer that closed nothing and opened nothing, and Fray, judging by a slight movement at the corner of his mouth, understood that.
Thorne nodded.
"Seats will be allocated. I'll see to it by morning."
Fray made the same brief incline of the head.
"Our thanks."
He turned and left, while Schtance followed, adding not a word, pulling the door quietly shut behind her.
The study returned to its former light and quiet.
Thorne took the quill and placed another mark on the map, this time in the area of the main arena boxes, then set it down and looked at Sterling.
Sterling stood at the table, unmoving, with the expression of a man who has already calculated several next moves and found pleasure in none of them.
"My people will see them in the box above the stands" — he said quietly.
"Yes" — agreed Thorne.
"After what happened in the forest."
"Yes."
Sterling exhaled through his nose.
"I need to go."
Thorne looked at him with the expression that for him meant agreement without surplus words.
Sterling took his helmet from the back of the chair and left the room.