Against The World

Chapter 96: What the Crown Promises

Halvane’s answer arrived with a man who wanted to speak before removing his wet coat.

Mary stopped him.

“You’re dripping on the map.”

He looked down.

Then stepped away from the table.

A servant took his cloak while I finished reading the letter he had brought.

Evelyn sat beside me. Garrick stood near the hearth with his hands behind his back.

The envoy’s name was Lord Talven.

He had a narrow face, a carefully trimmed beard, and the weary expression of someone who had been given instructions he expected to find difficult.

I reached the end.

Then returned to the paragraph concerning Soren.

“What does ‘restoration to proper custody’ mean?”

Talven glanced toward Mary’s pen.

“The healers remain subject to temple discipline.”

“They’re living here voluntarily.”

“Their vows were made before they crossed your border.”

Evelyn leaned forward.

“Do you have copies of those vows?”

“I have a statement from the high temple.”

“That wasn’t what I asked.”

He looked at her.

Then opened the leather case beside his chair.

There were three documents.

The first listed the names of those the temple wanted returned.

The second claimed expenses for their education.

The third was a copy of the oath sworn by healers entering Avar’s service.

Mary read that one aloud.

There were promises to tend the suffering.

To keep confidence.

To obey the lawful direction of the temple.

Then she reached the final passage.

A healer leaving service without permission could be required to repay the cost of instruction, lodging, and materials.

There was no limit on the amount.

No method for calculating it.

No provision for dismissal.

I looked at Talven.

“How much does Soren owe?”

“The temple has not completed its assessment.”

“He served for eleven years.”

“That will be considered.”

“Before or after you put him in a locked room?”

Talven’s mouth tightened.

“Your Majesty, I am trying to prevent this disagreement from becoming something larger.”

“So am I.”

I set the letter down.

“That’s why I’m asking what you intend to do with people you want me to hand over.”

The conversation lasted until the fire needed tending.

Talven insisted that Halvane’s crown respected Greykeep’s borders.

I asked whether it respected the people living within them.

He said that harboring those who had fled lawful obligations complicated relations between kingdoms.

Evelyn asked whether dismissal from an infirmary counted as permission to leave it.

He returned to the temple statement.

Mary placed Yara’s copy of the dismissal order beside it.

For the first time, he had nothing ready to say.

He read the page.

Then read the names again.

“This should have been included.”

“Yes,” Evelyn said.

Talven looked older when he set it down.

I believed he had not seen it before.

That did not make me more willing to surrender anyone.

“You may send a reply from here,” I told him. “You may speak to anyone who wishes to speak with you. You may present an actual claim for money, with records, to our council.”

“And the request for their return?”

“Refused.”

He drew a breath.

I let him take it.

“No one leaves Greykeep in chains because a temple has found a new description for displeasing it.”

Garrick shifted slightly beside the hearth.

Talven folded his hands.

“I will convey your answer.”

Afterward, I expected to feel satisfied.

Instead, I found myself reading the oath again.

Soren stood across the table from me.

He had asked to see it.

When he reached the final passage, he nodded.

“I remember.”

“Did anyone explain that part?”

“They said it was meant to prevent people accepting years of instruction and immediately selling their skills elsewhere.”

“And you believed that?”

“Yes.”

He touched the edge of the paper.

“I was nineteen.”

I thought of myself at nineteen.

Of a world I had barely understood and all the people whose explanations I had needed.

“How much were you paid?”

“Enough for small purchases. Most of our needs were provided.”

“For eleven years.”

“Yes.”

He looked up.

“Please don’t pay them.”

“I haven’t offered to.”

“They’ll send another demand. For the next healer. And another after that.”

I pushed the page away.

“We’ll make them show what they’re claiming before anyone discusses payment.”

Soren nodded.

Then he hesitated.

“Could I speak with the envoy?”

“If you want to.”

“I do.”

Their meeting took place that afternoon.

Soren asked Mary to attend.

I joined them at his request, though I took a chair near the window and let him begin.

Talven rose when Soren entered.

“Brother.”

Soren sat down.

“My first teacher died of a fever,” he said.

The envoy’s expression changed slightly.

He had plainly expected a different opening.

“I’m sorry.”

“She was called Sister Elwen. She taught me to wash my hands properly. How to tell when a patient was pretending not to be frightened. How to sit beside someone when there was nothing else to do.”

Talven listened.

“I owe her a great deal. I know the temple fed me while I learned. I know the books cost money.”

Soren placed both hands on the table.

“But I worked. Every day. I stayed through winters when half the beds were full before breakfast. I buried patients whose families couldn’t reach them.”

His voice tightened.

“If that counts for nothing, I would like the temple to write that down too.”

Mary’s pen moved.

Talven looked at her.

Then back at Soren.

“I can request the service records.”

“Thank you.”

There was a pause.

Then Soren asked about Brother Cael.

“He is under examination,” Talven said.

“For treating someone?”

“For refusing his superiors’ direction.”

“Has he hurt anyone?”

“I have no information suggesting that.”

“Has he stolen anything?”

“No accusation of theft has been presented to me.”

“Then why is the door locked?”

Talven looked toward me.

I said nothing.

This was Soren’s question.

After a moment, the envoy turned back.

“I will ask.”

“Will you ask the temple, or your king?”

Talven’s fingers rested against the arm of his chair.

“My king.”

Soren nodded.

The meeting ended soon afterward.

There were no raised voices.

When the door closed behind the envoy, Soren leaned forward and put his face in his hands.

I remained by the window until he was ready to stand.

That evening, Garrick came to my study carrying a much thinner bundle than usual.

I eyed it.

“Have you lost something?”

“No. I’ve removed everything that can wait.”

He put the papers down.

Then took the chair opposite mine.

“You made a promise today.”

“I’ve made several.”

“This one needs writing.”

I looked at him.

He tapped the temple’s letter.

“Protection for those who live here. Freedom to worship. Freedom to leave. You’ve said all of those things, often enough that people are beginning to arrange their lives around them.”

“They should.”

“Yes.”

He waited.

I began to understand.

“What happens when I’m elsewhere?”

“Or when a magistrate decides you meant only the people named in this dispute.”

I sat back.

Outside the window, workers were carrying the last baskets out of the courtyard.

I watched them pass.

“We should have done it sooner.”

“We can do it now.”

Evelyn joined us after the children were settled.

She read the short page Garrick had prepared.

Then she asked for another sheet.

“What are you adding?” I asked.

“Dismissal from work.”

She wrote slowly.

“A person shouldn’t lose wages because their employer dislikes where they pray.”

Mary, summoned from the archives, sat beside her.

“We’ll need to distinguish household employment from duties that are themselves religious.”

“A priest can be expected to conduct the service,” Evelyn said. “The woman washing his sheets should be allowed her own prayers.”

Mary nodded and began adjusting the wording.

I read the first paragraph again.

Anyone living under Greykeep’s protection could worship peacefully, change their worship, or practice none.

No foreign authority could seize them here.

No one could be punished merely for refusing a religious oath.

It looked startlingly small on the page.

A few lines.

We had spent weeks living inside the trouble those lines described.

We worked until Helena appeared in the doorway with Carol.

My daughter looked thoroughly awake.

My wife looked thoroughly tired.

“You may continue this in the morning,” Helena said.

Mary reached for her papers.

Garrick stood.

I looked at the unfinished draft.

“There’s one more part.”

Evelyn held out her arms for Carol.

“What?”

“Officials who ignore it.”

Garrick looked back at me.

“A way to complain,” I said. “Somewhere outside the office that made the decision.”

Mary made a note.

“Tomorrow.”

I opened my mouth.

Helena looked at me.

I closed it.

We went upstairs.

The next morning, the council argued about three words for nearly an hour.

I regretted not bringing breakfast.

By midday, however, we had a proclamation that said what we intended.

Mary read it aloud.

Then the Castellan compared it with the surviving laws of Greykeep.

“There are precedents for several provisions,” he said.

“Under Aurelia?”

“And earlier reigns. Enforcement was inconsistent.”

“That sounds familiar,” Eleanor muttered.

I looked toward the bronze plate.

“Can you preserve this with the standing laws?”

“Yes.”

“And make copies available when someone asks what protection they have?”

“Yes.”

We signed it.

Evelyn first.

Then me.

Garrick and the council witnessed it.

Mary sanded the ink.

When she lifted the page, I saw the impression our signatures had left on the sheet beneath.

The proclamation was read in the gate court that afternoon.

People stood in their work clothes.

A cart waited near the archway. Someone had left flour on one sleeve. Arwen attended with her duck under one arm because, she explained later, the bird had objected to being left.

Soren stood beside Yara.

The healer who still wore Avar’s sun had come with his wife.

His pendant was visible above his collar.

I noticed it.

So did several others.

Nobody asked him to cover it.

Mary finished reading.

For a moment, the court remained quiet.

Then a woman near the front raised her hand.

“My husband says the children must attend his temple.”

Evelyn and I looked at each other.

Mary took a fresh sheet.

The questions lasted longer than the proclamation.

By the end, I understood why a few lines of law could require so many people to carry them out.

Talven asked to leave the following morning.

I met him in the receiving room.

His traveling case stood beside the chair. This time, he had removed his coat before approaching the table.

“I have sent your refusal,” he said.

“And Soren’s statement?”

“With it.”

He placed a folded paper before me.

“I have also requested that Brother Cael’s confinement be reviewed by the crown.”

I read the copy.

He had been precise.

No accusation of violence.

No stated criminal charge.

No end given for the examination.

“Thank you,” I said.

Talven looked toward the window.

“I visited your infirmary yesterday.”

“I know.”

“Soren was treating a guard.”

“He’s begun using the new blessing.”

“Yes.”

The envoy rubbed his thumb along the edge of his glove.

“I had been told he abandoned his vocation.”

I waited.

Talven looked at me again.

“I will report what I saw.”

When he had gone, I walked through the lower garden.

The air was cold enough to sting, but sunlight had reached the sheltered wall. Water dripped steadily from the roof above the infirmary.

Through a window, I saw Evelyn sitting with Ilyen.

My wife was listening.

Soren stood beside the table, demonstrating something with his hands.

For once, he was the one explaining.

I smiled and continued upstairs.

Helena met me outside our rooms.

“Your son has discovered that being carried is preferable to almost anything else.”

“I thought he knew that already.”

“He is becoming more persuasive.”

She passed him to me.

Garrick settled against my chest with immediate satisfaction.

“An effective argument,” I said.

Helena went to find her daughter.

I carried him to the window.

For a while, we watched the courtyard.

A new copy of the proclamation had been fixed beneath the covered noticeboard.

Two people stood reading it.

Another waited while a clerk explained a line.

My son pushed one small hand against my coat.

I looked down at him.

One day, he would be able to read that page.

He might agree with it without thinking much about the people whose arrival had made us write it.

I hoped he would.

I hoped the idea would seem so ordinary that he would wonder why anyone had needed a proclamation.

Behind me, Carol began to stir.

I sat beside her cradle with Garrick still in my arms.

“You’ll both have opinions,” I told him.

He stared at my collar.

“Your mother will encourage that.”

The door opened.

Evelyn entered in time to hear me.

“So will you.”

“Yes,” I said.

She bent over Carol and lifted her.

Then she came to sit beside us.

Brother Cael’s reply arrived six days later.

It was short.

The handwriting sloped unevenly, as though he had written on his knee.

He thanked Maelin for finding a visitor.

He thanked Soren for remembering him.

At the bottom, beneath those courtesies, he had added two lines.

The crown has ordered that I be allowed to leave the residence.

There are patients who wish to come with me.

Mary looked up from the letter.

I thought of the beds we had filled.

The rooms Helena had found.

The blankets.

This time, I reached for a clean sheet before making the promise.

“How many?” I said.

Mary smiled slightly.

“He has enclosed a list.”

“Of course he has.”

I drew it toward me.

Then I called for Beatrice.

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