Page 51 of Peregrine's Call
“Change of plans. Estmar’s tower wasn’t actually that interesting. Why do you think Estmar wanted me to go there?”
“I don’t know. Perhaps just he wanted you out of Willesden because he figured out you arrived in response to ‘Govannon’s’ message. I tried to be discreet, but I know I’m being watched carefully.”
“Speaking of that, let’s discuss Govannon’s message to the king.”
“It’s the middle of the night!” the other man protested. The cat seemed to be in agreement.
“It’s the end of the night, and coincidently, also the end of my patience. We talk now and you tell me what is truly going on, or I’ll leave you here to stew on your own.”
“It’s not safe. We’ll be overheard.”
“So you told Robin,” Tav noted. “But at this hour, everyone is asleep. Now is the time.”
“Lady Robin was quick with her message,” Pierce said, looking more alert. “When did you speak to her?”
“What does it matter? She told me, and I’m here. Tell me about why you need to get to the king personally.”
“Other factions do not value me highly at the moment,” said Pierce. “The empress has grown sluggish in her fight for the crown, and the Welsh…damn the Welsh.”
“Even Myfanwy?” Octavian remembered the black-haired Welsh woman who had been Pierce’s lover.
Pierce’s eyes narrowed and his mouth thinned. Though subtle, it was the first sign of real anger that Tav had seen from him. “Myfanwy left me, and Govannon here is my only ally. The one exchange in which I can definitively say I profited.” He rubbed the cat’s ear affectionately. “Govannon has never betrayed me. Not yet, at least.”
Tav wholeheartedly agreed that the cat was the better companion. Though he’d had only a few exchanges with her, Myfanwy had struck him as a petty, vicious person. “I thought you were well suited to each other,” Tav said coolly.
Pierce chuckled. “A little too much alike, perhaps. If you can imagine it, the beautiful Myfanwy was not to be trusted. She worked with her damned family in secret to overthrow me and hand Malvern over to a warlord they liked better, all because he promised them more spoils from his constant raids.”
“Raids?”
“In the name of the empress and her vassals, he claims,” Pierce said with disgust. “But the truth is that he’s no better than a cattle thief. The raids aren’t against enemy strongholds. He sends his soldiers to raid farmsteads that have nothing to do with strategic safety, taking everything from herds of swine to farmers’ daughters. He’ll inspire a peasant uprising, the idiot.”
“I heard about some raids in the area, but I assumed they were your doing.”
Pierce’s eyes narrowed. “I’d never condone that. We’ve gathered what we found near here, that’s true. But all the livestock you see, all the servants, I paid for them. I’m not a thief.”
“So you wish to regain Malvern for the good of the people?” Octavian asked, not bothering to hide the skepticism from his voice.
“Regardless of what you think of my politics, sir, I never allowed the people in the very shadow of Malvern to starve. And this winter, with their food stores raided by the new overlord, they will starve.”
Tav had been wondering something else as well. “You knew who I was when you sent that message under the name of Govannon. You asked for me specifically. Why?”
Pierce sighed. “I needed to know that it was really a king’s man who came, not some imposter or a traitor. Even with the code name of Govannon, the message could have been intercepted. You’re a difficult man to impersonate, for obvious reasons. I knew you’d be you.”
That was what Tav had suspected. “All right. Explain, in detail, what information you’ve got for the king.”
Pierce said, “Earl Ranulf is planning another rebellion in the north, and he’s going to start with an attack on an important city early in the new year, while it’s still winter.”
“So Stephen won’t have time to send reinforcements,” Tav guessed.
“Exactly. Ranulf will win, and that will cause more cities and towns in the north to fall, one by one. The result will be dissolution. The northern barons don’t want to help the empress Maud rule. They want to rule themselves. Think of a hundred little duchies, all squabbling and fighting and killing for the next generation. They say it’s anarchy now, but what will come next is far worse. Is that what you want?”
“It doesn’t matter what I want,” Octavian said. “You’re the one who claims to be able to stop this.”
“I am.” Pierce leaned in. “I know what city Ranulf will attack, and how, and when. I know which allies he is relying on for aid. And I’ll tell Stephen everything I know in exchange for his support so I can take back Malvern Castle, and once again be the lord, as I should be.”
“You don’t need me for that,” Tav said, frowning. “You can just go.”
“As I tried to make clear to your little companion, I’m a prisoner here as much as you two are. The moment I do anything to reveal a change of heart—”
