They did eventually bring her food—dried smoked salmon and water in a small leather bottle, passed up on a long pole. But other than that there was nothing for Signy to do but sit and think. What Signy principally thought about was escape. Eventually, she considered her bracelets. They were very much a part of her. She'd worn them day and night since she was thirteen. The reason was simple enough—they would no longer fit over her hands. The little interlocked bear figurines were indeed sharpish-edged. Would the silver be hard enough to cut the bars of her prison? She doubted it. But . . . she could sit in dimness and brood, or she could try.
She tried to get her hands out of them. And failed.
She tried just snapping them. It hurt her fingers and wrist, and didn't even bend the thin silver. It was a lot stronger and harder than it looked. Perhaps it would cut the wood after all—if she could get it off. She looked around for something she could hook and jerk at it. The edge of her pallet? Or—looking up—one of the bar ends? The woodworking on her cage was rough. Standing on the pallet she could probably reach one of those. But the thought of touching the cage wood made her flesh creep. Eventually, she steeled herself to do it. Gritting her teeth, she pushed her hands through. She hooked the bracelet onto a sharp end, her bare skin burning where it touched the wood. She kicked her feet off the ground, expecting pain. Expecting it to fail.
A moment later she was struggling to grab the bracelet before it fell through the slats. She fumbled it. She was never any good at that sort of catch. But luck was still with her despite her expecting it to fall through the bars, it landed on one, and hung there. Squinting to see it clearly she retrieved it from the wooden slat. The silver proved soft and flexible now. She had no trouble straightening it into a sort of blade.
It was virtually ineffectual as a saw. Eventually she did the same with the second bracelet. This time she had the sense to tie it to her wrist with a thread from her dress.
It didn't cut effectively either. But she felt much better for doing something. Or maybe she just felt much better.
Juzef Szpak was feeling just as much ;a prisoner as Manfred was now supposed to be. Snow was drifting down around Kingshall, thick and soft. It was no longer the near blizzard they'd fought their way back from Svartdal in, but it was still not plausible to go out into the snow again. And, Szpak noted, their quarters were now under guard. Even going to see their horses, they were constantly accompanied.
He'd gathered the monks and nuns in his chamber for a conference.
Szpak found new heart as brother Uriel led them in prayer. The monks placed their candles, invoked the wards of silence and raised a veil of privacy around them, deadening the sounds and muting their voices.
Yes. They were trapped by the weather, and possibly by the heathen horde. But he had been trapped before. And the soldiers of the cross had saved him then. They still had their swords and armor. If it came to a fight, their foes would pay a steep price.
Brother Uriel stood up. "We can speak freely now, Ritter. I warn you, Ritter, that we are being spied on, night and day."
"I had a feeling that was the case," admitted Szpak. "One has to wonder why?"
"All I can tell you," admitted Sister Mercy, "is that there are fewer witches here now than there were when we attempted to divine the thief. But there is still powerful magic being worked, and it has an unwholesome feel to it."
"The weather is not wholly natural, either," admitted Ottar. "Brother, Sisters, something is wrong here. We're definitely not wanted. I overhear things, as the warriors do not think that I can follow their speech. And I have made contact with some of the secret Christians."
"That's risky."
Ottar directed a cool look at him. "So is what they do. And they are not protected, as we are, by a truce oath. At the moment we are in no danger. They are. When that oath is not renewed . . . we may need any friends that we can find. Vortenbras's men are already placing wagers—using your horses as collateral."
Szpak pulled a face. "And I thought that having to explain how we'd lost Prince Manfred was our greatest problem. Well, unless they take us by trickery, or burn us out, we can hold this section of the halls for a while—we can make taking us expensive in the extreme. If the weather lifts we can try to ride for the coast."
"If the weather lifts. The snow is deep out there, and getting deeper, Ritter. We have the sisters to transport, too."
"And meanwhile your scrying has not found either the arm-ring or the prince."
"No. Somehow the arm-ring has disappeared as far as magic is concerned. The spells simply indicate that it is still there, which it plainly isn't. And all we have been able to establish about Manfred and Erik is that they are both alive and very far away."
"The alive part is good news."
Back in Copenhagen Francesca de Cherveuse did not even have that much information. And she was finding it a source of no small irritation. Spies and governments do far more than merely try to listen in on conversations. They also watch things like the lading of ships and the traffic in certain goods. But at the end of the day the best information comes from separate human sources of information, tallying each piece against another, the pieces gradually interlocking to form the entire picture. As a Venetian courtesan, Francesca had been privy to a great many things—including information from disparate sources. Here, in Copenhagen, she had set up her networks, too . . . social networks. The prince's leman was safe to flirt with, politely, although efforts—and they were numerous—to take matters further had to be avoided. Well, men were less guarded with pillow talk, but could still be foolishly informative out of bed.
At the moment it was snowing outside. She grimaced at the view from her window, and turned back to her visitor. She found him a fascinating man even if he could not tell her anything about what was happening in Norway. Most women would not have found Jubal Silvio fascinating—he was elderly, very wrinkled, and not even particularly rich. "Snow. More snow. Snow. Why does it snow so much in the North?"
The wizened man gave a reedy chuckle. "To affront you, mademoiselle." He spoke flawless Aquitaine. He actually spoke some nine languages, and read several more. That was his reason for coming to Copenhagen. In pursuit of rare volumes Jubal had traveled the known world. "Some theorists hold that the North is farther from the sun than the Southlands. A matter of solar angles apparently. An elegant piece of work from a mathematician in Carthage holds them to be correct. But I prefer my theory. And like you, I do not like the stuff. The Venetian spring convoy cannot come soon enough to take me back to Alexandria."
"There are other vessels, Jubal."
"For me, yes. My poor old carcase is not worth much. But for the treasures I have found! A second copying of Gesta Hammaburgensis Ecclesiae Pontificum! And in such good condition too. No, I cannot take a chance with that being stolen by Barbary corsairs, for all that they have been less predatory in the last few months. Venetian galleys it must be, regardless of the expense."
Francesca raised an eyebrow. "I can see the corsairs tossing your books overboard, but not stealing them. Pardon my saying so, but they look like poor loot. Not even any gold lettering."
He twinkled. "Ah, but it is the content, not their warped binding and foxed pages, that make them more valued than gold. And there is a ready market on the Barbary coast. Aruj Aidin and his brother may have terrorized the seaways, but they've brought some stability to the Berber. Tunis and Algiers and Carthage are burgeoning places of culture now. As nothing to Alexandria, but still good."
"I suppose piracy pays them well. Perhaps better than librarianship," she said archly.
He chuckled again. "A library's coin is not always gold. She pays in a variety of other bright things. Some I hold as worth more . . . and are harder for the foxes of the pillars of Hercules to steal. Treasures such as your mind, m'dear."
She tapped him with her fan—it was, she thought, a singularly useless fashion accouterment for any other purpose in this climate. "I imagine you say that to all the ladies, who are a lot less flattered than I am. I hear Heinrich with my other guests. Pardon me a moment. I must go and greet them."
Privately, she hoped that it was one of her informants, rather than the head of naval procurement—a noted amateur astronomer—or the bibliophile Count Achen and his vacuous-headed wife. But no word had come from Norway except: snow.
Bakrauf was nearly incandescent with anger. She scratched yet another coin with her nail. A troll-hard nail . . .
Thin gold foil flaked off, revealing the underlying lead. "After them. After the hostages. They've cheated us!"
She knew that it was too late. The little maggots had already crossed the bridge. Its stones had returned to invisibility. Before her people got there the kobolds would be hidden in their narrow twisty little cracks again. She looked angrily and suspiciously at the fake coin again. Where had mine kobolds, not even up to making their own mattocks, got such skilled work from? Her suspicion naturally fell on the dwarves. She got them to make much of her own fine artifice. But, right or wrong, she was in no position to challenge the dwarves. Besides, she'd need their services again herself, sooner or later. They made the hednar needles, with which she bound men to the changeling beast-skin, and many other powerful tools. Revenge on the maggot-kobolds would have to suffice, for now.
From her cage Signy watched the furious troll-wife stump out, cursing. She could not help but be glad. They'd been about to lower the cage again. Now all she got was a leather flask of water, pushed up through the bars on a long pole.