Free Swordpoint by Ellen Kushner Page B

said; 'I've never worked for him.'
    'Her,' said Alec sourly. 'Can't you detect the woman's touch?'
    Richard shrugged. 'I can't keep them all straight.'
    'I'm surprised you've never done a job for her. Diane is such a lady of fashion, and you are fashion's darling - '
    'Diane?' Richard groped for and found the connection. 'Oh, that one. She's the one who had her husband killed. I remember that. It was before I got fashionable.'
    'Killed her husband?' Alec drawled. 'A nice lady with such a pretty boat? What a terrible thing to say, Richard.'
    'Maybe she didn't like him.'
    'It hardly matters. He was crazy anyway. She was made duchess in her own right, and they locked him up. Why kill him?'
    'Maybe he ate too much.'
    'He died of a stroke.'
    St Vier smiled down at the ground. 'Of course he did.'
    The barges were tilting and rocking as friends tried to get close enough to one another to exchange gossip and pieces of fruit. There were also several competing musical consorts. Their ears were assaulted by a dramatic volley of brass, uncomfortably tangled in the sinews of a harp and flute and the anaemic arms of a string quartet.
    'Well,' said Alec, taking in the chaos down below, 'at least we can be fairly sure he didn't die of boredom.'
    In the barges all around them people were hurling food and greetings at each other with impartial good cheer. They received a couple of oranges, but in Diane's calm presence the party on the swan boat forbore to join the melee, while the swan's wings shielded them from missiles.
    Mary Halliday, who, unknown to many, had a good ear for music, winced at the melange of instruments and tunes. Smiling sympathetically at her, Diane said, 'I wonder if we could get them to cooperate on "Our City of Light"?'
    'Not if you love me,' said Ferris, the Dragon Chancellor. 'I don't know much about music, but I know what I'm sick of hearing. We open every Council season with it.'
    'But', the duchess grinned at him, 'have you ever heard it as a trio for trumpet, harp and viola d'amore?'
    'No; and with any luck I never will. What a pity you didn't bring your portative organ so we could drown them all out with "God Hath Warmed my Heart".'
    'We would have to set the pipes at the rear, and the image would be unfortunate. If you're cold, my lord, just bite down on a peppercorn.'
    Suspicion was creeping into Michael's heart. Diane and Lord Ferris seemed terribly familiar. Could they have an intimate connection? Michael tried to tell himself not to be an ass. Lord Horn was boring him and Helena with a complicated story about some state banquet he'd attended, for which it seemed necessary to keep touching Michael's knee for emphasis. If he were a woman, Michael reflected, Horn would never dare to touch his knee. If it were true about Diane and Ferris, perhaps he could contrive to have Ferris killed. Or even - of course, he was still a beginner, but Applethorpe seemed to think he had some promise as a swordsman - he could call the chancellor out himself, without any warning so that Ferris couldn't hire someone else to come up against him. But fighting one's own duels was unknown.
    Might the duchess find it in poor taste? Or was it the sort of daring originality she looked for in him -
    'As I'm sure Lord Michael would agree,' Horn finished complacently.
    Lord Michael looked up at the sound of his name. 'What?' he said inelegantly.
    Laughing, Lady Helena tapped his shoulder with her pomander, and Horn's clear grey eye fixed on him. It gave Michael a sudden distaste for the poached whiting he'd been eating.
    'Helena,' Michael demanded testily of the young lady with the pomander ball, 'can't you learn to control your pet?'
    The duchess's silvery laughter was all the reward he needed for what he considered a laudable, indeed a magnanimous, rein on his temper.
    It vexed Alec not to be able to provoke St Vier into betting on which barge was going to overturn first. He had the odds all figured out, considering the way those people were