His eyes glistened. “So Marshal Steralt said in Valdaire. But I—he is my son.”
“Yes. But what is it Gird has said to you that you think rises above your abilities?”
“Not exactly my abilities,” Arvid said with a touch of his old arrogance. “But my due—”
“Just say it, Arvid!”
He flushed, then answered. “It’s the Code, Marshal-General. It’s … what we know now of what Luap wrote means that the Code itself should be changed. You’ve already said that—”
“And what has that to do with you? Come, Arvid; you’re shying around the matter like a colt afraid of a saddle on the ground in a training pen.”
“Gird … thinks I should … speak out about such things.”
“And so you should. And—?”
“And … not just as a very junior yeoman or scribe. As …”
“A judicar?” His jaw dropped; Arianya could not help laughing. “Come, Arvid; that makes sense. Someone who has been outside the law sees the law more clearly—and yes—” She held up her hand to forestall him. “Yes, I know you consider the Thieves’ Guild to have had a law of its own. So you are doubly qualified, are you not? And you learned something of southern law in Vérella and military law from your time with Fox Company.”
“Um … judicar, yes, Marshal-General, but also … um …”
“Gird’s right arm, Arvid, just tell me what he said. Marshal-Judicar of Gird, was it?” She tossed it out like a jest.
For a moment she thought he would literally fall over even as her own thought caught up to the idea seriously. A thief as a Marshal? A Marshal-Judicar? Well … why not?
“I can’t—I haven’t—I don’t let myself—”
“You’d better,” Arianya said, her voice now steady. “Because if Gird has that in mind for you—or anything else, including heading the Fellowship—then you’d best be about learning what you need to know to do a good job of it.” He still said nothing, breathing too fast. “You don’t want someone like you, two hundred winters from now, saying you were a second Luap, do you?”
“I’m not!” That in a voice absolutely devoid of jest, boast, or anything but determination.
“Indeed, you are not anything like the Luap we now know. You are a far better man, in my estimation, and that’s a judgment I made before the attack.” She gave him a long, considering look. “It will be a difficult trail to follow, Arvid, and would have been so even without this turmoil over magery. But if this is Gird’s charge to you—and I think it is—then we need you. I need you.”
He nodded finally, a decisive nod. “So—now what?”
“Now I will have one of the senior judicars review your knowledge of the Code as it is. Then we will see.” She called in the guard at the door and sent word to the head scribe and the Judicariate that she requested a conference.
Removing Arvid from the scribes took only a moment. “Gird requires him elsewhere” got a bow and a respectful “Yes, Marshal-General.”
The judicar who came, however, was a different matter, Deinar being one of those who held strictly to the Code and had argued already that magery could not be made legal. He looked at Arvid with disfavor. “This is the thief?”
“This is the former thief,” Arianya said with all the patience she could muster. “Now a yeoman of Gird—”
“A provisional yeoman still in his first year of service and having missed drill-night attendance at a grange for—”
“For the time it took him to travel from Valdaire to here, as commanded by his Marshal in the south. I am aware of that, Judicar Deinar.”
“Hmmph. And what do you want me to do, Marshal-General?”
“Arvid has a broad background in several legal systems—”
“Thwarting them, no doubt,” Deinar said.
“Hear me out, Judicar.” Arianya allowed her voice to acquire a bite, and Deinar stiffened.
“Yes, Marshal-General.”
“Arvid will be studying the Code more deeply than his Marshal can supervise—on my behalf—and you will need to examine him and determine what his current level is. Are you able to do that, or does your bias against him prevent it?”
“Bias? I’m a judicar; I am perfectly impartial. I adhere to the Code.” From his tone, no one could possibly doubt that.
“We shall see,” she said. “Arvid, you will spend four glasses a day with Deinar, and Deinar, I expect a daily report from you on which parts of the Code you have covered that day and how Arvid’s understanding fares.”