Chapter 21

MARCH 25TH IN TRELLECH'S HALLS OF JUSTICE

P recisely at four, Griffin knocked on Lamont's office. He'd taken the last half hour to spruce himself up and make sure all his notes were in order. The proposal was at the top of his portfolio, and that was tucked neatly against the arm of the chair. He'd left the crutches in his office with Charlus, who was working on copies of a few things Griffin hoped he'd continue to need. After the meeting, however long or short it was, Charlus had offered to take him back to the portal. That meant he didn't have to send his case with a change of clothes and a refill on his potions and pills on ahead.

Now, Griffin put on his best professional cheerful face, and at the acknowledgement from inside, opened the door and wheeled himself in. Lamont - or one of his clerks - had thoughtfully removed the chair on this side of Lamont's desk, pulling it to the side. Griffin rarely met with Lamont here. It was far more often in a group in one of the meeting rooms. He couldn't decide what he thought of it now. Or, as he'd said yesterday, what to make of the fact this was at four on a Friday. The building was rapidly emptying of the few people there over the spring recess period.

Lamont himself looked relaxed and dapper. He was in his usual dark suit and gemstone bow tie - today's was a golden amber, with a pocket square to match. Griffin knew he was in his later sixties, and he might be ten years or so from retirement. He'd become Lord of Trellech's Justice rather young, after a short time as Heir, right around when he turned forty. Griffin hadn't started working in the Courts, and Lamont had been well established as Lord when he'd begun his apprenticeship in the autumn of 1901.

History had it he'd named his Heir promptly, back then. But one had died - a regrettable illness, something with his heart. And the other under consideration had declined a few years later. Instead, Lamont had named three potential Heirs before the War, but then had refused to choose between them. There was no use treading that ground again, not right now. Griffin instead pulled his focus to the office, to what had changed since the last time he'd seen it.

The office itself was pleasant. It was, of course, nearly twice the size of Griffin's. There was an adjoining door to the Heir's office and another to the clerk's. The Heir's office was currently empty, as it had been for fourteen years. It was well lit, with a brightness that was glowing rather than brash and artificial. White walls hinted at an ancient temple, but with splashes of jewel-toned colours breaking up the white.

They had a multitude of forms; an art print, an orrery, the very books on the shelves that lined the sides of the room. But they were also matched to each other rather than haphazard. The desk itself was stained dark. It had a strip of beautifully resonant birch wood inlaid along the edge, a reminder of the chair Lamont held as Lord and Head of the Courts.

"Good afternoon, sir. I hope you had a pleasant and blessed equinox?" Lamont kept those rites, and keeping track of who did was something Griffin paid particular attention to.

"Quite restorative, thank you, and an excellent time besides." Lamont nodded as Griffin set his brake so the chair would stay stable. "I appreciate you coming down here this afternoon. I wanted to ask you a bit more about your current project, with fewer people wanting to overhear." He lifted two fingers. "I should say, before anything else, that you are not in trouble. And I do not expect anything you say today will make me recall you if you think there is more to do."

Griffin let out a breath, trying not to make it too obvious. "I appreciate that, sir." He pulled the portfolio out from one side, then the foldaway table surface. "Where would you like to begin?" The last part was the fountain pen, in case of notes.

"Tell me what you've been doing, would you?" It was certainly a reasonable place to start, and one Griffin had prepared for.

He laid out what he had done so far, passed across the list of what he'd done, who he'd talked to. "Mistress Matthewman has agreed to come and have a look. I'm hoping to make the arrangements for late next week. She has some business to attend to in Whitby first."

Lamont listened attentively. It was, Griffin had long thought, one of his particular gifts. He focused on what was in front of him, but also on how it intersected with all the other things going on. He asked excellent questions, and he thought about the consequences. When Griffin finished laying out everything so far, Lamont nodded. "Very thorough. And if, as you say, Mistress Matthewman is the best choice to bring here, I am glad to approve it. The usual room and expenses. You're competent at doing the forms without six reminders."

Griffin had to smile at that. "Sir." Then he cleared his throat. "You could have asked for this by letter. I'm assuming there's some other reason you wanted to speak."

It earned Griffin a small chuckle. "Of course. I didn't expect that point to slip by you." Lamont considered, resting his fingers on the broad polished wood of the desk. "I was pleased to see you extending yourself on this question. You know there continue to be concerns about your ability to do the work."

Griffin nodded once. It was not a comment that needed a reply.

"I am well aware that I really do need to pick between you, Harriet, and Nestor. And I am under some pressure to do so sooner than later. Or some other Heir, but we all know it will be one of you three." Lamont weighed his words here. "None of you is a simple choice. Nestor, as Fir Primus, would make the administration of the courts run smoothly and precisely, like clockwork."

Griffin certainly knew better than to comment on his colleagues here, especially Nestor. Or his competition, even though he knew it wasn't exactly a competition in the usual way. "And he already oversees three courtrooms to my one." Might as well put it out there himself, seeing as it was the truth.

Lamont raised one finger from the desk. "And Harriet has an eye for the larger view, as Apple Primus. And she is more at home with the ritual magics in some ways than either you or Nestor. Though you needn't bristle, your skills are also refined and solid."

To have that spotted, his reaction, stung a little, but Lamont was as observant as the rest of them. More so, given the amount of practice and high level of politics he swam in on the regular.

"And both of them have something of an advantage of birth over you. Coming from those sorts of families." Griffin's folk were Fourth Families, not part of the Great Families of Albion. People like him had been named Heir before, more than a few times, but it was starting from behind, even if Griffin had gone to Schola.

"I imagine it's a difficult scale to balance, sir," Griffin said, after a moment. "A tradesman's negotiation, this thing for that, based on dozens of factors."

Lamont chuckled again. Whatever else this conversation was, he wasn't strained about it. "Exactly. And I have been weighing those. My concerns about you have not been about your health per se. They have, however, been about the consequences of your health. Since you returned to us, you have sometimes been more cautious than even a man of probity, a solicitor, might normally be. Some have wondered, to me, if you could or would act when needed." Lamont laid it out, deliberately, and now he was watching Griffin carefully.

The thing of it was that Griffin couldn't argue with that, not exactly. He was more cautious now, in dozens of ways every day, because getting something wrong, especially exertion, had a ripple effect for hours or days. He thought that overall, this made him better, long-term, because he thought through the consequences before leaping. But Griffin also couldn't argue with the statement, nor how it was true for him in particular. Now he took a breath and let it out. "That's a fair enough concern, sir."

"Seeing how you have gone about this particular problem, I am no longer so worried. You have been mindful of resources, your own and other people's. You have not rushed a decision or your actions. But you have also pressed when pressing was needed. You have made solid progress given the lack of ideal experts. And you have done so away from home and your usual habits and routines and resources. Being Heir - or Lord - rarely involves leaving Trellech. But it is necessary at times beyond the Council rites or various social gatherings. Demonstrating you can be as effective in Whitby as here in the Halls of Justice has some weight."

That put a somewhat different twist on it than Griffin had been thinking. Enough of one that he was honest now, bringing part of it out in the open. "I assumed, sir, that more than one person thought I'd fail - that the hills or the stairs would make me take a tumble in pride, if not physically."

"Oh, that's also true." Lamont's smile was rather different now, someone waiting for someone else to step into a trap. Not Griffin, Griffin was fairly sure of that. Mostly. "I would, therefore, ask you to continue in your plans, in the way you see best. I will continue to ask you for explanations, as well as the written reports, but I am giving you your head. Make of it what you will."

That put the whole thing in the proper context. Lamont had not created this challenge, but he would use it to refine his own plans. He could have taken this back from Griffin, and instead he was letting Griffin do it his way. It was up to Griffin to make the most of it. Griffin considered, making a couple of notes of things to prioritise, given that remit. "And the others? If there is opposition? I'm presuming you'd prefer me to handle it through the usual methods, and to let you know if that does not serve."

"Oh, let me know either way, but yes, just so." He glanced at Griffin's notes. "Anything else, then?"

"May I draw on the resources of the Courts? Mistress Matthewman has noted that she doesn't have training, but we suspect there's some talismanic work at play, or that might be helpful. Someone with a focus on stones, gemstones of any kind, by preference. I know someone, but she's a master of her art, and her fees match her skill."

"Oh, I believe we can do something about that, yes. A moment." He touched the bell on his desk. It didn't ring in the office, but thirty seconds later, Griffin felt a shift in the warding of the space, and the door from the clerk's office opened. "Sir?"

"Would you pull the contacts and standing profiles of the talisman workers we contract with, particularly anyone with a focus on gemstones? General pieces, not necessarily the courtroom settings, yes?" He added to Griffin, "Anyone on the list has my approval, usual rates. You had someone in mind, then?"

"Niobe Hall, sir, and I know she's on your list, but I'd like options if she's not available." Griffin replied promptly. "I think taking a step back and looking at other approaches might be beneficial."

There was a brief exchange, more gesture than sound, from Lamont to the clerk, and she disappeared. Griffin knew that would be ready before he left the building. Some messenger would be rounded up to bring it to his office. Once the door closed again, and the warding came back with it, Lamont considered. "I have not asked you, directly, what you want out of things here. Not for some years."

"My answer has not changed much, sir." Griffin wasn't entirely sure why he was bringing this up now. But this was a more direct conversation about who should be Heir than Lamont had had with anyone in a good while. Or so Griffin was fairly sure, because he suspected Nestor wouldn't have hid smugness at it, if he'd been in a similar one. "I love Trellech. I always have. And I find myself drawn in so many ways to the Courts. To the work of the courts, the ideal of justice and fairness and improving things for people who have need of that, properly. But also to the..." Now he ran out of any eloquence. "The shape of them. The spaces we make here, what that makes possible."

"And Trellech? This is the first time you've been away for a while, hasn't it?" Lamont leaned forward now.

"A few days, three times now, with my parents, up in Cambridgeshire. But no, not this long since the War." Griffin thought about how it had felt, coming back through the portal. "Whitby is a beautiful town, with a lot to commend it, and also a lot of struggles. But coming back this morning, I was home and glad to be. And I will be glad to be back when my work in Whitby is done." He let himself shrug. "It is unfashionable to love Trellech for herself, all her odd alleys and corners and ageing streets, but I do."

Lamont leaned back. "I appreciate your answer, and the truth of it. But of course, I know your standards there, and you do not let them slip." That was a particular bit of praise. And Lamont, of anyone, would indeed understand that.

Griffin let himself smile. "Of course, sir. Nothing but, here and now."

"That was the last for the moment, and I'm sure you want to get back to Whitby before it gets too far into the evening. Can you wait for the profiles? I'll also send down a few notes to go with you. It might be an hour?"

"Charlus made us a portal reservation for half-seven, after the evening crush." Griffin said. "I was planning on being in my office until then, no point in going home so briefly."

"Excellent. We'll have that for you as promptly as possible. Let me know if there's anything else that would assist in your project. The notes will include an expanded budget you can spend to, without additional approvals." That was going to be excellent. Griffin had been as careful as any shopkeeper's son should be about expenses, but having more to work with would be a help with additional experts. "A good evening, then."

"And to you, sir." Griffin nodded, waited for a return nod, and then smoothly released the brake. He backed up a little, and turned tightly to wheel himself to the door and open it.