Shorefall

by Robert Jackson Bennett

  “Some,” said Berenice. “Lots of them merged with the Commons, though people are leery of living too close to the Mountain. Why?”

  “And…aren’t there wine casks they use for the parades during carnival? Big ones? Ones that could possibly hold all kinds of interesting things?”

  Orso narrowed his eyes at him. “Possibly,” he said. “Gregor—what are you getting at?”

  He shrugged. “Carnival starts tonight. Why not throw a parade of our own?”

  * * *

  —

  As they left the courtyard, Sancia grabbed Gregor’s arm and slowed him down until they had a little more privacy.

  “What is it?” he asked.

  “Something I need to tell you,” she said. “I got Valeria to promise me to grant us more than just protections. She also promised me that she’d…she’d find a way to fix you. To release you from what’s been done to you.”

  Gregor stared at her, his eyes wide and haunted. Then he looked away.

  “What’s wrong?” said Sancia. “I thought you’d be happy. Or at least happier.”

  “I am, I suppose. Thank you for thinking of me in that moment, Sancia. It has great meaning to me.”

  “Then what’s wrong?”

  He watched as the parade of filthy, giggling children ran in loops throughout the streets. “Do you trust Valeria?” he asked.

  “No. I trust we have her backed into a corner, though. Why?”

  Gregor’s right hand rose and thoughtlessly probed the side of his head. “When I saw Crasedes aboard the galleon…” he said finally. “When I heard his voice, and he addressed me…I remembered him. I remembered his voice, I remembered…seeing him before, I think. I think he designed me, Sancia. He made the plate in my head, or told my mother how to make it. He’s the one who made me do all the things I did, in a way. So I am not sure…I am not sure I want to be fixed. Not if it means I would remember.”

  “Remember what?”

  “I don’t know. There is so much I could have forgotten. That is what worries me. I appreciate your efforts,” he said wearily. “But I will say, Sancia, that I am not convinced that…that this is a fix, either.”

  “I just wanted to give you what had been given to me.”

  “Yes. But to these beings, we are little more than pawns. And…” He trailed off.

  “And what?” asked Sancia.

  “Nothing,” he said. “It is just my paranoia, I’m sure.”

  “Are you lot done?” shouted Orso irritably from down the lane. “We’re burning daylight!”

  Sancia and Gregor exchanged one last haggard look, and then rejoined the others. But Sancia felt sure she’d known what Gregor had been about to say: And I am not sure if Valeria has truly granted you freedom either.

  “Finally,” said Orso. They started back off toward the Lamplands. “Let’s hop to it. Day is the one advantage we have. I mean, I know it’s Crasedes Magnus we’re talking about, but…without his privileges, I doubt even he can get much done before nightfall.”

  14

  Armand Moretti strode through the halls of the Michiel Hypatus Building, feeling faintly worried.

  It was not exactly extraordinary for the Dandolo campo ambassadors to reach out to him for an emergency meeting: emergency inter-house meetings were unfortunately quite common these days, with all the houses losing so many scrivers to the Lamplands and the revolts in the plantations going on every week. But he was concerned that they were reaching out to him just days after he’d finished his deal with Orso Ignacio. That posed a number of troubling questions.

  Damn it all, Ignacio, he thought as he turned the corner to his meeting room. If you sold me something that belonged to Ofelia, I will wade into the Lamplands and gut you myself…

  He came to the doors to the meeting room, stopped, and tried to swallow his rage. He’d been in a poisonous mood ever since the deal with Orso: the bit with the sun cloud still smarted—both to his pride and his body—and he had not quite gotten over his bedchambers burning up like a torch. He’d had the guards responsible locked up and their families evicted to the Commons, but he still found himself sulking over the whole thing.

  He carefully composed his robes and arranged his hair. I will get through this meeting, he thought, and then I shall ply someone young and pretty and stupid with wine at carnival, and get my candle thoroughly dipped. That should put me aright.

  Moretti thought, very briefly, of that girl Orso had hired to play scriver during his presentation: the tall one with the cool eyes. Perhaps I shall come upon her at some gala, he thought idly, and put a whole pot of wine in her—along with a few other things…

  Then he cleared his throat and opened the door to the meeting room to greet the Dandolo ambassadors.

  He stopped short.

  There was only one person waiting for him at the table: a skinny young man who looked rather sweaty and anxious. He didn’t even have any papers with him.

  This made Armand relieved: if the Dandolos had come here looking for blood, they’d have sent a much more formidable team.

  But if they aren’t here for blood, he thought, then…what are they here for?

  For a moment there was no sound but the time lantern in the corner—a cunning little scrived rig that allowed tiny, luminous beads to tumble out into a glass chamber like sand in an hourglass. They ticked and ticked as they fell into the glass.

  Moretti cleared his throat again, walked in, shut the doors behind him, and approached the table. “Good afternoon,” he said, bowing. “I’m sorry it took me so long to respond to your summons, Master…”

  “P-Participazio,” said the Dandolo ambassador with a slight stutter. The young man stood and bowed as well. Both of them went about the usual gestures of mutual recognitions of power, though the young man was not particularly well versed in them. Moretti noticed that this Participazio was sweating quite heavily…and trembling too.

  “Now,” said Moretti as he sat, “I must admit I am…a bit befuddled. Usually houses do not begin business when it’s so close to carnival, but—how may I be of assistance to Founder Dandolo today?”

  The young man tried to clear his throat, but succeeded only in making an awkward, squelching quack sound. “We…would like to open negotiations,” he said. “For acquisitions of properties.”

  Moretti’s mouth fell open. “I’m sorry?”

  “And…we would like to close negotiations today, and complete the purchase.”

  He stared. The buying and selling of campo properties between the houses usually took years, and was overseen by committees of elder scrivers and solicitors. They were not ever pursued by a damp young man walking in out of the blue expecting it to get done in a handful of hours.

  “For…which property, in particular?” said Moretti.

  Participazio reached into a satchel at his side, pulled out a single parchment, placed it on the table, and slid it over.

  Moretti read it with astonishment. “You…You wish to purchase the Candiano inner enclave? The Mountain?”

  “Ah…yes,” said Participazio. He glanced into the corner of the room.

  Moretti’s astonishment slowly twisted into indignation. “But…But this is simply ridiculous! What a waste of time! I cannot see exactly why Founder Dandolo could possibly want it, or could think she can get it for this paltry sum! I…I mean, damn it all, we outbid her several times over in acquiring it!”

  “W-Well, sir, I—”

  “And the Mountain is…well, it’s goddamn structurally unstable! Our own expert scrivers haven’t even found a decent way to get into the innards of the thing without it all falling down on their heads! I mean…This whole conversation is ludicrous. Ludicrous! Do you have any idea how much of my time you’ve just wasted? My time?”

  Participazio sat there, his young face fixed in a look of panicke
d anxiety. Moretti watched him, feeling slightly satisfied. This was an unusual situation, certainly—but it wasn’t one he was unused to. He had spent his fair share of time with terrified young people in empty rooms.

  So he knew the next steps quite well.

  He narrowed his eyes at the young man. “Tell me, boy—is this a joke?”

  “N-No, sir, I—”

  “What’s your name, again?” he demanded.

  “P-Participazio, sir, and I m-meant no disres—”

  “P-P-Participazio?” said Moretti, mimicking his stutter. “Did someone trick you into this absurd task? Or are you really even an ambassador, boy? You look more like a child playing dress-up to me.”

  “N-No, sir, I j-jus—”

  Moretti lounged back in his chair and studied the young man like he was an unpleasant new breed of beetle. “It must have been a mistake,” he said. “I wonder what it feels like, to have made such an epic, dundering scrum-up so early in one’s young career. Is Donato still there? At the ambassadors’ division?”

  The boy’s eyes widened slightly. “He…He is the division vice-chief, bu—”

  “Mm,” said Moretti. “He’s an old friend of mine, you know. I think he would be quite interested to know one of his junior lot were in here making these kinds of mad requests…”

  Moretti felt a flicker of pleasure as terror and confusion shot through the boy’s face. “Were I to guess, you’re one of the lower junior ambassadors,” he said. “Maybe one generation away from the Commons. You’re just happy to have a roof over your head and a pot to piss in, aren’t you? But I could make all that go away, you know, with one simple word to old Donato.”

  Young Participazio now looked absolutely miserable. He glanced again into the corner.

  “So,” said Moretti playfully. “Will it be information you give me? Leverage over someone on your campo?” Moretti’s eye lingered on the boy’s neck, on his fingers, on his ears. He was not especially pretty. But he was young. And that counted for something. “Or something…else?”

  Then there was a voice.

  It came from the corner of the room. It was deep, and rich, and it had the curious quality of sliding over the surface of Moretti’s mind like soft velvet.

  “I think,” said the voice, “that that’s enough.”

  Moretti turned, and saw there was a man standing in the corner of the room—and apparently he’d been standing there this entire time. Moretti wasn’t sure how he hadn’t noticed this man before, especially considering his manner of dress: he was, outrageously enough, wearing a Papa Monsoon carnival costume, complete with the black mask.

  “W-What on earth?” said Moretti. He looked at Participazio, somehow feeling betrayed, but the young man had averted his gaze and was staring into the floor.

  “I said that that is enough,” said the deep voice again. The man’s empty eyes were fixed on Moretti. “I feel obliged now to repeat our petition.” He crossed the room and stood at the head of the table, looking down on him. “We would like to purchase the Mountain. And we would like to have this finalized today.”

  “What?” said Moretti. “Really? I mean—really?”

  The man in black stared down at Moretti. “Really!” he said. “Now, I must ask—are you hearing me, Armand?”

  Normally, Moretti wouldn’t begin to take such a proposal seriously, but…

  …as he listened to the sound of the man’s voice, it suddenly felt very hard to do anything else.

  “Who…” stammered Moretti. “What is your name again, si—”

  “I did not give it,” he said. “But I know you quite well.”

  “How might you know me, sir?”

  “Because you have made yourself known,” said the man in the black mask. He leaned closer, head cocked, and Moretti began to feel a little troubled—he could not see any eyes behind that mask. “Haven’t you?”

  “Well. I suppose so, yes, as all gentlemen must.”

  “Yes,” he said dryly. “As a gentleman must. Boy?”

  Participazio jumped a little in his seat.

  “Why don’t you leave us for a moment, please.”

  The boy practically leapt out of his seat and sprinted out of the room.

  Moretti watched him go, feeling increasingly alarmed about all this. “Sir, I must ask, are…are you a certified Dandolo campo ambassador?”

  “Certainly!” said the man in black. “I just don’t have any certifications.”

  “But…that doesn’t make sens—”

  “You know, you were one of the first ones I considered, Armand,” said the man in black. He took a seat at the table across from him. “A long, long time ago.”

  “You considered me? For…what?”

  “I watched you start here at this house,” continued the man in black. “I watched you begin your rise. Working your connections. Being groomed for the top stations. You seemed a promising candidate. Ambitious. Hungry. I watched you when you applied your first sigil to your first rig. It was a disaster, wasn’t it? Some kind of paper that was intended to glow…”

  “Do…Do I know you?” said Moretti. “How did you know tha—”

  “And I watched you,” said the man, “when you were given your first commissioned post. How proud you were that day. You beamed like a barn mouse atop the chaff.” He cocked his head. “Do you remember what you did that night when you won it, and received your first pay?”

  Moretti was silent. The time lantern ticked and ticked away in the corner.

  “I do,” said the man in black. “You had a servant girl bring you a saffron striper pie. A delicacy here. I remember. And then you laid nude on the bed in your rooms…and you made her feed it to you. You made her feed it to you bit by bit, with a tiny golden fork.”

  Moretti felt the blood leave his face. “Stop.”

  “And you enjoyed it. You enjoyed making her feed you this treat she herself would never have the pleasure of tasting,” said the man, “and you enjoyed seeing how uncomfortable it made her.” He cocked his head. “And then you dashed the plate aside, and you held her down, and you forced yourself upon her—didn’t you?”

  “I say, you really can’t—”

  “It wasn’t the first time. And it certainly wasn’t the last. After all—the same impulse just passed through your head at the sight of young Participazio, didn’t it?” He cocked his head the other way, a disturbing, birdlike gesture. “An impulse that extends beyond your thirst for flesh, of course—an impulse to take, to degrade, to…own. It’s really not so uncommon here, is it?”

  Moretti tried to get angry. He wanted to get angry. He wanted to stand and call for the guards and have them take this man and throw him out on his ear, but…

  But the man’s words kept echoing in his mind, occupying his thoughts, suffocating any outrage he could muster.

  “You…you’re a liar…” whispered Moretti.

  “Oh, I’m many things, Armand,” said the man in black. “But I am not a liar. Maybe it’s not your fault. Maybe you, like so many of this city, believe that all the world should be your servant because you haven’t ever learned what it’s like to be powerless.”

  Moretti broke out in a sweat. There was a curious pressure building in his mind, like a bubble at the fore of his brain. “I won’t sign your damned contract,” he gasped. “Get out. Get out before…before I have someone come in an—”

  “I wonder—would you like to know what it’s like to be truly helpless, Armand? To have all choices ripped away from you?”

  “I…I…”

  “Listen to me,” said the man. His voice was soft, yet it seemed to echo in the depths of Moretti’s bones. “Listen to me now, and be still.”

  A long silence.

  Moretti sat frozen in his chair.

  The time lantern ticked and ticked.
/>   “Now—stand up, Armand,” said the man in black.

  Moretti watched himself stand up. He wasn’t sure why he was standing—in fact, he was barely aware of himself actually moving at all. It was like the command was written on some underside of his very brain, and he couldn’t ignore it.

  “Turn around,” suggested the man in black.

  He did so.

  “Look at that cabinet there, up against the wall.”

  Moretti tried to resist. He furrowed his brow, trying to focus on the man, on this room, but his words were so rich, so smooth, so…What was the word? Mellifluous? As he pondered this, he realized he was now looking at the cabinet up against the wall, which was dark green with gold inlay.

  “There is a knife in the top drawer of the cabinet,” said the man in black. “You’re going to go to the cabinet, open the drawer, and look at this knife.”

  A black, churning dread boiled in Moretti’s belly. He jerked slightly, but did not move.

  Tick, tick, went the time lantern.

  “Do it,” said the man in black.

  Moretti stiffly walked to the cabinet and opened up the top drawer. Inside was a long, curved knife, with a black handle.

  “You see the knife,” said the man in black. “Yes? Answer me.”

  “Yes,” whispered Moretti.

  “Good. Pick it up, please.”

  With trembling hands, Moretti picked up the knife and brought it over to the table. The man in black watched him return, his veiled body so still and motionless Moretti briefly wondered if there was anyone under there at all.

  “Now, Armand,” said the man. “I want you to take the knife in your right hand and press your left palm flat against the table.”

  “Please…” whimpered Moretti.

  “Now.”

  Moretti did so. The table felt cold and hard to his touch.

  He stared at his left hand.

  The time lantern ticked and ticked.

  “Look at the knife, Armand,” said the man in black. “See the knife. See how sharp it is, how strong.”

  Moretti’s gaze moved to the blade in his hand, and he studied it. It did seem very strong and sharp.