“The Terafin did not leave the city on her own,” Hectore continued, when Andrei did not immediately argue. “She took some members of her House with her. I do not speak of the pale, cold man, and I do not speak of the mercurial domicis—those, I think, she would have regardless. Nor,” he added, as Andrei opened his mouth, “do I speak of the cats. She took Adam.”
“Adam might survive.”
“And she took a member of her den. I believe Finch called him Angel. He is not talent-born; he is as ordinary as I. She is ferociously protective—even you must admit that.”
“She is not worse than you are.”
Hectore frowned. “Be that as it may, her retinue will travel with her, and if she is entering this territory of which you speak, she will not do it alone. If she is content to allow them to take that risk, I do not believe it will kill me.”
“I would take Jarven in a second,” Andrei countered.
That stung. “Only so you could lose him.”
“Yes.”
The sting vanished. “You will have to accustom yourself to Jarven at some point. He is unlikely to go away.”
“You speak truer than you know. Hectore—I must go. She has entered the tangle, but her path has not yet been unmade, remade; it has not yet been transformed. She is not lost to me—but she will be if I tarry.”
“I do not advise you to tarry—but I am going where you go.”
“You do not generally accompany me when I do my work at your behest.”
“This work is not at my behest,” Hectore replied. He did not speak of the nightmare which had dropped him unceremoniously out of sleep.
“Hectore—”
Hectore smiled. It was a very particular smile; it implied a wellspring of gentleness, of kindness, of humor. It was, of course, deceptive; Andrei recognized the expression immediately. So would his wife. His children were not always as perceptive, but that was fair; children did not see “person” half so much as “parent.”
And it was not a smile he ever offered his grandchildren. Andrei deplored his indulgence and was probably correct to do so.
“I cannot concentrate as I must if you are with me.”
“I have seen you at your worst,” Hectore countered, his smile genial, agreeable.
Andrei said nothing for one long moment. “Why do you insist on accompanying me?” he finally asked.
Hectore considered the possible ramifications of answering the question. He considered, as well, the cost of remaining silent. Everything that existed between them existed in a space that words did not generally touch. Those words were not allowed entry, as if to speak was to break that fragile peace.
He chose not to speak. His smile spoke for him; it deflected all rejection, all denial. He did not say that he followed because he was concerned. No, he was afraid. He was not at all certain that Andrei would find his way back without Hectore as anchor.
• • •
Before he left—and he extracted Andrei’s very, very sour promise to wait—he accoutred himself with a number of small stones, each purchased at great expense from the Order of Knowledge. On numerous occasions throughout his adulthood, stones such as these had saved his life. He wasn’t certain what their function would be on the road he now traveled, but certainty was not required. They might be useful, and if they became so, it would be worth the cost and the inconvenience.
He retained his caravan clothing. Tangle, to Hectore, implied an unkempt, wild place, and he did not wish to wear ostentatious and impractical clothing there. Yes, he could replace anything that was destroyed, but it was the principle of the thing.
You sound like a doting mother.
He smiled, remembering.
• • •
Andrei was tense, which was not unusual. His eyes were all black, which was. Hectore cleared his throat, and Andrei shook himself.
“Your eyes,” Hectore said.
“My—” Andrei glanced in one of the decorative mirrors placed in the hall to make it seem both larger and grander. He frowned, and his eyes cleared. They were, at the moment, a very passable, nondescript brown. “It will not matter, where we are going.”
Hectore rolled his own eyes. “What have I said?”
“You have said so much in my life were I to recite it all, we would never leave. You will, no doubt, remind me by repeating it.”
“I will, indeed. In the warm months, clothing is almost irrelevant for purposes of protection or shelter; the night, and the temperature, will not kill. How many people walk the streets of our fair city without clothing in such weather?”
“Ah, that. I am, as you see, clothed.” He exhaled. “But there are no streets where we now walk, Hectore. There are no people of your particular variety. There are glimpses of the familiar, but they are fractured, fragmented. In nightmare, terrain shifts and changes beneath your feet, to your sides, in front of you—it is one of the features that marks it as nightmare. This might be very like that. There are oases within the shifting, changing space; places in which the current mode might remain stable for hours, perhaps days.”
“You do not make this sound pleasant.”
“No. It is not, or will not be, for you.”
“Is there some intent in these changes?”
“There is war,” Andrei replied. After a pause, he added, “there is the detritus of ancient war. It is an echo of things past, of ancient struggles. But there is no loss as we define loss, and no victory, as we define victory; it is the struggle itself that has primacy.”
“And you can just walk there.”
“There is no ‘just’ about it.” Andrei began to tie rope around Hectore’s waist; Hectore allowed it, noting that he tied the same rope around his own shortly after. “If I ask it—”
“No.”
• • •
Hectore followed where Andrei led. This was almost novel. While it was true that in day-to-day life Hectore allowed Andrei to guide him to the various appointments that he might otherwise neglect, he was unaccustomed to giving Andrei free rein. While they were together, they served Araven’s interests—or Hectore’s. Every decision made reflected that. Andrei did not merely help in the shaping of the merchant empire; he offered aid in the building of bridges between Hectore and his offspring.
Between Hectore and his godchildren.
He thought of Ararath, as he walked behind Andrei. “We are going?” he asked his servant.
“To the Terafin manse.”
“Wearing rope around our waists.”
“Yes. Apologies, Hectore—but without the rope I cannot guarantee that you will not be seen.”
“People can’t see me?”
“No. There will always be exceptions; it is a subtle, quiet magic, meant to deflect vision rather than defeat it.”
“Why the Terafin manse?”
“It is there that we will find, or fail to find, a way to reach your godson’s ward.”
Hectore repented of his clothing choice. He almost ordered Andrei to remove the rope; he had no reason not to visit the manse in the open. But perhaps Andrei did. He was ill at ease, thus roped, and Terafin was not a minor patrician house, to forgive all oddity and all possible offense.
• • •
Andrei chose to avoid the manor itself. Hectore was grateful, but unsurprised. He was very surprised when he entered the forest, attached by rope like a child in thick, leading strings, to find himself instantly confronted by the Terafin gardener.
Her eyes were the color of bright blood, not dark; it made the rest of her skin seem unflatteringly pale. She glared openly at Andrei, who offered her a very formal, very correct bow. Or rather, it would have been correct had she been The Terafin. The grace of the gesture did nothing to mollify her, but Hectore thought nothing would, where Andrei was concerned.
He found it very difficult to like the woman, which was irrelevant in any practical sense.
“I have been granted permission to traverse these lands, while The Terafin lives.”
<
br /> She nodded, glancing at Hectore and frowning at the rope that joined him to his servant. She did not seem to note his clothing, but her own was no better. “What do you intend, Patris Araven?”
“My servant,” he replied, “believes that your Terafin may be in trouble.”
Birgide Viranyi stiffened. “On what grounds?”
“An interesting choice of words.”
“Patris Araven. What a pleasant surprise!”
There was only one thing that could further blacken Andrei’s mood. Hectore, however, felt his automatic grimace fade into a resigned smile. “Jarven.”
“I see Andrei is in fine form this morning. It is, however, rather early for you.”
“I could say the same thing but will refrain from doing so. We do not, sadly, have the time to spar; Andrei feels that The Terafin is in danger.”
“And he feels he might come to her aid? Does he even know where she is?” Jarven’s tone didn’t change; it was jovial, friendly, even warm. His eyes, however, were sharp, and the glint in them was cold.
“She is,” Andrei replied, “in the tangle.”
The whole of the forest erupted in noise then.
• • •
Leaves rustled so loudly they sounded like ocean waves in a storm. Birgide, in spite of her eyes and her duty, didn’t understand the significance of those words. Nor, it appeared, did Jarven. But the trees did. The earth beneath their feet did.
Hectore was not surprised to see Haval Arwood, accoutred in an apron and armed with sewing needles, appear from between the trunks of two trees. Haval bowed—to Hectore. He glanced at Jarven with about as much affection as Andrei had shown.
“Patris Araven.”
“Hectore, please.”
“Very well. Hectore. The elders seem alarmed at your servant’s words.”
“If, by elders, you mean trees, I noticed.”
“They wish to me to ascertain that his words are materially true.”
Hectore stiffened. “They do not mean to insult my servant or my House, surely.”
“No. But The Terafin is seer-born. They have heard some whisper of rumor that she approaches the tangle, but opinions had only barely begun to be expressed. They are now worried.”
Haval studied Andrei; Andrei returned the regard. The older man, Hectore thought, had the better of it, in the end. Haval Arwood did not often condescend to open conflict, but he was clearly well-practiced. Given his obvious knowledge of Jarven, that should not have come as a surprise.
“You did not, of course, lead her into the tangle.” At those words, Hectore relaxed, inasmuch as one could in The Terafin’s forest. This forest had will; he could feel it bearing down on them all, in anger or fear. Or both: fearful men were often prone to anger, which led in turn to acts of folly.
Andrei nodded, wary now.
“The elders, therefore, wish to know—”
“We wish to know,” a voice from somewhere beneath Haval’s knees said, “how you know and why she has entered the tangle.”
Hectore looked down to see the fox. He offered the fox a respectful bow. The fox regarded him with lively eyes in a gold-furred face. “Tell me, Eldest,” he said, mindful now of how the fox had been addressed by others. “Do you ask The Terafin how she knows what she knows?”
The fox regarded Hectore as if coming to a decision about his impertinence. He could find it either offensive, which would be difficult, or amusing. Amusing might cause other difficulties, but those would be in future. “As you must know, we do not. But the Councillor questions her often, and she feels compelled to answer his many, many questions, even when they are not respectful.”
“Does she have an answer that is acceptable to you?” Hectore continued. He had injected a note of mild curiosity, and he kept his voice soft. He could not treat the fox as a child; he could not treat the fox as a peer. He had always been a man sensitive to the currents of power, and in this clearing, they swirled around the fox.
Jarven said nothing; he observed. This was not unusual.
“All of her answers are acceptable,” the fox replied, as if the question made no sense. Given the forest, the wilderness, the great trees that had sprung full grown from the soil itself, perhaps it didn’t.
“My servant,” Hectore continued, with emphasis on the second word, “has my absolute trust. I do not ask him how he knows what he knows.”
“You are not likely to understand most of the answers.” The fox was definitely condescending now. And this, too, Hectore accepted, although in other circumstances he would have been offended.
“Ah. But, you see, The Terafin is like unto me. What I will not understand, I fear that she will not.”
The fox turned his nose toward Haval and lifted it, in obvious question. Haval met Hectore’s gaze for a brief second and then nodded. “Jewel is fond of Hectore,” he added.
“Yes. We are aware of that. She wishes to preserve him. But she is fond of his servant, as well.”
“Yes, she is. Hectore, like myself, is not a young man. And Andrei is unusual. But inasmuch as she trusts, she trusts them both. And, Eldest,” he added, as the fox opened its mouth, “you cannot tell me that she does not see. You might accuse Hectore of that ignorance—but you would be wrong, in my opinion. I think Hectore sees more than any of us.”
“He cannot,” the fox said, clearly cross and irritable.
Haval did not disagree; it wasn’t necessary. But he straightened shoulders, fussed a moment with his apron, and turned—to Andrei. “Can you reach The Terafin?”
“From here, yes, but I must move quickly.”
“What do you intend?”
“I intend to lead her out of the tangle. It is not safe. It was not safe for gods, when gods walked, and she is no god.”
“She is Sen,” the fox said.
Andrei nodded. “She is Sen,” he agreed. “And it is possible that she might claim some part of the tangle as her own and make it strong—but that will not help her in the end; it will not help you. It will not save this city, or this Empire, when the god walks.”
“What is the tangle?” Haval asked.
“It is what remains in the wake of the death of gods. Death does not mean to the gods what it means to even the firstborn; the firstborn, when dead, are gone. But the gods cohered. They were not born as you understand birth; nor did they give birth as you understand it.”
“You know where she is.”
“I know where she has walked; it is not, in the tangle, the same thing.”
“And you know the tangle.”
“One cannot know the tangle,” Andrei replied, with obvious frustration. He looked at the fox as if expecting aid.
To Hectore’s surprise, the fox said, “Very well. Warden, if the Councillor accepts it, we will accept it. The Terafin does hold Araven in some esteem. He has not lied to you,” he added, to Haval. “But understand: he is namann. He does not need to lie. All truths are his, and some of those truths will destroy you.”
“He is Andrei,” Hectore said, voice cold.
Andrei placed a hand on Hectore’s shoulder; Hectore shrugged it off.
“It does not offend me, and it does not cause me pain,” the servant said.
“Not anymore, no.”
“And you will not hold the entirety of the ancient world responsible for my . . . childhood.”
“As it happens,” Hectore replied, “you are not the keeper of my opinions.”
Haval pinched the bridge of his nose. “You will have to tell me how you first met your servant. Ah, no. I would dearly love to know, if you are willing to speak of it at all. I do not require the knowledge.” To Jarven, who had not moved, he said, “It is highly inadvisable.”
“But he will take Hectore into the tangle, and Hectore is one of the few—the very, very few—who have provided me with any challenge in decades. I would not lose him to that. It seems too impersonal.”
• • •
“Have you tired of this man?” the fox as
ked Andrei, indicating Hectore. It was not asked in accusation, but curiosity.
“If you would refuse him passage,” Andrei replied, “I would consider it a boon, and I would be indebted to you.”
The fox considered this.
Haval, however, said, “No.”
“But if he does not wish to lose the mortal, the mortal cannot follow.”
“The mortal in question is Hectore of Araven, and he has chosen.”
“And namann would be in our debt.”
“He will be in our debt in the future, regardless, if I am any judge of The Terafin,” Haval countered.
“She would not wish Hectore to be put at risk.”
“And she would allow it, regardless.” To Andrei, he added, “You will allow it, as well.”
“You are not my master.”
“No. But I believe I understand what is now at stake.”
“And me?” Jarven said, his voice soft.
“That decision, I leave in the hands of the eldest. I am aware of some of your abilities, but they are not in the area of my expertise.”
“And you don’t particularly care if I’m lost?” Jarven smiled.
Haval did not. “I do not feel it would aid our cause—at all—to lose you. It might afford me some personal peace, but I am accustomed to long periods without peace. Eldest?”
“No.”
“No?” Jarven asked.
“No.”
“You do not think I will survive?”
“It is the tangle, Jarven. It is not mortal—or even immortal—politics, where you pit knowledge, will, and raw power against the same. It is no more an opponent than typhoons; you endure it—or you die. I see no reason at all to take that risk, given the usual outcome. Firstborn have been devoured by it. Foolish gods.”
“Foolish gods?” Haval asked.
“Yes. Very, very foolish gods.” He hesitated. “Oh, very well.” And his tail flicked once, twice, and a third time, and the forest changed.
• • •
“Eldest,” Andrei said, in a tone entirely unlike his usual servant’s tone.
The fox ignored him.
They no longer stood beneath the bowers of towering trees; they stood by the side of what appeared to be a lake—and a lake whose opposite shore could only barely be seen.
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