The Kindly Ones

by Melissa Scott

  Rohin nodded, and I thought I heard, above the noise of conversation, Leith give a soft sigh of relief. Before I could be certain, however, she had said, brightly, "What'll you drink?"

  "Spiked coffee, with all the trimmings," I answered. Leith, with her Annwnite metabolism, could drink tsaak all night if she wanted; I knew my limits.

  Rohin said, "We could split a jug, Trey—if you'll let me get the next round, Captain, pilot."

  Leith nodded. "Fair enough." She looked to Guil. "Tsaak?" The pilot nodded, and Leith punched our order into the central box. After a few moments, a clubman appeared with the heavy tray. There was the usual confusion as he tried to fit the jug and the mugs and the tray of condiments on the table's limited surface, and wedge in the double flask of tsaak as well, but at last he'd managed it, and Leith flipped him her card to settle the bill. The cabarets in the Necropolis don't run tabs. I poured myself a mug of the coffee—from the look of it, the bartender had already added a goodly quantity of the harsh local whiskey—and added spices and sugar. Rohin did the same, but added a shot of the sweetly potent cordial as well. Guil poured tsaak for herself and Leith, and leaned forward, cradling her cup in both hands.

  "I hear it's Betas Kyrk tonight, the temptation scene."

  Rohin nodded, and I said, "That should guarantee bravura performances."

  Leith gave me an inquiring glance over the rim of her cup. Guil said, softly, "I told you the plot, Leith."

  I said, "It's one of those scenes actors can't resist—can't leave well enough alone. It's a good play, though."

  Leith nodded, satisfied, but I wasn't really paying attention. Not only did the temptation scene appeal to actors, it appealed to ex-actors., too, and I couldn't help feeling jealous of the performers. Belos Kyrle is one of those wonderful tortured villains you find only on restrictive worlds. The character is based on a real Demi-heir, a Halex, in fact, who, after a complicated series of events, found himself obliged by the code to murder his lover's blood-sib. Rather than admit what he's done, Belos conceals the murder, hoping to keep his lover, and the bulk of the play deals with the lover's search for truth and the final, bloody vengeance. I had seen the full play twice already, and while the protagonist—the lover, who can be played by actors of either sex depending on company resources and directorial whim—is a good part, I would've given my right arm to play Belos, when I was younger. The death duel, and the death speech following, are an actor's dream.

  "Is it true the playwright was murdered for writing it?" Leith asked.

  Guil glanced at Rohin before she answered. "It started a Fyfe-Halex feud—it was the poet Esko Fyfe who wrote it—and he did get killed by a gang of Halex."

  Rohin shrugged. "Esko Fyfe was kin to Hulder Vieva, who was Shenard's lover—that's the 'real' Belos," he added, to Leith. "Shenard Halex." He looked back at Guil. "Esko took his revenge as best he could, and so did we."

  Before Guil could answer, the main lights flickered, then dimmed steadily to near-total darkness. The pilot contented herself with a rather scornful sniff, and poured more tsaak. All around us, conversation faded to anticipatory whispers. Then lights flashed on in the center of the cabaret, webbing the drumbox stage in a complex net of light and shadow. I leaned back in my chair to see more clearly, closing both hands around my drink. I was suddenly, painfully tense, knowing what this competition could mean to an up-and-coming holopuppet group—money, certainly, but more than that, enough publicity to guarantee continued employment through the next few months. I shivered, forced myself to relax, to think only of the entertainment.

  A glowing sign appeared in the air above the drumbox, a starship superimposed on a crescent Agamemnon. Leith murmured something that sounded like a question, and Rohin whispered, "Goddard Studios. Shh."

  The mailship captain gave him a startled glance, but seemed to recognize the intensity on the Demi-heir's face, and fell silent. Music sounded from behind the solid column of light, eerie and biting. Slowly, the first figure coalesced on the box: a holopuppet, dressed in contemporary style, moving into a strangely awkward dance even as it took shape. It was a very good figure—I could not have been certain it was a puppet if I hadn't seen it form—and I decided that the dance was meant to be awkward, not merely the work of an unskilled operator. Then another figure, a live actor this time, vaulted onto the box to confront the puppet, while someone offstage intoned the first line of the scene in a keening falsetto.

  By the fifth line, it became clear that Goddard had overreached itself: even knowing the scene, it was almost impossible to figure out what was going on. I thought the puppet—which had begun to fade in and out alarmingly, showing unpleasant glints of bone and organs —was meant for Belos, and the actors for the nightmare figures who tempt him to deny the killing, but the narration was so overdubbed and mixed with lines from later in the play that it was impossible to be sure. The sono ended to no better than polite applause, and I saw Leith lean across to Guil. I couldn't hear what she said, but the para'an's face eased suddenly into a broad grin, transforming her completely.

  It was a contagious smile. I grinned myself, and said, low-voiced, "Don't you like experimental theater, Leith?"

  Rohin shushed us both, and Leith subsided, mouthing an obscenity at me.

  "Witchwood's next," the Demi-heir whispered, and pushed back his hood to see better. I started to say something, but Rohin's expression was so tense, willing his twin to do well, that I couldn't bring myself to disturb him. It was dark enough in the cabaret that no one was likely to notice, and if anyone did, the family medium was clearly present.

  Witchwood's tree symbol was already fading, and the familiar nightmare music rose from the array of synthesizers behind the stage. A figure in Belos's stylized, conventionally exaggerated costume stepped through the curtain of light, struck his pose, and began to speak. Rohin's hand clutched my knee convulsively.

  "Rehur."

  I hardly needed that confirmation: the face beneath the actor's heavy makeup was Rohin's. I braced myself, knowing the Demi-heir would ask my opinion of the performance, but after a moment I let myself relax. Rehur was good, at least within the Oresteian tradition. His voice was particularly attractive, light in tone, but very flexible, and he spoke the intricate verse well. At this point in the play, Belos has done the killing, but hesitates to claim it, for fear of losing his lover. Figures appear to him in a dream, tempting him to hide the body and deny what he has done—the ultimate cowardice, in Oresteian eyes. At the proper moment, grotesque holopuppet shapes frothed and flowed from Belos's body to whisper-chant their seductions. All four of them had Rehur's face and spoke with his voice: an easy effect, but nicely handled. Witchwood's director was very good at the traditional forms of khy sono. It was too bad, I thought, that this competition required something more. In a few years, though. . . .

  The music changed abruptly, ranged through a quick, discordant variation on Belos's theme, and slid into the blatting trumpet-and-drum of a major entrance. All five figures faded, became translucent, and there was a collective gasp of surprise: none of us had realized the central figure was a puppet. Then the curtain of light went scarlet, and a figure stepped through it onto the stage. This was unmistakably a living being; the puppets lost all vitality by comparison, the puppetmaster helping the effect by greying their colors slightly. The new Belos wore ordinary formal dress, the sort of clothes the "real" Belos would have worn, felty trousers, deep boots, snowy knitted tunic. His coarse black hair was loose, falling in ratted hanks to his shoulders; his eyes were huge and mad in a too-pale face. He lifted his long hands in a gesture of furious despair, and a trick of the puppetmaster's lights turned them bloody red. His entourage crowded onto the stage behind him. The dream-figures had almost vanished, were barely visible shadows, but "Belos" saw them, and opened his arms to them. In a sudden whirl of light and music, the holopuppets flew toward him, dissolving into his body. "Belos" closed his arms over them, embracing them, embracing himself, bowing his head ove
r his reddened hands. I counted three before the blackout.

  There was an instant of silence before the applause. Rohin was clutching my knee again, and pounding the table with his free hand—less in sober assessment of Witchwood's sono, I thought, than in sheer relief that his twin had done nothing foolish.

  "My God," Leith said. Her left arm had slipped from the table top; she grimaced and picked it up, then reached to order another round.

  Guil leaned across to tap the table in front of the Demi-heir. "Your brother?"

  Rohin could not keep the pride from his voice. "My late twin."

  "He's good," Leith said, dropping her voice as the applause faded and another company's symbol appeared above the drumbox. I watched Rohin instead. The Demi-heir fumbled cautiously in the inner pocket of his coat until he found his card case, then pulled it out, waiting for the music to begin before easing back the catch. He took out a blank card and a pen, scribbled a few lines across the card, signed it with a complicated squiggle, and slipped the case back into his pocket. As the sono ended, the clubman appeared with our drinks. Rohin caught at his sleeve, and handed him the card, folded in a twenty-five-senes note.

  "Take this to the Witchwood Belos, please."

  "Certainly, sor," the clubman answered with a smirk, deftly pocketing note and card. I guessed that Rehur was popular tonight. Rohin flushed, but remembered in time that he was just another anonymous patron. The clubman slipped away, and I settled back in my chair to watch the rest of the khy sonon-na.

  Most of the interpretations were highly experimental, ranging from good to interesting to utterly awful. One, which exaggerated the traditional gestures into near-ballet, was particularly well-received, but to my mind, Witchwood's performance was clearly the best. Then again, I thought, most Oresteians had grown up on traditional sonon, and had a right to be tired of them. It would be interesting to see what they made of this.

  The final sono—a dreadful, "spacer" version—ended, and the lights slowly came up in the rest of the cabaret. Rohin hastily drew his hood back up, letting it fall forward to shadow his face. Leith leaned forward, raising her voice to carry over the noise of conversation.

  "Who judges this contest, anyway?"

  "They do," Guil said, nodding toward a table not far from us, directly in front of the stage. "You know, other managers and critics and such."

  "I thought the audience voted," I said.

  Guil gave me a sort of half-smile. "Sure, Medium, we vote—we should be getting our ballots any second now—but the hired judges make the real decision."

  "A popular victory means a lot, too," Rohin objected.

  "Is it a money prize?" Leith asked.

  "A nominal sum only," the Demi-heir answered, and leaned back to let a passing clubman slide four ballots onto the table in front of him.

  "Feed it to the central box when you're done," the clubman said indifferently, and moved on to the next table.

  A nominal sum, in Rohin's eyes, might well mean a week's food for a starving actor. I suppressed that thought, and reached for a ballot, blackening the circle next to Witchwood's name. Leith leaned over my shoulder and laughed.

  "Well, that's unanimous," she said.

  "You have good taste," I answered, and slid my ballot into the slot beneath the order box. "How long do you think it'll take to get a decision?"

  Rohin shrugged. Guil said, almost cheerfully, "About an hour, I'd guess. The popular vote'll be counted sooner, but the judges always take forever."

  "Standing on their dignity?" Leith asked.

  Guil ignored her, glancing at our empty glasses. "Time for another round," she said. "Medium, and you, friend, what'll you have?" There was a faint note of belligerence in her voice. Leith gave her a quick glance, but said nothing.

  I said, "I think it's my round, pilot."

  For a long moment, we locked stares. The para'an's eyes were blue, all right, but it was a very pale color, almost grey. Ice blue, I thought, and then she looked away.

  "It's Guil, then."

  I nodded. "And I'm Trey." I looked at the others, all of us pretending nothing had happened. "The same again?"

  "We'll split a single flask," Leith said.

  "I can handle another carafe if you can," Rohin said. I saw his eyes lock briefly on something across the room, but did not glance back until I had finished punching the order into the central box. The actors and musicians and puppeteers had been making their ways back into the cabaret's main room for some time. Now, Rehur was threading a path through the tables toward us, followed by a red-haired woman and a nondescript little man carrying a sketchblock. Leith glanced toward the newcomer, then back at Rohin.

  "Your twin's joining us?" she said. Rohin nodded, unable to keep his eyes off his brother.

  "And how long has it been since you saw him last?" Guil asked.

  "A full year, para', and not by my choice," Rohin snapped.

  The pilot lifted a hand in uncharacteristic apology. "Sorry," she said, and sounded as though she meant it. "Pax?"

  Rohin eyed her warily, but nodded. "Pax."

  "Medium?" Offstage, Rehur's voice was enough like Rohin's to make me jump a little. I turned to face him, offering my hand. "I'm the Halex Medium," I said. "Trey Maturin."

  "Rehur." The actor took my hand, smiling. "I'm delighted to meet you," he said, and sounded as though he meant it. "Would you give my greetings to my brother?"

  "Of course," I said, and added, "I enjoyed the sono very much—it was spectacular."

  "Tell him the same from me," Rohin said.

  "Thanks," Rehur said, ambiguously, as I repeated his greeting to Rohin. He glanced around the table, including us all in his next words. "May we join you?" He gestured to the redhead. "This is Belit, ex-Fyfe, para'an of Fyfe in Fyfe, and the vulture here—" He pointed to the little man with the sketchblock. "—is Cho Vieva, of the stage-door press." He put a hand to his face, still Belos's. "I can't take off my makeup until he's done."

  "Not long now," Cho said, soothingly, absently, stylus flying across the block. Prints and sketches of actors in costume were extremely popular in Destiny; they were also excellent publicity for the actors and companies involved.

  I repeated Rehur's request and introductions for Rohin's benefit, and the Demi-heir nodded acceptance, too excited to speak. Leith said, "Have a seat—if you can find one. I'm Leith Moraghan, captain of Pipe Major—the six-week mailship."

  "Guil ex-Tam'ne," the tug pilot offered. "Para'an of Tam'ne on Electra. I work for the Port Authority."

  The redhead wedged herself in between Rohin and her fellow para'an. "I'm Witchwood's synth man," she announced cheerfully. "All the sound effects and none of the credit."

  Rehur made a rude noise, and hooked a chair from a nearby table, pushing it into place between me and Leith. Up close, he looked less like Rohin than I had thought, less a copy than a mirror image. Maybe it was just the makeup, I thought, doubly stark now without the bulky wig to balance it. His own hair, cut even shorter than Rohin's, was as black as the wig had been.

  "Can I ask a stupid question?" Leith said. "The holopuppets—do the puppeteers tape you doing the part, and play back that tape, or do they actually manipulate an image?"

  "Both," Rehur answered, still smiling. He was very up from his performance, excited and confident that he had done well. Remembering the feeling from my own youth, I couldn't help smiling back.

  "This time, though, the Tempters were fully pretaped," Rehur went on, "and the puppet-Belos was pretaped except for the voice. Ash—she's the main puppetmaster—wanted me to do the voice live so that there'd be a bigger surprise when it turned out to be a puppet."

  "You fooled me," Leith said.

  "All done, Rehur," Cho said. Light rippled across the surface of the sketchblock, fixing the image in its memory.

  "Thank God, Cho-cho," Rehur said. "Send me a copy, please?"

  "I won't even charge you," the artist answered, and slipped away to sketch some other actor.
r />   "You better send Rowan a copy," the musician Belit said.

  Rehur made a face, but nodded. "I will." He glanced at the rest of the table. "Rowan's the other puppetmaster. And company manager."

  "Rowan and Ash," I said. "Thus Witchwood?"

  Rehur gave me a look of pleased surprise. "That's right. A lot of people don't get it."

  "Like me," Guil said.

  "They're kinds of Terran wood," Leith said. "Used by witches, right, Trey?"

  I nodded, aware of Rehur's newly interested gaze, but before I could say anything else, Rohin tugged at my sleeve. I glanced at him, and he beckoned me closer, until he could whisper in my ear.

  "Transfer your sanction, Trey, please."

  I hesitated. It was possible, under the code, for a medium temporarily to transfer his immunities to another person, allowing that person to see and speak with ghosts, but it was intended for emergencies, or at least for more serious things. On the other hand, it was unlikely anyone in the cabaret would even notice, much less file a formal complaint—and the brothers had not seen each other in a year. I touched the black-hand badge pinned to my collar, put my other hand across Rohin's lips, and repeated the formula. The pleasure on Rohin's face made it worth the risk.

  Rehur moved abruptly, almost spilling what was left of Leith's drink, waving broadly at someone on the far side of the room. He glanced at me, and said, "Ash and Rowan. You don't mind?"

  "Not at all," I said, and the others echoed me.

  The puppetmasters were a magnificently mismatched pair, Ash tall, typically Oresteian; Rowan small and stocky enough to be thought an off-worlder. But it turned out, as we traded introductions, half-shouting to be heard above the other conversations, that she was originally an Orillon of Electra, and distant kin to Guil. Ash—her birth name was Nariko, she said, but she'd picked Ash to complement Rowan—turned out to be a ghost of the Elgeve Branch of the Branch Kinship. Rohin bristled a little at that, and made some disparaging remark, but Ash agreed so fervently that the Demi-heir's suspicions were instantly disarmed. Rehur laughed softly, and Rohin answered in the broad mountain dialect. The actor looked startled for an instant, then, glancing from me to his brother, realized what I had done. He gave me a nod of thanks, and leaned back in his chair to talk directly with his twin. The rest of us ignored them, turning to our own conversation. By unspoken agreement, we didn't talk about the sonon: the judges' decision would be coming up very soon, and I could see that the puppetmasters were edgy beneath their congenial talk.