by Steven Brust
“All right, so Aliera is out as heir, if that’s what you want.”
“Right. And, by the same logic, Morrolan, so are you. Who’s next?”
They looked at each other. “I don’t know,” said Aliera at last.
“Neither do I. But, in a sense, it doesn’t matter. I’m sure the Sorceress in Green knows. Whoever it is probably isn’t even involved—it’s merely someone whose politics are known. No Dragon wants to be heir, you said. What does every Dragon want to be?”
“Warlord,” said Aliera, with no hesitation.
“Right. Morrolan, why don’t you send for that list, if it’s ready now.”
“But . . . all right.” He concentrated for a moment. “It’s on the way.”
“What list?” asked Sethra.
“I asked Morrolan to collect the names of everyone who might have suggested the Athyra wizard who helped on Norathar’s scan.”
“Now,” I continued, “if Morrolan or Aliera were Emperor, each would have appointed the other Warlord, so you both had to go. Norathar had been harmless before, but with things moving as they were, it was safest to eliminate her, too.”
“Before the Interregnum, there was an obvious choice for Warlord if Adron were Emperor, so—”
“Who?” said Cawti.
“I’ll get to it. Anyway, without his knowledge, it was arranged for him to become the heir. When he failed, the Phoenix remained in power, so there was no immediate problem. Then Morrolan became the heir, which was fine—”
“It was?” said Morrolan.
“Yes—until Aliera suddenly arrived. Then, the person who would have been Warlord under you was out. And, worse than that, Aliera’s politics were wrong. You both had to go. Baritt, who had been willing to help until then, drew the line at this. He had to go, too.
“So, the Warlord-to-be and the Sorceress in Green, who was a good friend as well as being a Yendi, laid new plans. The first thing they did was pretend to quarrel, so they wouldn’t be linked in anyone’s mind.
“The plan took two years to mature, which is quick work for a Yendi. The fact that you two became friendly with me, and that I moved up in the Jhereg so quickly, must have helped quite a bit.
“First, they were going to kill Norathar.”
“Why?” said Morrolan.
“Because Aliera was looking everywhere for someone to be Dragon Heir instead of her. She wouldn’t deliberately do something to get herself disqualified by the council; she wouldn’t consider it honorable. But she was trying to find someone with ‘purer genes,’ or whatever it is the Dragons look for. That would have led her, eventually, to the e’Lanyas.”
“It did,” said Aliera. “I was trying to find out what had happened to Norathar already, just on the chance that she could lead me to another relative.”
I nodded. “So they had to kill her, because, as soon as Aliera found her, she’d realize that she was, in fact, pure.”
“All right,” said Morrolan. “Go on.”
“The idea,” I said, “was to kill Norathar and discredit the two of you for helping me. I suspect that someone slipped somewhere, and you two were supposed to have been alerted sooner. I don’t think they wanted to cut it as close as they did. But it worked anyway—until you, Aliera, spoiled everything by revivifying Norathar. Then they had to improvise. The first thing they did was to test Norathar, just to see if she could, in fact, be of use to them as Emperor.”
“How?” asked Norathar.
“Don’t you remember the Sorceress in Green asking you how you felt about invasion plans for the East? I didn’t think anything of it at the time, but—”
“You’re right!”
“Yes. And if you had said you were in favor, they would have stopped right there, finished me off, and found a way to convince you to make the right person Warlord. Since your politics were wrong, they tipped you off about Laris so you’d go rushing off to kill him—he’s expendable—and disqualify yourself as heir.”
Cawti shook her head. “But why continue the fake assassination attempts, Vladimir?”
In answer, I turned to Norathar. “If there hadn’t been two failed attempts on my life, would you have believed that you’d been set up, even after you were told?”
Her eyes narrowed, then she shook her head. Cawti nodded.
At that point, right on cue, a servant arrived, holding a piece of paper. He gave it to Morrolan.
Morrolan glanced at it. “Find,” I said, “the name of the person whom you would have named Warlord if Aliera had not shown up.”
He did, and his mouth dropped open. Sethra leaned past Aliera and took the list from Morrolan’s limp hand. She glanced at it, nodded, and threw it down onto the middle of the table, her eyes cold as the blade of Iceflame.
“I would rather,” she said, “that she had tried to kill me.”
There were nine names on the list. The third one down was Sethra the Younger.
Chapter Sixteen
“Vladimir and I will just watch.”
We all sat there looking at each other; then Morrolan cleared his throat.
“Shall we eat?” he said.
“Why don’t we?” said Sethra.
Morrolan gave the necessary orders. I have no idea what appeared, but I must have eaten it, because I have no memory of being hungry later.
“Will they be here tonight?” asked Norathar at one point.
Morrolan said, “I would expect them to be.” There was no need to ask who “they” were.
“Then perhaps we should plan to meet with them. Do you agree, sister?” Norathar asked Cawti.
“Not here,” I said. “Morrolan forbids the mistreatment of his guests.”
“Thank you, Vlad,” said Morrolan.
“You’re welcome.”
“But surely,” said Aliera, “under the circumstances—”
“No,” said Morrolan.
Before another storm could erupt, I said, “We should still verify all of our guesses before we do anything else.”
Norathar looked at me. “You mean you aren’t sure?”
“I’m sure. But it should still be verified.”
“How?”
“I’ve a way. It may take a little time. But then, we’re eating anyway.”
“Fentor.”
“Yes, milord?”
“Have you tracked down the ownership of those flats, yet?”
“No, milord.”
“Maybe it’ll help if I give you a couple of names that might tie into them. Sethra the Younger, and the Sorceress in Green.”
“I’ll check into it, milord.”
“Very good. Get hold of me as soon as you have something.”
“Yes, milord.”
“With luck,” I said aloud, “we’ll know something soon.”
“Vladimir,” said Cawti, “how should we approach them?”
“Yes,” said Morrolan dryly. “You wouldn’t want her to turn you into a newt.”
“I’ll get better,” I said. “In any case we can’t attack them here if we want to do anything permanent to them. Does anyone know where the sorceress lives?”
“One never knows where a Yendi lives,” said Sethra.
“Yeah. One possibility is Laris. If I can arrange to meet with him, I might be able to show him that his partners are stabbing him in the back. Maybe he’ll help us set them up.”
“But aren’t you still going to try to kill him?” asked Aliera. “If you aren’t, I am.”
“And I,” said Norathar.
“Sure I am, but he doesn’t have to know that.”
Aliera’s eyes narrowed. “I will have nothing to do with such a plan.”
“Nor will I,” said Morrolan.
“Nor I,” said Sethra.
“Nor I,” said Norathar.
I sighed. “Yeah, I know. You insist that everything be honorable, upright, and in the open. It isn’t fair to take advantage of someone, just because he’s been trying to assassinate you and conspiring against
your friends, right?”
“Right,” said Aliera, with a perfectly straight face.
“You Dragons amaze me,” I said. “You claim it’s unfair to attack someone from behind, but somehow it’s a fair fight even when it’s against someone both of you know is weaker, less experienced, and less skilled than you. That’s not taking advantage? What rubbish.”
“Vlad,” said Morrolan, “it’s a matter of—”
“Never mind. I’ll think of something—wait a minute, I think I’m getting that verification now.”
I had a brief conversation with Fentor, then turned back to them. “It’s confirmed,” I said. “Sethra the Younger, through intermediaries, owns a row of flats that were used as part of the setup for the attempt on me by Cawti and her friend the Dragonlord.”
“Very well,” said Morrolan. “How do we proceed?”
“It is vain to use subtlety against a Yendi,” said Sethra. “Make it something simple.”
“Another axiom?”
She smiled coldly. “And I’ll deal with Sethra the Younger myself.”
* * * *
“It’s simple enough,” I said a while later, “but Cawti and I aren’t at our best right after a teleport.”
“Cawti and you,” said Aliera, “will have no need to do anything.”
I looked at Cawti.
“I don’t mind,” she said. “Vladimir and I will just watch.”
I nodded. I intended to do more than that, but there was no need to tell them about it. Except—
“Excuse me, Morrolan, but just to be safe, may I borrow a Morganti knife?”
His brows furrowed. “If you wish.”
He concentrated for a moment. Soon a servant appeared with a wooden box. I opened it, and saw a small, silver-hilted dagger in a leather-covered sheath. I took it partway out and at once recognized the feel of a Morganti weapon. I replaced it in the sheath and slipped it into my cloak.
“Thank you,” I said.
“It is nothing.”
We stood up and looked at each other. No one seemed able to find anything suitable to say, so we just stepped out of the small dining room and walked over to the central part of the castle, where the main dining room was.
We walked in and spotted Sethra the Younger almost right away. Loiosh left my shoulder and began flying around the room, staying high enough to be unobtrusive. (Morrolan’s banquet hall had ceilings that were forty feet high.) Morrolan approached Sethra the Younger and spoke quietly with her.
“Found her, boss. Northeast corner.”
“Good work.”
I gave this information to Morrolan, who began guiding Sethra the Younger that way. The rest of us converged on the Sorceress in Green; we reached her at about the same time Morrolan did. She looked at him, looked at Sethra, then looked at us. There was, perhaps, the smallest widening of her eyes.
Morrolan said, “Sethra the Younger, Sorceress, for the next seventeen hours you are not welcome in my home. After that time, you may return.” He bowed.
They looked at each other, then at the rest of us. Others in the hall began to watch, sensing that something unusual was occurring.
Sethra the Younger started to say something, but stopped—the sorceress had probably told her psionically that it was pointless to argue. The two of them bowed.
Sethra Lavode stepped up behind her namesake and put a hand on her arm, above the elbow. They looked at each other, but their expressions were unreadable.
Then, abruptly, the Sorceress in Green was gone. Loiosh returned to my shoulder, and I looked at Aliera. Her eyes were closed in concentration. Then Sethra the Younger disappeared. Sethra Lavode left with her.
“What will she do to her?” I asked Morrolan.
He shrugged and didn’t answer.
Presently Aliera spoke, her eyes still closed. “She knows I’m tracing her. If she stops to break the trace, we’ll have time to catch up with her.”
“She’ll find the most advantageous place she can,” I said.
“Yes,” said Aliera.
“Let her,” said Norathar.
Cawti swept her hair back with both hands just as I was adjusting my cloak. We smiled at each other, as we realized what the gestures meant. Then—
“Now!” said Aliera.
There was a wrenching in my bowels, and Castle Black vanished.
* * * *
The first thing that hit me was the heat—an agony of flames. I started to scream, but the pain went away before I had the chance. We seemed to be standing in the heart of a fire. From somewhere off to my left I heard a dry voice say, “Quick work, Aliera.”
I recognized the voice as belonging to the Sorceress in Green. She continued: “You may as well dispense with your teleport block; I’m not going anywhere.”
It occurred to me that she must have prepared herself while teleporting, then brought us into a furnace. Apparently, Aliera had figured it out and put a protection spell around us before we had time to be incinerated.
“You all right, Loiosh?”
“Fine, boss.”
Then the flames surged around us and went out. We were in a room, about twenty feet on a side, with blackened walls. We were standing in ash that came above our ankles. The Sorceress in Green stood before us, her eyes as cold as the fires had been hot. In her hand was a plain wooden staff.
“You had best leave,” she said coolly. “I am surrounded by my own people, and you can hardly do anything to me before they get here.”
I glanced at Aliera.
The Sorceress in Green gestured with her staff, and the wall behind her collapsed upon itself. On the other side of it, I could see about thirty Dragaerans, all armed.
“Last chance,” said the sorceress, smiling.
I coughed. “Are all Yendi so melodramatic?” I inquired.
The sorceress gave a signal, and they stepped onto the ash.
Aliera gestured, and we were surrounded by flames again for a moment; then they died.
“Nice try, my dear,” said the sorceress. “But I’d thought of that already.”
“So I see,” said Aliera. She turned to Morrolan. “Do you want her, or the troops?”
“It is your choice.”
“I’ll take her, then.”
“Very well,” said Morrolan, and drew Blackflame. I saw the faces of the men and women facing us as they realized that he was holding a Morganti blade, and one of power that, beyond doubt, none of them had encountered before. Morrolan calmly walked up to them.
“Remember,” I told Cawti, “we’re just here to watch.”
She flashed me a nervous smile.
Then there was a flicker of motion to my side, and I saw Norathar charge for the sorceress, blade swinging. Aliera hissed and leapt after her. A spell of some kind must have gone off behind me, because I heard a dull boom and smoke came billowing past.
The sorceress slipped past the front line of her troops and raised her staff. Fires leapt from it toward Norathar and Aliera, but Aliera held her hand up and they fizzled out.
Morrolan, Norathar, and Aliera hit the front line at the same instant. Blackwand cut a throat, swept across the chest of the next guard, and, with the same motion, buried itself high in the side of a third. Morrolan slipped to his right like a cat before anyone even struck at him, withdrawing Blackwand, then sliced open two bellies. He parried a cut and impaled the attacker’s throat, then stepped back, facing full forward, slightly on his toes, blade held at head height and pointing toward his enemies. In his left hand was a long dagger. The room was filled with the sound of screams, and those who’d been watching Morrolan turned pale.
I saw three more guards at Norathar’s feet. Aliera, meanwhile, was wielding her eight-foot greatsword like a toy, flipping it back and forth amid their ranks. She had accounted for five so far.
Then, incredibly, the dead guards began to stand up—even the ones slain by Blackwand. I looked at the sorceress, and saw a look of profound concentration on her face.
Then Aliera did something else, and the sorceress cried out as a blue glow began in front of her. After a moment it went away, but I could see perspiration rolling down her face.
Morrolan and Norathar had ignored all of this, and by now more than half of the enemy had fallen.
I spoke to Cawti out of the corner of my mouth. “Should we do something?”
“Why? They’re Dragonlords; they enjoy this kind of thing. Let them do it.”
“There is one thing I’m going to have to do, though. And pretty soon, it looks like.”
“What?”
About then Norathar broke through the line. The sorceress cried out and swung her staff, and Norathar fell over, clutching the air.
Cawti moved before I could do anything. She got through to her friend, somehow, and knelt by her side.
The ones who’d been fighting Norathar turned to Aliera, and she had to defend herself again. I took out a pair of throwing knives and, just to test, threw them at the sorceress. Naturally, they veered away from her when they got close.
I heard Morrolan curse and saw that his left arm hung uselessly at his side, and that there was red over the black of his cloak.
Aliera was still locked in some kind of struggle with the sorceress while holding off three guards. There was a sudden flurry near her as two more of them came at her. There was an impossible tangle of metal, and three of the guards were down. Aliera was still up, but there was a knife sticking out of her low on her back, and a broadsword actually through her body, just to the right of the spine, front to back, above the waist. She seemed to be ignoring it; I guess sorcery is also good for overcoming shock. But no matter how skilled a sorceress she was, her gown was ruined.
Norathar seemed to be alive, but dazed. This, it appeared, would be the best chance I had. I drew two fighting knives, then ran forward as fast as I could through ash up to my calves. When I reached the fighters, I watched Aliera closely, then ducked under a swing. I left the knives in the stomachs of two fighters who had no ability to deal with an Easterner rolling past them; then I was beyond the line, about four feet from the sorceress. Spellbreaker was in my hand before I stood up, and I swung it in front of me.