Vallista--A Novel of Vlad Taltos

by Steven Brust

  “Thank you, Harro.”

  “Of course, sir.”

  “And you’re sure you didn’t hear a scream?”

  A smile flicked across his face—exactly the right smile for someone who is aware of a jest, but doesn’t actually think it’s funny. He bowed and took his leave through the small door.

  “Yeah, Loiosh. He’s lying.”

  “Share the fish, Boss.”

  The bread was good. The fish was kind of bland, but not really the sort of thing you can screw up once it’s been smoked. I’d have enjoyed the food more if I didn’t keep wondering where it came from. The empty kitchen was as disturbing as whatever it was I’d seen out of the back of my eye. Almost as disturbing.

  “How long are we going to sit here this time, Boss?”

  “About as long as last time.”

  I guess I should explain my thinking here. First of all, Devera needed my help; I wasn’t going to turn her down. Also, well, I was curious, and I knew there were all sorts of things going on around me that I didn’t understand, but I did have some theories. For one thing, I was pretty sure there was necromancy at work in the place. If you aren’t familiar with it, necromancy is magic that has to do with death, which involves places that can’t be reached by means of normal travel. The Necromancer herself once explained that death was only a passage to such a place. She might be wrong, but until I had evidence to the contrary, I was going to assume she knew her stuff. For one thing, she came from a place like that. For another, well, she’s called the Necromancer, right?

  And the bread indicated something—the smell had been there in the kitchen, but there was no sign of anyone having made it. No sign of fish in the coldbox. Nothing at all, in fact, in the pantry, the coldbox, or the kitchen. Except apples. Why were there apples? That was at least as odd as the other stuff.

  I didn’t want to just sit there, but I also wasn’t comfortable about just aimlessly running around the place. I thought about finding Zhayin and putting a knife or maybe Lady Teldra to his throat, and politely asking for a few straightforward answers to some simple questions. But not yet. Not until I had some idea of what sort of forces he might have available. I don’t like to threaten someone and then discover that he’s got the edge on me. I’ve had that happen a couple of times. It’s embarrassing.

  I finished up the bread, the fish, and the wine. Loiosh and Rocza shared the longbeans, because they always taste like soap to me no matter how they’re prepared. Wherever the food came from, and whatever it indicated, it was better than not eating. Except the beans—not eating was better than the beans.

  “I wonder if the wine cellar is empty, too,” said Loiosh. It took me a moment to realize he was being serious. But either way, what would it tell me? Besides, I doubted that I’d have more luck finding it than anything else.

  On impulse, or something like it, I got up, left the room, and went back toward the front doors—just to see whether the doors I’d seen before were still there, or if everything had moved while I wasn’t looking, like one of those castles in an Eastern folk tale. No, they were still there, which was some relief. I turned around, went past the doors I knew, and took the hallway to my right that led to the empty kitchen, then kept walking. At the end of the hall, where I’d met Discaru, I turned left, under some sort of vague notion of going from one corner of the structure, the “platform,” to the opposite corner.

  Ahead of me, a pair of doors stood open. I went through like there was nothing to worry about, and in fact there wasn’t—it was a very large ballroom with a high ceiling, strategically placed cabinets with bottles and glasses, a stage at the far end, freestanding full-size mirrors in each corner, and two curving stairways leading up that looked like they were made of white marble.

  I got closer, and yes, they were marble. I ascended, and found myself on a balcony that wrapped all the way around the ballroom. I wondered what it would be like to be up here when the floor was full of dancers and the room full of music. Cawti would have said something about how many Easterner or Teckla families could be fed for the price of one of the gowns or doublets.

  I silently snorted—I had now, it seemed, reached the point of having imaginary conversations with her over imaginary entertainments.

  There were doors in each corner on this floor. The two that were above the entrance were large and ornate; the others were smaller. Which way to go? The aristocrat, or the servant? I went through the nearest door because it was the nearest.

  “At last!” said Loiosh. “After all our searching, we have found the treasure—”

  “Shut up.”

  A mop, a bucket, two brooms, a dustpan, and a shelf full of jars of liquids and powders of various colors, as well as a few piles of rags. And the oddest place you could come up with to put a closet like that. It made no sense, which meant that, like everything else, I just couldn’t see it. I was annoyed.

  I closed the closet and headed for the other servants’ door. I guess I expected it to be pretty much the same, but this one opened to a long, narrow corridor, doors on the left every twenty feet or so. I walked past them. They were probably servants’ quarters, and while I didn’t have any problem sneaking around Zhayin’s manor and poking my nose into private places, for some reason walking into a servant’s room seemed a little excessive.

  The door at the far end was locked. I studied the lock, removed my set of picks, and spent a lot longer than Kiera would have getting it. To the left, I doubt Kiera gets the same sense of satisfaction I do from hearing that “click.” I put my stuff away, opened the door, and stepped through.

  3

  THE PHANTOM OF THE DANCE

  It was a neat, tidy little study—a bookshelf with books, a desk with papers, a pedestal for larger books, and a tall, slanting table with clips around the edges. On the desk was a fist-size clear ball of a sort I’d seen in Morrolan’s study, and against the corner was a short, black, polished stick topped with a smaller version of the clear ball. Another corner held several cylinders, about three feet in length and perhaps half a foot in diameter. In addition to books, the shelves held several tablets of paper, some of them very large. And yeah, you guessed it: a mirror. A small one, wedged into a corner of the floor, pointing out and up. It was slightly convex, which may have meant something, I don’t know.

  “Boss? What if you broke the mirror?”

  “I know. I’ve been thinking about it.”

  “And?”

  “Not yet.”

  This was the first place I’d found that made it look like someone lived here—with the exception, of course, of the room Zhayin was occupying. I went in and, without touching anything, looked stuff over. There was a blue ceramic jar on the desk, containing more pencils than I’d ever seen in one place, and a truly lovely quill holder, inkstand, and sand jar all done in turquoise set with mother-of-pearl. There was also a matched pair of fountain pens, which proved that Zhayin embraced modern technology.

  I glanced over the books. There were a few on sorcery and several on necromancy, but most of them had titles like, Strength Considerations for the More Common Steel Alloys with Updated Formulae for Stress Calculations and Observations of the Effect of Water Pressure on Various Granite Structures Considered over Time. None of them looked like they’d be a lot of fun to read. Loiosh waited patiently, Rocza remaining on the floor in the doorway to give me warning if anyone should approach.

  I might have learned more if I’d wanted to open the drawers of the desk, or take the books down from the shelf, but sorcerers have the nasty habit of setting traps on such things—traps I couldn’t detect while the amulet I wore was keeping me blind to sorcery.

  The last thing I did was check for secret doors or movable walls or whatever, just because the room seemed like an odd size and in an odd place compared to the rest of what I’d seen. I didn’t find anything, and I decided that was enough. Rocza resumed her place on my shoulder as I closed the door and, with some effort, locked it behind me. It’s funny ho
w often they’re harder to close than they were to open. And there’s no thrill in succeeding, either.

  I went back, all the way around the balcony, and flung open the first set of big double doors like I had every right to.

  Sure, there’s no reason a place like this shouldn’t have a big dining room. In fact, if I’d thought about it, I’d have assumed it did have a big dining room. Only not here—not on the second floor, leading off a balcony like this. And where was the pantry? The hallway with the sitting rooms ought to be right below me, and it didn’t seem like it could work. I looked behind me, and the balcony was still there. Ahead of me was a long table—maybe twenty seats on a side. And doors opposite. And really, was it possible to have a dining room any farther from the kitchen? How do you get food there without it getting cold? Or were there magic doors or something that led from one to the other?

  It was big enough that I had to spend some time making sure it was empty, then I had to fight the temptation to sit down at the head of the table, just to see what it felt like.

  Did I mention there was a pair of mirrors built into the walls? No, but you probably guessed it, didn’t you?

  “It’s a big empty room, Boss.”

  “Yeah.”

  “With a table. And some chairs.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Bet we can learn all kinds of things.”

  “Shut up.”

  I got closer. The table was empty except for half a dozen candle holders, none of which had lit candles. This made me wonder where the light was coming from, and it was only then I noticed several windows high on the wall to my right. It was still daylight outside. I tried to figure out how long I’d been there to see if that made sense, but gave up. It took me a while studying them to see that they were covered with glass—even there, way up where no one could reach them. Whoever built this place had too much money.

  It hit me that I should have grabbed some paper from the study while I was there and tried to make a diagram—maybe I’d have seen something, like, I don’t know, the hallways formed the sorcery rune that means “This is stupid.”

  “There are doors at the other end, Boss.”

  “So I see. Probably open onto mid-air, and I’ll fall into the ocean-sea.”

  “But you’re going through them anyway, aren’t you?”

  “Of course. Unless something jumps out of the walls and eats me between here and there. Which isn’t all that unlikely.”

  “You’ll probably just go mad before you get there.”

  “This is the place for it, isn’t it?”

  “Unless you already are mad. I hope not, because—”

  “Then you are too?”

  “Yeah,” he said. I kept my eye out for anything interesting, but it was just a big room with a long table. Not much you can do with that. I mean, if there’s nothing there—

  “Loiosh.”

  “Boss?”

  “Big fancy doors at one end.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Big, fancy doors at the other.”

  “Your powers of observation, Boss, are—”

  “So where does the food come from? Where is the entrance from the kitchen? Where do the servants go? You know they can’t use the doors the important people use.”

  “Hmmm.”

  “I thought this room was too normal.”

  The walls were blank—some decorative lamps and candle holders, and strips of a darker wood here and there, but nothing else. Secret passages? Maybe. But I looked for them, and it’s pretty hard to conceal an opening in a blank wall from someone looking for it; that’s why most secret passages are behind bookcases or in slatted floors or something. And if they were servants’ entrances, why conceal them? In a way, the lack of servants’ doors was the most bizarre and inexplicable thing I’d yet come across, and that’s saying a great deal.

  Verra take it, then.

  The doors at the opposite end were the twins of the ones I’d first come through. I went up and flung them open. It was dark on the other side.

  “Boss—”

  I stepped forward into the darkness.

  Unlike any other transition, this was accompanied by a sense of dizziness, a moment of fuzzy vision, and even a low roaring my ears. Then everything cleared, and I was—

  Sitting.

  Well, that was interesting.

  The chair was hard and wooden, and there were more chairs, empty, in front of me, and to both sides. Many of them. Directly in front of me, past all of the chairs, was—

  I was in a theater. A big one, given that it was inside another building: a quick bit of compound addition from my years of schooling told me that there were more than three hundred seats. The stage was the traditional six-sided figure, raised about four feet, and well lit from all sides. Now, you understand, there was no way a theater of this size could have fit beyond those doors I’d opened—for one thing, it would have extended down to the floor below. By now, I shouldn’t have been upset about the place not making sense, only I was. I looked for the inevitable mirrors, and found them, above each door.

  You had to be some kind of theater lover to build your own three-hundred-seat theater in your house. Did Zhayin have guests often? I returned my attention to the stage. It was now occupied, which it hadn’t been an instant before. Well. That was interesting.

  In the center of the stage was a woman I didn’t recognize. She stood there, motionless. I didn’t move either, or say anything, for what felt like most of a minute. Then the music started. I didn’t see anywhere for music to come from, and I certainly didn’t see anyone playing it, but it started—big, orchestral. She began to dance.

  I don’t know much about music, and even less about dance, but I can tell you how it felt: it was like the grasslands to the north, when a strong wind comes up and the grass lies down flat, like it’s bowing. And it was like the forests to the west, when the snow is first melting and the streams run black against the white blanket. Her movement never stopped—her hands drawing patterns in the air, her legs bending, straightening, leaping, collapsing; her torso moving like a snake’s, her head erect and balanced and it seemed like even the twitches of muscle above her eyes were planned, and precise, and perfect.

  I became aware that I was holding my breath, and let it out.

  Look, I’m sorry to get all poetic on you. We both know that isn’t what I’m about. My point is, it’s the only way to tell you what happened, and that by itself should tell you something, all right?

  So I sat there in that empty theater, and I watched her dance until, after I don’t know how long, she stopped, her body twisted up into a position that was impossible in its beauty, the lights went down, and the music ended. Then I sat there for a little longer. I was just coming back to myself enough to wonder what it all meant when she jumped down from the stage and approached me, working her way through the aisle, then over to my row. Her movements were like water, or, you know, something that flows. She was short for a Dragaeran—maybe half a head taller than Aliera, and the term “willowy” might have been invented to describe her.

  I sat and waited. She took the chair to my left. She didn’t look at me; her eyes were focused ahead, on the stage she’d just left. She said, “My name is Hevlika.”

  “Vlad. You’re an amazing dancer.”

  “Thank you.”

  “I can’t imagine the hours of training to learn to do that.”

  She nodded, still staring straight ahead. “I’ve been studying the art for four centuries. I started when I was barely forty.”

  “Dancing before you could crawl.”

  “That’s the saying, yes.”

  “I also liked your entrance.”

  “My—?”

  “When I entered, the stage was empty. I looked away, looked back, and there you were. Nice trick.”

  “Oh. That was not my effect, it was yours.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yes. Don’t you know? In any performance, the audience provides most of
the magic for their own enchantment?”

  “I’ve heard that, but I never took it quite so literally. It’s never been my area of study. How did I manage it?”

  “How could I know?”

  I didn’t have a good answer to that. “This place,” I said.

  “Hmmm?”

  “This is an odd place. Things happen that I can’t figure out.”

  “And outside of this place, you understand everything so well?”

  “Don’t be cryptic.”

  She chuckled a little.

  “I can’t even tell what House you are.”

  “Does it matter?”

  “Always.”

  “You wonder if I’m real.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I wonder if you are.”

  “I could tell at once we had a lot in common. Can you tell me anything useful about what’s going on in this place?”

  She looked around for a moment, then faced the stage again.

  “What do you mean?”

  “The kitchen was empty, unused, but there was fresh bread.”

  “What brought you here?”

  “A friend asked me for help.”

  “What kind of help?”

  “I don’t know.”

  She turned and looked at me. Her face was triangular, and she reminded me a little of Sara. Okay, Issola, then. After giving me a quick glance, she faced the stage again. I started wondering what was so fascinating there.

  I said, “So, what can you tell me about this place?”

  “Precipice Manor?”

  “Yeah. Sorry, I can’t say that with a straight face. Which is odd, because I know someone who calls his home Castle Black.”

  She spared me a quick look. “Apparently you can’t say that with a straight face, either.”

  “True enough. So, what can you tell me?”

  “I don’t know a great deal. I dance. That’s all.”

  “You dance?”

  “For Lord Zhayin. Every couple of months he has me dance.”

  “Private performances?”