[Vlad Taltos 04] Taltos

by Steven Brust

  She paused, appearing to consider, then covered her head again. “The blood of a goddess,” she said.

  “Oh.” And, “I don’t think I’ll ask.”

  * * * *

  I woke up the night after my altercation with Loraan feeling a peculiar half-thought growing in the back of my head and realized that someone was trying to reach me psionically. I woke up more fully, saw that it was almost dawn, and allowed the contact to occur.

  “Who is it?”

  “Sethra Lavode.”

  “Oh. Yes?”

  “We need your help.”

  Several remarks came to mind, but I didn’t make any of them. “Go on,” I said.

  “We’d like to bring you here.”

  “When?”

  “Right away.”

  “Mind if I break my fast first?”

  “That will be fine. Would you like us to have a bucket ready for you to throw up in?”

  Bitch. I sighed. “All right. Give me ten minutes to wake up and become human.”

  “What?”

  “Become Eastern, then. Never mind. Just give me ten minutes.”

  “All right. “

  I rolled over and kissed Szandi’s neck. She mumbled something incomprehensible. I said, “I have to run. Help yourself to breakfast and I’ll see you later, okay”

  She mumbled again. I got up and took care of necessary things, including wrapping the gold chain around my left wrist and putting various weapons in place. Loiosh landed on my shoulder as I was finishing.

  “What is it, boss?”

  “Back to DzurMountain, chum. I don’t know why.”

  I walked down to the street and around a corner and waited. Sethra reached me again right on time, and then I was at DzurMountain.

  * * * *

  I wondered about the vial Kiera had given me, holding what she claimed to be the blood of a goddess. When I got back home, I took it out of its pouch and studied it. It was dark and could have been blood as easily as anything else, I suppose. I shook it, which was perhaps foolish but no harm came of it. Yeah, maybe it was blood. Then again, maybe not. I put the vial back in the pouch. I chose not to open it. I wondered if I would ever learn the story behind why Kiera had it but didn’t want to hold onto it and couldn’t sell it and like that. I realized that it made me feel good to do something for her for a change.

  I put it in a chest where I kept my few precious objects and didn’t think about it again for some time. I had other things to keep me occupied. My grandfather had decided that, as part of my ongoing training in witchcraft, it was time for me to acquire a familiar.

  * * * *

  Ten minutes after I got there, I was deciding that I could come to like Sethra, after all. They brought me straight into the library this time, and, after giving me ten minutes to recover from the teleport, Chaz showed up with hot, good klava (klava is a strange Dragaeran brew made from Eastern coffee beans. It tastes like Eastern coffee but without the bitterness). She had thick cream and honey to put into it, and hot biscuits with butter and honey. Morrolan and I sat around eating and sipping for a good, long while. Chaz stood behind Sethra, occasionally eating bits of the crumbs off the tray and flicking his eyes around the room.

  I studied Morrolan because he still fascinated me. He seemed to be working to keep any expression off his face, which probably meant that he was pretty concerned about something. I speculated idly but came up with no good guesses, so I concentrated on eating and drinking.

  I have to say I was quite surprised by the food and even more surprised, and pleased, when the servant brought Loiosh a fresh dead teckla. He presented it to me and indicated Loiosh with a sort of half-flick of his head, as if he thought I might not know for whom it was intended. He set the tray down, and Loiosh started in on it, displaying his best table manners. Neither Sethra nor Morrolan seemed put off at eating with him.

  “These people are okay, boss.”

  “I was just thinking that.”

  What shocked me even more, however, was the sight of Lord Morrolan, wizard and witch, duke of the House of the Dragon, licking honey off his fingers. It’s a shame Dragaerans don’t have facial hair, because Morrolan ought to have had a black goatee to get honey in.

  If the whole thing was a scheme to put me in a better mood for helping them, I can only say it worked. I found it, at least, far preferable to the last idea they’d come up with. When the bowls of warm water with the steamed towels came around, I was pretty much willing to listen to any crazy idea they’d come up with.

  It was plenty crazy, too.

  * * * *

  The spell to acquire a familiar is as old as witchcraft, and has as many variations as there are types of familiars and families of witches. It is a simple spell by the standards I’m used to, but has some risks beyond those inherent in performing any ritual to which you are committing your mental energy. For instance, it meant wandering alone through the jungle. I’d asked my grandfather why I couldn’t simply find one of the jhereg that fly about the city, and he asked me if I’d ever seen any of them close up.

  My grandfather gave me a pack and stern lectures on what to put in it, and only general comments on hazards to avoid. I asked him why he couldn’t be more specific, and he said it was because he didn’t know. That scared me. I said, “Are you sure this is safe, Noish-pa?”

  He said, “Of course not, Vladimir. I will tell you that it has much danger. Do you wish to not do it?”

  “Ummm, no. I guess I’ll go ahead with it.”

  Then I spent many hours in study of the wildlife of the jungles west of Adrilankha. I think my grandfather knew I’d do that, and, in fact, that was why he’d phrased things the way he did. I learned a great deal as a result. The most important thing was to study carefully anything that might hurt you.

  This lesson has held me in very good stead.

  * * * *

  “Wait a minute,” I said. “Start over. Just exactly why am I supposed to pack up and trundle off to the Paths of the Dead?”

  * * * *

  Remember how you felt the first time you buckled on a sword and went stomping around town? Remember the scabbard clanking against your leg? Remember touching the hilt with your off hand every now and then, just to reassure yourself it was there? If you’ve never done it, try to imagine the feeling. There’s nothing quite like it; a little voice in the back of your head goes, “I’m dangerous now. I matter.”

  If you can remember that, or imagine it, think about how you’d feel the first time you slipped a dagger into your sleeve and another into your boot, and concealed a few shuriken in the folds of your cloak. All of a sudden you feel, I don’t know, like a force to be reckoned with. Does that make sense?

  Now, in point of fact, you don’t want to show this at all. I never had to be told this; it’s obvious. Even in subtle ways, you don’t want to project the feeling of danger; you’d rather disappear. But there it is, anyway. Walking around with lethal surprises about your person changes the way you look at life; especially if you’re a sixteen-year-old Easterner in a city of Dragaerans. It feels great.

  Why was I walking around carrying concealed weaponry? Because I’d been advised to by someone who ought to know. She’d said, “If you’re going to work for the Organization—and don’t kid yourself, Vlad, that’s what you’re doing—it’s always best to have a few surprises about you.”

  That’s what I was doing: working for the Organization. I’d been given a job. It wasn’t clear exactly what my job was, except that it could involve violence from time to time, starting with today. I was human, hence smaller and weaker than the Dragaerans I lived among. Yet I didn’t fear violence from them, because I knew I could hurt them. I’d done so. More than once.

  Now, for the first time, I was going to be paid for it, and I sure didn’t mind. Whatever becomes of me, I’m going to hold the memory of walking from my tiny little flat to the shoemaker’s where I was to meet my partner for the first time. A newly hatched jhereg whom I
was going to make my familiar nestled against my chest, reptilian head lying just below my neck, wings tucked in, claws gripping the fabric of my jerkin. Occasionally I would “hear” him in my mind: “Mama? “I’d send back comforting thoughts that somehow didn’t conflict with the rather violent frame of mind I was in.

  It was the sort of day you look back on later and see as a pivotal point in your life. Thing is, I knew it at the time. It was a day when magic things were happening. Every time I swung my left arm, I’d feel the hilt of a dagger press against my wrist. With every step, my rapier would thump against my left leg. The air was cool and smelled of the sea. My boots were new enough to look good, yet old enough to be comfortable. My half-cloak was old and worn, yet it was Jhereg-grey and I could feel it dance behind me. The wind blew my hair back from my eyes. The streets were midafternoon quiet. The buildings were mostly shut, and—

  There was a shadow that stood out unnaturally from the tall apartment complex on my left. I paused and saw that the shadow was beckoning me. I approached it and said, “Hello, Kiera.”

  * * * *

  Morrolan looked disgusted; it was something he was good at. He said, “Sethra, you try.”

  She nodded; brisk, businesslike. “Morrolan has a cousin; her name is—”

  “Aliera. Right; I got that.”

  “Aliera was caught in the explosion in DragaeraCity that brought down the Imperium.”

  “Okay. I’m with you so far.”

  “I managed to save her.”

  “That’s where you lose me. Didn’t Morrolan say she was dead?”

  “Well, yes.”

  “All right, then.”

  She drummed her fingers on the arm of her chair.

  “You getting any more of this than I am, Loiosh?”

  “Yeah, boss. I’ve already figured out that you’re messed up with a couple of nut cases.”

  “Thanks loads.”

  At last Sethra said, “Death isn’t as simple and straightforward as you may think it is. She is dead, but her soul has been preserved. It’s been lost since the Interregnum, but we have located it, with your help, as well as the help of ... well, some others. Yesterday, it was finally recovered.”

  “Okay, fine. Then why the trip to DeathgateFalls?” I had to suppress a shudder as I said the words.

  “We need to have a living soul to work with, if not a living body. The body would be better, but the Necromancer can supply us with ... Well, never mind.” Her voice trailed off, and consternation passed over her face.

  “There you go again,” I said. “First you say you have her soul, then you say—”

  “The soul,” said Sethra Lavode, “isn’t as simple and straightforward as you may think it is.”

  “Great,” I said. I’m not sure, but I think Chaz might have smiled a bit. “Well, okay, how did it end up in the staff?”

  “It’s complicated. Loraan put it there, though. He found it right after the Interregnum, in a peasant’s field somewhere. Now—”

  “How did you know what the staff looks like?”

  She gave me a scornful glance. “I can manage elementary divination, thank you.”

  “Oh. Well, excuse me for living, all right?”

  “I might.”

  “So what is the state of her soul at the moment?”

  She was silent for a few moments. Then she said, “Have you ever had cause to use a Morganti weapon?”

  I held my face expressionless. “Maybe.”

  “In any case, you are familiar with them?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Are you aware that Morganti weapons cannot destroy the soul of someone who is already dead?”

  “Hmmm. I guess I’ve never thought about it. I’ve never had cause to go sticking Morganti weapons into corpses. It makes sense, though, I suppose.”

  “It’s true. And yet the soul is still there, or else revivification would not be possible.”

  “Okay. I’ll buy that.”

  “And are you aware that sometimes the bodies of those highly respected by their House are sent over DeathgateFalls, there to walk the Paths of the Dead?”

  “I’ve heard that, too.”

  “So you can understand—”

  “I understand that Easterners aren’t allowed to enter the Paths of the Dead, and that, in any case, no one except the Empress Zerika has emerged alive.”

  “Both true,” said Sethra. “But those two facts, taken together, may indicate that an Easterner would be allowed to—”

  “May?”

  She hesitated. “I think it likely.”

  “Great. And, for doing this, I get exactly what?”

  “We can pay—”

  “I don’t want to hear. Certain amounts of money are so high they become meaningless. Any less than that and I won’t do it.”

  The two of them exchanged looks.

  Morrolan said, “We’d very much like to convince you. It means a great deal to us, and there is no one else who can do it.”

  “This conversation sounds really familiar.” I said. “You two had this in mind from the beginning, didn’t you?”

  “We considered it a possibility,” said the Dark Lady of DzurMountain.

  “And now you’re saying that you’ll kill me if I don’t do it.”

  “No,” said Morrolan. “Only that we’ll be very grateful if you do.”

  They were learning how to deal with me. This could be good or bad, I suppose. I said, “Your gratitude would be nice, but if I’m already dead—”

  “I think you can survive,” said Sethra.

  “How?”

  “I’ve been there. I can tell you which paths to take and which to avoid, and warn you of dangers you are likely to encounter and how to protect yourself. That will leave you with only one danger, and I think the fact that you are an Easterner, who doesn’t belong there, will be enough to—”

  “What danger is that?”

  “From those who run the place. The Lords of Judgment.”

  I didn’t like the sound of that. There was a sharp intake of breath from Chaz, who’d been standing in his usual position during the whole interchange. I said, “The Lords of Judgment?”

  “You know,” said Sethra. “The gods.”

  Chapter 8

  I noticed that the stiletto I’d stuck in the ground was vibrating, and I wondered what that meant. After a moment, I detected a low-pitched hum. I concentrated on it until I could pick out the beats.

  Beats ...

  Now, there was an idea.

  I concentrated on the rhythm and held out my left hand, palm up. I concentrated on the humming and held out my right hand, palm up. I brought my hands together, turning them over so the palms met. Behind me, I felt Loiosh spreading his wings and collapsing them. My eyes closed as if of their own accord. I realized I was starting to feel fatigued, which frightened me, and I still had a great deal to do.

  I don’t know which changed, but now the humming worked with the rhythm I’d established.

  I wondered how I’d write this up in a spell book, if I ever chose to do so.

  “Fine,” I said. “No problem. You mean I have nothing at all to worry about except a few gods? Well, in that case I don’t see how it could go wrong. Sure, sign me up.”

  I was being sarcastic, in case it escaped you. I found myself glancing over at Chaz to see if he appreciated it, but I couldn’t tell.

  Sethra said, “I don’t think it’s quite as gruesome as that.”

  “Oh.”

  Morrolan said, “Show him the staff.”

  “I can see it from here,” I said, looking at it next to Sethra’s hand. Sethra ignored my comment and picked it up, held it out to me.

  I said, “This person’s soul is in there?”

  “Yes,” said Sethra. “Take it.”

  “Why?”

  ‘To see if you feel anything.”

  “What am I supposed to feel?”

  “Perhaps nothing. You won’t know unless you hold it.”
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  I sighed and took the thing. Since she’d spoken about feeling something, I was very much aware of the smooth finish, and that the thing was slightly cold. I’d held it before, but I’d been rather busy at the time. It was a light-colored wood, probably diamond willow.

  “Feel anything, Loiosh?”

  “I’m not sure, boss. Maybe. I think so.”

  Then I became aware of it, too. Yes, there was some sort of presence, seemingly dwelling at my fingertips. Strange. I was even getting a vague sense of personality; fiery, quick-tempered. A Dragon, certainly.

  Also, to my surprise, I felt an instant sympathy; I’m still not sure why. I handed the staff back to Sethra and said, “Yeah, I felt something.”

  She said, “Well?”

  “Well, what?”

  “Will you do it?”

  “Are you crazy? You’ve said no one except Zerika has—”

  “I’ve also explained why I think you’ll live through it.”

  I snorted. “Sure. All right, I’ll do it—if you’ll go along to protect me.”

  “Don’t be absurd,” snapped Sethra. “If I could go, there would be no need for you in the first place.”

  “Fine,” I said. “Then I’ll take Morrolan.” I smirked, which I’m beginning to think is always an error when dealing with Dragonlords. I think I caught Chaz smirking, but I can’t be sure.

  Sethra and Morrolan exchanged glances. Then, “Very well,” said Morrolan. “I agree.”

  I said, “Wait a minute—”

  Sethra said, “Morrolan, the Lords of Judgment won’t let you leave.”

  “Then so be it.”

  Sethra said, “But—”

  I said, “But—”

  “We’ll leave tomorrow,” Morrolan told me. “We’d best get you back at once to prepare for the journey.”

  * * * *

  Kiera the Thief s longish face was mostly concealed by a cowl as she towered over me, and her voice was low, not quite a whisper. “Hello, Vlad.”

  “Thank you.”

  She said, “So you know.”

  “I know it must have been you who spoke to Nielar about me. Thanks.”

  “I hope I’m doing you a favor,” she said.

  “Me, too. Why do you think you might not be?”