House War 03 - House Name

by Michelle West

  Jewel nodded. “I think it’s the only way in—the only way left. I don’t think there is any other way in.”

  “And they could not have closed this from the inside, as they did the others?”

  “I don’t think they could get to it.” Jewel drew a short breath. “Terafin, I don’t know that we can. But we were there.”

  “We?”

  “Duster and I.”

  “Duster is the girl who died so that the rest of your den could escape the holdings?”

  “Yes.”

  “Tell me, Jewel. Tell me quickly.”

  Jewel did.

  When the door had closed on Jewel Markess and her silent and stiff guard, The Terafin rose. Morretz had already left her side and had entered the stacks, searching for the information she required. It was not a short search, and during it, Amarais paced the carpeted floor like the much younger woman she had once been. She ordered the magelights to brightness as Morretz at last emerged, his sleeves covered in dust, his arms balancing books, scrolls, and the remnants of either that previous rulers had seen fit to preserve.

  He laid them upon her table.

  “What do you think?” she asked him before she had opened the cover of the first book she touched.

  “She believes every word she has spoken is the truth.” He glanced at her and added, “So do you.”

  “I believe she believes it,” was The Terafin’s guarded reply.

  “You believe it, Amarais. What you know and what she knows, however, is not the same. You believe it because there are arcane and ancient writs and even laws governing the Sanctum; she is unlikely to know about them. Most of the House,” he added, “is unlikely to know about them; they are not invoked.”

  “No. But there must be a reason for those laws, and I need to see them again before I approach the Council. Or the Kings.”

  “Start here,” Morretz said. “You read Old Weston?”

  “No.”

  “Start there,” he said instead, grimacing. “Because I can get by in Old Weston. It brings back memories.”

  Judging by his shuttered expression, none of them were good. He had spent years in the halls of the Order of Knowledge as one of its students; why he had left, she did not know. Nor could she ask. But she was grateful for that departure, grateful that he’d survived it, and grateful—profoundly grateful—that he had chosen to serve the Guild of Domicis instead.

  In the end, they found some of what they sought, and The Terafin summoned Meralonne APhaniel.

  He was instantly wary, and the fact that this was noticeable said much about his state: he looked exhausted and worn. Amarais did not know his age; she knew it must be considerable, but he always seem to elude its weight. Today, he wore the full measure of years, and unlike those same years on the shoulders of Sigurne Mellifas, they suited him poorly.

  “Terafin. I realize that I am a mage in the employ of your House, but at the moment the Crowns demand my attention and my diligence. It is not easy to come here, and my presence will be missed.”

  “I would not call you for a message of little import, and indeed I expect that you will see this information to the source that it will best serve.” She spoke coolly and was rewarded by a formal bow—one he had to rise to make.

  “Your pardon, Terafin.”

  “Accepted.”

  “How may I serve you, Terafin?”

  She smiled; there was no expression upon his face. “It has come to my attention that there is a colloquial phrase used among the general populace. When the Sleepers Wake. It is used to mean—”

  “That something will never come to pass. Yes. I’ve heard the phrase.”

  She watched his face as if it were geography that she could find her bearings by studying. “Good. It is not a phrase that is used in my presence and not one that I am familiar with, perhaps because I have studied some of the history of the Sleepers.”

  There it was: the tensing of lines around eyes and the corners of a thinning mouth. What she said had not pleased him, as his next words made clear. “You have studied childhood lore.”

  “And yet you would agree that the Sleepers do exist.” She was not entirely certain which way this conversation would go, and she was willing—barely—to let it unfold naturally.

  He surprised her. He smiled. It removed years from his face, but it made of that face something almost fey. “I would agree, yes. But I would not necessarily say that the bardic understanding of the Sleepers and the reality meet in any meaningful way.”

  “Are these Sleepers dangerous?”

  Meralonne’s gaze was both measured and sardonic. “Who would know? They have never awakened.”

  “Yet it is considered an act of treason to interfere with them at all—to even, if I understand the law correctly, attempt to see or study them.” She lifted one treatise and let it fall again, as if tempting him to argue. He did not. “A very old law, upheld when the Kings took power. It is not in the records of the current magisterial courts, but rather the historical ones. Four hundred years ago. When the Sleepers were, in fact, considered myth.”

  “How—”

  “I wished plans,” she replied smoothly, her voice the practiced voice of reason that had held her in such good stead during her long years in Terafin. “Some lay of the ground that would indicate that the Sanctum of Moorelas had once been part of a building.” She studied his face for some sign of expression or surprise; none could be seen. He was cautious now. “Have you heard the phrase ‘under Moorelas’ shadow’?”

  What he had not offered her before, he offered her now; his brow rose and his complexion—which had started out poor—was suddenly white. The surprise did not last; it was transformed by a grimace that trod the narrow line between smile and pain into something like a concession. “Yes. It means, colloquially, that someone is doomed.”

  That phrase, she’d heard. It was more common than the previous one, in her experience. “So much history beneath the ground of Averalaan, of what was once AMarakas, and before that, Develonn. And before that? Vexusa, I think.”

  “Yes, the Dark League. I did not know how old these lands were, or how much history they contained; I feel, almost, that I walk in legend.”

  It was true. But it was also beside the point; who walked in legend and felt that they were doing so? Who had the time for anything but momentary awe and a sense that the universe was profoundly larger than one’s self?

  “The Sanctum.” She looked at him, waiting.

  He said nothing, and she silently cursed the way mages hoarded knowledge and information. It was their coin, and they were parsimonious. She rose. This often signaled an end to the interview, but Meralonne understood that she merely wished to leave the confines of chair and desk. She paced. Morretz frowned; she let him.

  “It is a shrine,” she said, “to the memory of Moorelas, a monument to the forces of justice, of courage, of sacrifice. Each year, upon the four quarters, wreaths are placed at the foot of the statue that guards the city’s bay. There are no doors into it, no windows—until today, I did not realize that it could be entered, although perhaps I should have; it is called the Sanctum of Moorelas. Few, if any, know what lies beneath its facade. You know.” It was an accusation, but she was graceful enough to make of it a statement, hiding its edges, but not its point.

  He did not attempt to deny it. The lack of denial, the lack of even an attempt, calmed her. Jewel, she thought. You were right. She was aware that she, too, was vindicated in her belief.

  “It is an edict that was decreed by Cormaris, Reymaris, and the Mother; those who serve Cartanis have also upheld the law, and I believe the Mandaros-born do so as well. In fact, if you take the time—”

  “I will find that there is not a single god who does not wish the Sleepers to remain undisturbed.”

  His smile was sharper. “Indeed.”

  “In fact, I will find there is not a single god who will even make reference to the Sleepers without indelicately applied pressure.”r />
  He bowed his head to her, lifting his hands in a steeple beneath his chin. Had he a pipe, he would have lit it; he did not.

  “If you’d like, Morretz will bring you a pipe.”

  “He will not bring me my pipe.” But he nodded to her, acknowledging not her rank but her perception. “Terafin, you put us in a difficult position.”

  “How much does the Council of the Magi know?”

  “The Council? I cannot say for certain. Krysanthos knew, although he was not one of the wise. The Kings know. The Exalted. Certainly,” he added, with a wry smile, “the Astari.”

  “But not The Ten.”

  “It is not relevant to The Ten.”

  Had she desired to turn the discussion sharply, she would have laughed—but the laugh would have been brittle, an expression of anger at his casual dismissal of the body of men and women who were second only to the Kings in power.

  “It is relevant to The Ten now. It is relevant to all of Averalaan.”

  Her tone caught him. “What do you mean?” His voice was casual, almost soft. She had heard him snap, snarl, and shout on many occasions. She preferred that to this, although she couldn’t clearly say why.

  But if she was The Terafin, she was also human. She desired—for just that moment—to show him that The Ten were relevant and necessary. “It is through the Sanctum—and the secret that the Sanctum contains—that we will find our way into the undercity.”

  He watched her in silence. It was a silence that drained him of color, of all the little things—breath, motion—that gave him the semblance of life. Stone was as still. Only his eyes, gray-silver and light enough in this setting that she found them disturbing, moved. He absorbed both her words and her certainty, and as he did, they widened. “Of course. We should have known it.”

  Gone were all arrogance and all condescension.

  “Tell me, Meralonne—why do the gods fear the Sleepers?”

  “I . . . do not know,” he replied after some time had passed, and he could not—in The Terafin’s considered opinion—fabricate a pleasing enough lie. “And I will not venture to guess; it would take years, and a better understanding of the relationship between the gods and their followers than you or I possess.”

  Not better than yours, she thought, watching him. Certain of it. Willing to trust the instincts that had guided her through one bitter and bloody House War to her current uncontested position. She wanted to know more about this man. But she had tried in the past, and his past was closed to Terafin. It was also rumored to be closed to the Astari, but thus far, Meralonne had survived.

  “And is the fear of the gods for the Sleepers greater than the fear of Allasakar’s coming?”

  He rose, unfolding slowly and wearily. “I believe it is time to answer that question.” He did not ask her permission to leave; had he, she was not entirely certain she would have granted it. But she owned only his contracted time, not his loyalty. She let him go.

  He reached the door, and turned; he was Meralonne, and it was seldom in him to let anyone else have the last word.

  “Terafin.”

  “Yes?”

  “If you worship those gods, you might wish to pray that the Sleepers do not awaken.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  23rd of Corvil, 410 A.A.

  Terafin Manse, Averalaan Aramarelas

  THE FACT THAT BARSTON had any hair left was almost a shock to Teller. Over the course of the past ten days, he had taken to pulling at his hair in frustration, while explaining that things were not normally this difficult. On the morning of the twenty-third, just past what civilized people—in Barston’s words—would call breakfast, they arrived together at the closed and guarded doors of Gabriel’s office to find they were not the first people to do so.

  Sadly, the other people weren’t guards; the guards were always there. No, these early arrivals were very oddly robed, very unfriendly looking older men and women. Teller habitually stayed behind Barston when anyone official entered the office; he pressed himself into the nearest wall as Barston came to a sudden stop.

  Barston, as far as Teller was concerned, felt that manners were necessary—and that groveling was not. He cautioned Teller against overt obsequiousness, as he called it, when dealing with the members of the House, because some of those members felt the name gave them the right to be both demanding and rude. Teller had once asked Barston how it was that demanding and rude people were offered the House Name to begin with, and Barston grimaced.

  “Politics,” he’d replied briskly. “And I’ll thank you not to repeat that.”

  Whoever these men and women were, they weren’t Terafin; if it hadn’t been obvious by their dress, it would have been by Barston’s attitude; he immediately bowed—a formal, perfect bow—and he held it until the oldest man present ordered him to rise.

  Teller thought they were priests. The only priests he had seen in his life in the holdings were the daughters and sons of the Mother—and none of the women were wearing the Mother’s symbols—but something about the robes and the staves these men and women carried suggested the cathedrals that, alone among the buildings on the Isle, were taller than the spires of Avantari, where the Twin Kings lived.

  “My pardon for our tardiness,” Barston said, when he gained his full height and once again became the stiff and precise man that Teller had worked with almost nonstop for weeks now.

  “You are not late,” the man replied. He lifted his hands and lowered the cowl that hooded his face, and Teller’s eyes rounded. The man’s eyes were golden. “But the Exalted of Cormaris received an urgent missive from The Terafin and bade us come to speak with her.”

  “Someone—someone at the gates sent you here?” Barston said, his voice thinning.

  “Ah, no. Your pardon. We are aware that Terafin House protocol requires all unannounced and unscheduled visitors to speak with Gabriel ATerafin. We merely asked directions to his office and waited.”

  “For how long?”

  “Not more than an hour,” was the quiet reply.

  Barston produced keys instantly, and he motioned the Chosen who attended the doors like statues to either side. “The right-kin is not due in his office for another half hour,” he told the priest. Then he turned to Teller and whispered, “Go to Gabriel’s rooms at once and bring him here.”

  “But—”

  “He has to be in his rooms; he did not choose to take breakfast in the hall, or we would have seen him. Go now, and tell him—tell him whatever you feel is best to get him out of his room, appropriately attired, and here.”

  It wasn’t as difficult as Barston’s severely worded command implied. He didn’t have to knock on the door; the Chosen did that. Nor did he have to wait outside in the hall; Gabriel’s quarters, much like the den’s, had a large sitting room in which people could wait in comfort. The Chosen on duty indicated that he was to wait for Gabriel, and he told them both that Barston had said the situation “could not be more urgent.” They nodded gravely, but they always did that when on duty. He wondered what they said when they were off duty.

  But not for long. Gabriel, attired for a long day at the office—as all the days had been since this crisis had started—met him almost immediately.

  “What seems to be the problem?” he asked, as Teller stood.

  “I’m not exactly sure it’s a problem, but there are god-born priests waiting outside your office door.”

  Gabriel raised a hand to his eyes. “Which church, and how long have they been waiting?”

  “Cormaris, and they said not more than an hour.”

  “Well,” the right-kin said as he headed for the door, motioning for Teller to follow, “that didn’t take long at all. The Terafin, as usual, was correct.”

  “Should I be in the office?”

  “Yes; they won’t be. They will be escorted directly to The Terafin as soon as Barston completely clears her schedule.”

  Teller carefully stopped himself from cringing, which earned him a slight smi
le from Gabriel. “It is not only Barston who will bear the brunt of several people’s displeasure; the schedule—such as it is—has been cleared frequently and without warning in the past few weeks, much to the annoyance of several influential and wealthy people.

  “I appreciate your presence in the office at this time,” he added, in a more serious voice. “This is not the usual training that most applicants for a job here will undergo, but you’ve weathered it well. I am of a mind to speak with The Terafin about the matter of your pay.”

  “Speak with Barston first.”

  “Oh, indeed. Even if I did not, the various letters that would accompany such a suggestion would pass through his hands. Come, Teller. These are not the only god-born priests we will see today. With luck, and with the blessing of not only the Triumvirate but of any god who watches the Empire, this will be over soon, and things will return to what passes for normal.”

  In all, three delegations came that morning from the churches, one each from Cormaris, Reymaris, and the Mother. Barston had warned Teller to be unfailingly helpful and utterly silent unless words were somehow demanded, and Teller had obeyed with the ease of a quiet person used to living in a house full of the louder variety.

  But it was easy. The priests were not, like the rest of the angrier House Members, difficult or frustrating; had it not been for Barston’s obvious nerves, Teller would have found them calming. Even the golden eyes, after the initial shock, seemed natural; they were the color of warmth, not power. While Barston was going out of his way not to offend them—and acting as if breathing their air was cause for the offense he wished to avoid—Teller observed.

  They were formal, the way The Terafin was formal and the way Gabriel could be when he so chose; they were not, however, chilly or condescending. They spoke to each other while they waited, and some mention of children, or the children, carried in the otherwise silent space. It came to him, as he watched them, that they were just people with unusual jobs and a slightly different language. He could have taken them to Helen in the Commons, and after she’d dressed them, they would have almost fit in.