Hell's Pawns

by Dave Gross

  "Master Henderthane," says Korva. "That is, Lord Henderthane, please, I was just explaining to Count Jeggare that classes are not to be disturbed."

  Boys begin to pour out of the classroom, and Korva casts a baleful gaze at the instructor when he emerges. He shrugs and says, "It was only a few more minutes before luncheon." When he sees that Korva's anger is not mollified, he slinks away.

  "Fetch the Father at once," she calls after him. The instructor hurries down the hall and steps out into an interior courtyard.

  "I apologize for my intrusion," says Jeggare. "In my enthusiasm to share my latest acquisitions with a fellow student of Mwangi culture, I arrived unannounced."

  "Our students are the most promising young men of all Cheliax," says Matron Korva. "Their education is paramount to the future of our nation, as I am sure you understand. Interruptions of their studies are..." She searches for a polite expression and comes up with, "undesirable."

  "Of course," says Jeggare. "I wish only to help further that education. When Lord Henderthane informed me that the Academy does not enjoy a collection of cultural artifacts, I felt it my duty to show the lads a sample of my own meager holdings."

  Boys stream out of the other classrooms and head past us toward the entrance. As they fling the doors open, I see other carriages have arrived outside the Academy, and a queue of servants has formed across the street to receive their charges. Among them I spy child-faced Rusilla, the maid who was so alarmed by our visit to House Henderthane.

  Korva looks past Jeggare, and I follow her gaze to see "Uncle" Orxines emerge from the courtyard. Today he wears garb similar to that of the instructors, only far more elaborate and with a baton of office dangling from a golden belt adorned with black and red stones. When he sees Jeggare turn his way, he dons an indulgent smile.

  "Ah," says Jeggare. "Father Orxines."

  If he minds the revelation of his double identity, Orxines does not show it. "Let us retire to my chambers," he says. He gestures toward the door opposite Korva's office, and we follow.

  "Your boy can wait outside," Korva says to the boss. I've always rankled at that term, especially when it comes from someone of a better class than Zandros, but when the boss nods at me, I nod back like a good servant and follow the stream of young boys out to the red carriage.

  "What in the nine Hells are you doing here?" The voice of Ivo Elliendo makes Korva's chilly tones seem warm. I prepare the big smile for him but then remember where we are. It's all very good to brush him off in an alley, but among his class the stakes are higher. I keep my expression neutral as I face him.

  The paralictor stands with his hand gently resting on the shoulder of a blond lad. It occurs to me then that all of the boys from the various classrooms are of the same cohort, not various ages as I'd assumed from the several classrooms.

  "Answer me, boy," says Elliendo. Before I can answer, a shadow of realization creases his brow, and he marches into the Academy muttering, "Jeggare."

  I follow him, but he bursts through the door to Orxines's chamber and has his hands on the boss's jacket before I can reach him. He hauls Jeggare out of his seat and throws him across Orxines's desk, sending a lamp and inkwell crashing to the floor. Korva's hand flies up to her mouth, and Orxines chokes at the sight of the paralictor manhandling a count of Cheliax.

  "You have no business here!" Elliendo shouts into Jeggare's face. I move forward to pull him off, but the boss shakes his head.

  Elliendo emphasizes his demand by slamming him back down on the desk. Orxines and Korva step away, afraid to interfere. I look to the boss for permission, but the blow has dazed him. He sees nothing but stars.

  "Do you understand me, Jeggare?" Elliendo smashes him against the desk again, and the boss doesn't put up a fight. "Stay away from my family."

  I hate to see the boss knocked around. It makes me look like a bad bodyguard, but unless he gives me the nod, I can't make a move. On the other hand, he didn't tell me to keep quiet.

  "Speaking of family," I say, "how's the wife?"

  Elliendo's head turns so fast I imagine I can hear the crack of a whip.

  "Your son takes after her," I add. "Handsome lad."

  "The old goat hasn't lost his looks—nor his edge."

  The whitening of Elliendo's face emphasizes the little semicircular scar beneath his eye. "You dare," he says, turning to me, but he releases the boss. I like his theatrical delivery. The man should be on stage.

  Behind him, Jeggare rises from the desk and shakes his head emphatically at me.

  "Paralictor," says Father Orxines, "I beg you to withdraw."

  From the hallway, several boys stare in wonder at their elders' fracas. Among them is Elliendo's son, his blue eyes round in astonishment. Korva moves to close the door, but Orxines intercedes and holds it open. "Perhaps another location is better suited to your discussion."

  Elliendo tugs his jacket down tight and turns toward the boys in the hall, who scurry out the front door. Without a glance at any of us, he stalks out of the office to collect his son.

  Jeggare clears his throat and says, "I beg your pardons." He looks a little shaky, but he gives me the nod to leave, so I step into the hall. He walks slowly out the entrance, and I follow him to the carriage and help him inside. With everyone watching, I take my spot on the footman's step instead of joining him inside.

  As the driver pulls away, I spot Morvus Henderthane standing on the corner beside Rusilla, whose gaping mouth foretells that this incident will be the talk of House Henderthane when she returns. Remembering something the boss asked me yesterday, I take a good look at Morvus and think back to the rest of his family. The boy has a striking resemblance to his mother, Drulia, but not only does he look nothing like his half-sister, he also bears no resemblance whatever to the portrait of the late Einmarch Henderthane.

  Come to think of it, the boy I saw with Ivo Elliendo did not much resemble his father, either.

  Chapter Four: The Palace of Jubilations

  Atop its colossal fountain, the statue of Mad Prince Haliad peers down at us like a boy inspecting insects as the boss orders the driver once around the Sargavan Plaza.

  This detour from the short route between the Scions Academy and House Henderthane is my cue to scan for pursuit. I always tell the boss it would be easier to shake off tails if he traded the red carriage for one of the black coaches so ubiquitous south of Five Favors, but he's sentimental about his father's legacy. When I'm satisfied none of Paralictor Ivo Elliendo's informants are in our shadow, I rap the all-clear from my perch on the footman's step. Jeggare orders the carriage to a halt and cracks open the panel to beckon me inside. Once I'm in, the slip driver slaps the reins and turns the coach north, toward the Triumph district and House Henderthane.

  "You noticed something odd about the students at the Scions Academy?" says Jeggare.

  "They're a bunch of bastards," I say, remembering the strange uniformity in the students' appearance, as well as the complete lack of similarity between the two boys we knew and their fathers. A faint smile creases the boss's long face, but it's serious business. If it could be proven that these sons of Egorian's most powerful families were illegitimate, an entire generation of Chelish elite would falter.

  "Quite possible," he says, "but before making such an accusation, one would want a great deal more evidence than we have seen." Jeggare must have been on to the question of Morvus Henderthane's parentage since he saw the boy standing beside his late father's portrait, but I was too busy staring at Morvus's sister to notice. "What else did you notice?"

  "They are all about the same age," I say.

  "Almost certainly they form a cohort," he says, "born within the same year, or near to it."

  "What does that mean?" I ask.

  Rather than answer, he steeples his fingers and rests his thumbs against his chin, forefi
ngers on the tip of his nose.

  "There's something else you should know." I tell him that Zandros claims one of the Henderthanes is indebted to him.

  "Ah," says the boss. "Young Lord Henderthane is seldom if ever without a chaperone."

  I know what he's thinking, because I've thought it too. It's more likely Pavanna who Zandros has hooked. "Maybe he means Drulia."

  "There is more value in a loan proffered to a favored child of a wealthy lord, less so in one granted to his abandoned wife," he says. He looks out the carriage window, and I see we've reached the gates of House Henderthane.

  At the door, the butler informs us that Miss Henderthane is not at home and that he doesn't know when she'll return. We drive back through the gate and around the corner, where I jump out and climb the locked gate to the servants' entrance. I lurk there for almost half an hour before the giggler I met in the kitchen yesterday comes out to dump the rubbish. It takes the little smile to lure her over, the hint of a nocturnal return to fluster her, and two of the boss's shiny gold coins to secure the information we want. A peck on her slender neck, and a minute later I'm back in the red carriage.

  "She left over an hour ago to visit her mother," I say. Jeggare orders the driver back toward Dice End.

  As we approach the Palace of Jubilations, a woman runs out the saloon doors hugging a dressing robe shut around her body. Even through her mask of kohl-stained tears, I recognize her as one of the performers we saw yesterday.

  Inside, the patrons gabble with the barmaids, the cook, the bartender, and a fellow I take to be a stagehand. Jeggare heads for the back rooms, and I intercept the bouncer who tries to intercept him.

  "It's all right," I say. "Pandarus called for us."

  A trio of worm-like scars flush pink under the big man's short hair, and I can tell he's not buying it.

  "If I were you," I say, "I'd make sure none of these rum sponges leaves before your songbird brings back the guard."

  The bouncer's determination falters, and he moves away to whisper a warning to a couple of his buddies. They scarper off, but not before I sketch their faces into memory. The bouncer plants himself at the front door to prevent the rest from leaving, and I follow the boss to the dressing room.

  Pandarus, the proprietor of the Palace of Jubilations, stands in the middle of the little room pulling at his fingers. He lifts his feet like a little boy who has to piss but doesn't have permission. Beyond him, Jeggare draws a sobbing woman away from the prone body of Drulia Henderthane and presses her into the arms of another singer.

  "Would you be so kind?" Jeggare nods toward the outer rooms. The singer leads the crying woman out of the dressing room, and I shut the door behind her.

  Drulia's eyes bulge open, and scorch marks darken her lips and nostrils. The dark ligature of a strangling cord rings her neck. Jeggare closes her eyes with a soft stroke of his hand. He shuts his eyes for a moment and then stands to face the other occupants of the room.

  "Who else was backstage?" he asks Pandarus.

  Pandarus stammers out a few names. I count them and compare the result with the number of non-customers I saw out beside the stage. It adds up, except for the woman we saw fleeing the Palace—one Sorcia, who found the body five or six minutes earlier—and Pavanna Henderthane.

  Jeggare continues the questions while I step out to have a look at the rear entrance. The rubbish-strewn alley behind the Palace shows no signs of recent passage, so I return to the front room when I hear a commotion at the entrance.

  A young guardsman stands sentinel at the door while his older partner orders the staff and patrons to sit where he can see them. The veteran scowls at me, but I jerk a thumb toward the dressing room and say, "Back here."

  He doesn't protest when I accompany him to the dressing room. There he sees the boss and bows, "Count Jeggare."

  The boss returns the greeting with the military nod that always sets the right tone with the city guards. "We arrived seven minutes ago," he says. "The deceased is Drulia, former wife of the late Einmarch Henderthane."

  The guard whistles low in appreciation of the name. He sends Pandarus out with the others and listens as the boss relates a brief but thorough summary of what we've learned so far.

  "Look here," the boss beckons to the guard. Together they kneel beside the corpse, and Jeggare indicates the marks on her lips and nose. He takes a candle from the dressing table and directs the guard to hold it up while he pries open Drulia's jaw. A lump of what looks like red-black stone tumbles out of her mouth, seething with a vermillion haze. The guard reaches for it, but Jeggare stops his hand.

  "Don't touch it," he says. "That appears to be a hell coal."

  The guard recoils from the stone. "A what?"

  The boss peers into Drulia's mouth, and I briefly glimpse the raw, meaty pit that has been seared out of her skull before he lays her head back. "A tool used by certain devils, or their servants, to destroy the eternal spirits of mortal beings."

  The thought that anyone would want Drulia Henderthane not just dead but utterly destroyed weighs down my belly like a lump of cold lead. Sure, she had married into a great house, but she had left all that behind without a fuss. She was nobody special anymore, nobody that anyone would need to obliterate.

  The same thought must have occurred to the guard, whose face seems to age as I watch.

  "My lord," says the guard, "would you be so gracious as to remain here and continue your examination while I send my junior to summon our captain?"

  "In truth," says Jeggare, "I had hoped to speak with—" A new disturbance erupts out front. I take a few steps down the hall, but when I see the hulking silhouette of a Hellknight.

  "Bring them to me," snaps the voice of Ivo Elliendo from the salon.

  What the hell is he doing here? I wonder. One glance at the boss tells me he is thinking the same.

  The Paralictor has two of his Hellknights and four other agents with him. They have already divided the patrons and employees of the Palace into groups at the four corners of the large outer salon. Elliendo's lips whiten when he sees us emerge from the backstage door.

  "Keep those two separate from the others," he orders a man wearing blood-colored robes, a studded shoulder guard, and a light helm adorned with spiraling goat horns. He sneers at me as if we're acquainted, but I don't recognize him. I notice a wand secured in a leather holster on his thigh, as well as a half-dozen small leather pouches arrayed on either side of his belt. He's one of Elliendo's signifiers, a spellcaster specializing in interrogations. He points at me, then toward the kitchen. He waves his hand in a somewhat more polite gesture to invite Jeggare along. With a snap of his fingers he summons one of the Hellknights to follow.

  As a nod to the boss's title, the signifier finds a tall stool and swipes it with his sleeve before departing with a bow barely this side of insolence. Jeggare takes the seat, leaving me to lean against a dirty counter on which the cook has left a neat row of fish fillets beside a pan of brown flour. Grease hisses and pops on a skillet on the nearby stove, and the air smells like scorched fat. I move the hot skillet off the stove—it takes more than a stove fire to burn me—and try not to think about the burned-out interior of Drulia's skull.

  "Gruck's a good kid. It's a shame he's mixed up in this."

  We wait in silence for the better part of an hour while Elliendo questions the others. When the guard captain arrives, the Paralictor makes it clear that he has assumed authority over the scene. The captain, whose voice sounds more wise than meek, does not remind Elliendo that murder investigations are the purview of the Egorian city guard, not the Order of the Scourge.

  "There's a lesson in that for you," the boss says, reading my expression, "although I am not unappreciative of your earlier efforts to spare me a thrashing, misguided though they were."

  That's close enough to thanks to suit
me, and any time the boss voices his appreciation, my next pay purse is a little heavier. Much as I might have liked to bloody my spurs on Elliendo's skull when I saw him tossing the boss around at the Scions Academy, it would have been more or less an act of suicide. His attack on Jeggare was socially dangerous, but Elliendo wouldn't have ended up hanging on the Judgment Day scaffold for it, as I would if he charged me with assaulting him.

  "Be that as it may," says Jeggare, "never again speak of the Paralictor's wife."

  Professional rivalry alone doesn't account for the mutual disdain I've always seen between the boss and Elliendo, not to mention the savagery of the Paralictor's reaction to seeing Jeggare in the headmaster's office. "What is it between you two, anyway?"

  Jeggare glances at the Hellknight standing guard at the kitchen door. If he ever answers me, it won't be while one of Elliendo's men is hanging around.

  We spend hours in the cramped kitchen before Elliendo comes for us. He gets one whiff of the greasy fish stink and orders the Hellknight to seat us at one of the little tables near the stage, where it smells more of hot lime dust, stale beer, and cheap Taldan cigars.

  The presence of Elliendo and his Hellknights reduces the city guards and their captain to the role of lackeys. I'd heard them searching the upper rooms earlier, but now two stand beside a stretcher laid across a couple of the other tables. Drulia's body lies there covered in a patchy remnant of purple velvet curtain. The young guard I saw earlier stands beside the front door, while his elder partner and the captain linger by the backstage door, watching silently as two of Elliendo's Hellknights take places behind us while the Paralictor faces us across the little table. Beside him sits his signifier, sketching sigils on the table in a gleaming blue powder and taking notes on a crisp parchment scroll. Two more of his armored behemoths stand behind the Paralictor, forming a perfect cage.