The Paths of the Dead (Viscount of Adrilankha)

by Steven Brust

  Piro’s goal was, at least for the moment, also achieved: He had learned enough about the Teckla to convince himself that by letting the fellow into his house he was not, as they said at the time, “letting the brigand onto the coach,” and he had, moreover, given himself a certain amount of information to think over during the night; this much done, he showed the Teckla to a spot where he might rest and be warm until the morning, after which the Viscount took himself off to his bedchamber to consider the events of a day rather more full of significance than he had expected it to be. To a Tiassa who had not yet passed the mark of his first century, events full of significance cannot fail to bring cheerful ruminations, wherefore it was a contented young man who fell asleep that evening in Whitecrest Manor.

  Chapter the Tenth

  How the Arrival of an Envoy

  Caused Turmoil in Whitecrest Manor

  By contrast with the sentiment with which we closed the previous chapter of our history, it was a discontented and ill-humored older man who, in the form of our friend Khaavren, woke up early the next morning and, after dressing himself, made his way down the stairs. We trust that we have dropped sufficient hints to prevent the astute reader from being unduly startled by the changes that have taken place in our old friend since we last saw him two and a half hundred years before; and we do not, moreover, wish to give needless pain to those readers who have done us the honor to concern themselves with the brave Tiassa whose activities have formed the center of these histories; all of which is to say that we propose merely to glance briefly at the Count of Whitecrest, and give only the barest outline of what he has become, thus saving ourselves from the vicarious unhappiness the poor soldier has suffered in the time that has elapsed since the assassination of the Emperor and the fall of the Empire.

  As the reader will, no doubt, have deduced, Khaavren’s failure—or, rather, what Khaavren perceived as his failure—to protect the Emperor had preyed upon his mind and spirit, leaving him, to some degree, a sad and bitter man, inclined to keeping his own counsel, and to torment himself mercilessly for every failure in his long and active life. To be sure, this bitterness had occurred only gradually during the last two hundred and fifty years, yet the alteration of his character, like the rot in a fruit, had come with ever-increasing speed once first begun, so that the last thirty or forty years had seen more change than the previous two hundred.

  These changes were reflected in the set of his jaw, which gave the appearance of hiding teeth perpetually clenched; and in his hair, which had become quite grey; and in the unnatural rigidity of his posture, which gave the impression, when he walked, of an utterly inflexible spine, as if he had suffered some disabling injury, and above all in his eye, which lacked the gleam of joy and ambition that had marked his countenance even when he had been, for all anyone could see, content to be merely a soldier, carrying out the humble yet exacting duties of his office. Moreover, though he retained, perhaps, some skill in swordplay, for such skill is based in part on knowledge of the art and science of defense that is not subject to the whims of the body, he had lost nearly all of the strength, quickness, and stamina which had made him, at one time, such a formidable opponent and one of the most feared and respected swordsmen in the Empire. His condition could be observed from the sagging of his muscles and the shortness of breath that accompanied even such a mundane task as climbing the stairs up to his bedchamber. To all of this, for the sake of completeness, we should add that his left hand, wounded on that long-ago day in the last, desperate battle to stop Adron, had never entirely healed, so that it remained somewhat stiff, and unable to close, and caused him a certain amount of discomfort, especially on cold, wet nights.

  And yet no one, least of all a Tiassa, is made up only of one characteristic; no one, that is to say, can be entirely lacking in complexity and contradiction. In the case of our old friend, the reader ought to remember that, at nearly the same time as the events which had marked what he saw as the great failure of his life, he had met a woman—to be precise, Daro, the Countess of Whitecrest—who had brought him a kind of happiness and contentment he had long despaired of achieving. His life with her, which resulted in a son in whom he had no small degree of pride, had worked, in some measure, to offset the sense of defeat that beset his spirit, so that at times, most often in the evening, as he sat in the drawing room before the grand hearth and played at sparrows with his son, or drew rounds with the Countess, or dealt dog-in-the-wood with both of them at once, a certain aspect of peace and happiness would settle over him; too often, however, it would be dispelled by some stray thought which would bring to mind those last days and hours of the Empire, and he would fall silent, and Daro (and, later, Piro) would know that he was asking himself once more what he could have done differently to have saved the life of that well-intentioned but ineffectual man whom the gods and the Cycle had made the last Emperor. At such times, wife and son would fall silent, as if in respect for his thoughts, and provide what little comfort they could by their presence.

  To be sure, in case it is insufficiently clear to the reader, it was the influence of his wife and son that had, as it were, held off for so long what might be called the disease of his spirit. These spells of bitterness or despair seemed to grow worse and more frequent as Piro grew older; almost as if the son in which the Count took such pride were a reminder to him of his own ambition, and the devastating blow it had suffered. Yet both mother and child knew him to be of a kindhearted disposition, and loved him all the more for the pain—physical and spiritual—that he carried with him.

  This was Khaavren, then, as, dressed in dark, baggy pants tucked into his tall boots and a thin blue blouse, he made his way down the wide central stairway of Whitecrest Manor, and so into the kitchen, where he found the cook deep in conversation with a Teckla he did not recognize, although the reader, jumping ahead to the correct conclusion that it is none other than Lar, will have knowledge ahead of the good Tiassa.

  Khaavren, whose ears had remained as sharp as they had been on that long-ago day when the Emperor had done them the honor to make an observation respecting their obedience to their owner’s desires, was able to ascertain that the conversation between the unknown and the cook concerned the identity of the unknown, wherefore from the force of old habits he took a moment to wait and listen. A moment was all it took for the Tiassa to learn something concerning the identity of the unknown, at which time he stepped forward and said, “I bid you good day. I am the Count of Whitecrest.”

  Lar bowed very low and stated his own name, adding, “I was informed—”

  “Exactly,” said Khaavren. “You have letters of recommendation?”

  Lar, remembering Piro’s advice of the night before, contented himself with nodding, bowing, and respectfully offering the documents in question. Khaavren accepted them and led the way back into the drawing room, where, after sitting and inviting Lar to do the same, he asked many of the same questions Piro had asked earlier, albeit in briefer form and receiving more laconic answers. At one point in the interview, the side-door clapper made its sonorous report, and Khaavren suggested Lar find out who was there; upon returning the latter announced coolly and without expression that a certain Teckla was at the door inquiring about a position as doorman and lackey.

  “You may tell him,” said Khaavren evenly, “that the position is filled.”

  Lar bowed without comment and turned to carry out his duty. Upon his return, Khaavren suggested that he see if he could find something with which to break his fast, after which he might introduce himself to the cook, the maid, and the stable-boy (who was also the night-groom), these being the only three other servants currently employed at Whitecrest Manor. “You will,” remarked Khaavren, “be informed of your duties at a later time, save that, as you know, you are to answer the door and—” He was interrupted again by the door clapper. He smiled and said, “To-day you will, no doubt, be spending a certain amount of your time informing those who arrive of your new position.”
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  “Yes, lord,” said Lar, and once more went off to answer the door, this time returning to say, “My lord, a messenger.”

  “How, a messenger?” said Khaavren, frowning. “And from whom?”

  “He would not say, my lord. But he is dressed in the livery of the House of the Phoenix.”

  These words had such a profound affect on Khaavren that even Lar, who scarcely knew him, could see that he was experiencing strong emotion. The Tiassa nevertheless mastered himself sufficiently to say, “Pray find the Countess and inform her, after which you may show the messenger into—well—into whatever room the Countess may wish.”

  “Your pardon, my lord, but—”

  “Well?”

  “Where might I find the Countess?”

  “Ah. At the top of the stairs, turn there to the right. At the far end of that corridor, on the right, will be a small anteroom where you will find her maid. Speak to the maid.”

  Lar bowed and went off to fulfill his orders, which he did with careful precision. Khaavren sat where he was, thinking and remembering, but not speculating. That is, it is not so much the case that he knew, or thought he knew, what the message was; or even that he didn’t care; it was that he had long ago simply stopped wondering about things. He knew that he would either find out or not, and it would have an effect on him or it would not, and it would be good or it would be bad, and he saw no reason to permit his thoughts to run ahead of the facts, especially when his thoughts were so entirely occupied with all of those recollections engendered by the phrase “House of the Phoenix,” which recollections we will, in respecting Khaavren’s privacy, refrain from making explicit to the reader, although the reader can, no doubt, form whatever conclusions he wishes, especially recalling that the Viscount had already spoken of a certain turmoil engendered by a letter. Should the reader conclude that the earlier letter and the present messenger are related, we will at once endorse this opinion; but should the reader choose, instead of speculating, to merely await the unfolding of events, a choice by which we are flattered in that it indicates trust in the narrator, we will give our word that the source and purpose of the messenger will be revealed before too many pages have passed.

  After some few minutes, Lar returned and stood before Khaavren.

  “Well?” said the Tiassa.

  “Madam’s compliments, and would the Count be kind enough to attend her on the terrace?”

  “Very well. Do you, then, bring us coffee.”

  “I will do so at once,” said Lar. “Unless—”

  “Well? Unless?”

  “If Your Lordship should wish it, and you have the filter, I know how to brew klava.”

  Khaavren’s visage brightened slightly, and something like a smile came to his lips as he said quietly, “Do you, then? I have not tasted klava in three hundred years. Yes, by all means, bring us a pot.”

  “Honey and cream?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Are there biscuits and bacon?”

  “Perhaps. Bring us what there is.”

  Lar bowed and went off to attend to his duties, while Khaavren made his way onto the terrace, which stood in the rear of the house and offered a view out over the ocean-sea—a view which had, in fact, improved with the Interregnum, now that Kieron’s Watch no longer stood in the way off to the southwest. The morning breeze came in from the sea, which required use of the appropriately named “morning-coats,” which were left on pegs near the terrace door. Khaavren donned his, which was colored a pale blue with white embroidery, then sat in his chair facing the wide expanse of reddish-orange ocean far below him. An instant later the Countess emerged, in a morning-coat of lyorn red against which elaborate stitching in brown could barely be seen (the Countess, we should add, though a Tiassa, always affected the colors of the House of the Lyorn, because they suited her and because she cared very little about the dictates of fashion). Khaavren rose and took both of her hands in his, smiled, and escorted her to a seat next to his, where they sat together for a few minutes, until Lar appeared and announced, “An envoy from the Enchantress of Dzur Mountain,” causing Khaavren and Daro to frown in sudden consternation, because Lar, in his inexperience, had first announced the visitor as a messenger rather than an envoy, the latter of which required the hosts to rise to greet him out of courtesy for his principal.

  They managed this, however, without any clumsiness. Daro bowed her head and said, “I am Whitecrest, and this is Lord Khaavren.” The envoy bowed very low and did not, of course, give his name, but did accept the chair that was offered, out of respect for his office, and he also gratefully accepted the klava that Lar brought, and which was so good that the Count and Countess immediately forgave Lar his error.

  The envoy, we should add, was not a Teckla, but appeared from his features, at first, to be verily of the House of the Phoenix itself, so that for just an instant the Countess and Count found themselves startled, until they recognized, by the shape of his cheekbones and nose, that the visitor was, in fact, a Dragonlord—those of the House of the Dragon tending to often resemble superficially those of the Phoenix.

  “Your Lordships perceive,” began the envoy, “that I wear the Phoenix livery.”

  “We had even remarked upon it,” said Daro.

  “It is for this mission only. I have taken service for this task at the request of she whom I serve. You might say that I have been loaned from one master to another. Yet I daresay my visit is not unexpected.”

  “That depends,” said Daro, “on whose behalf you come.”

  “I serve one called Sethra Lavode, whose name is, I expect, not unknown to you.”

  “That is true,” said Daro. “I have heard that name pronounced before.”

  “Sethra, on her part, serves one called Zerika.”

  “Zerika?” said Khaavren. “I do not believe I know her, but—”

  “But the name,” said Daro, “is significant.”

  “She is,” said the envoy, “the last being born of the House of the Phoenix.”

  Khaavren and Daro looked at each other.

  “Her mother,” continued the Dragonlord, “was the Princess Loudin, the Phoenix Heir at the time of the disaster. Her father was—”

  “Vernoi,” said Khaavren, suddenly remembering a conversation he had had with that worthy gentleman, a scant few days before the fall of the Empire.

  “Exactly,” said the other. “Vernoi died in Adron’s Disaster, but he had—”

  “Sent his wife out of the city some days before.”

  The envoy frowned. “Ah. You knew of this circumstance?”

  “At one time,” said Khaavren. “And yet, until you brought it to mind, I had not given it a thought in more than two hundred years.”

  “Well, yes. It seems the Lord Vernoi had a premonition of catastrophe, and sent his wife, the Princess Loudin, to a safe place some days before the Disaster, where she was delivered of a child.”

  “Zerika.”

  “Exactly. Now the Princess herself scarcely survived the birth of her child by a year, falling to the first wave of Plagues that accompanied the Disaster, but the child survived, and has been raised by foster parents, and it is now at last time …” His voice trailed off and he looked expectantly at Khaavren.

  “Yes? It is now time?”

  “Well, Sethra Lavode deems the time is ripe.”

  “The time is ripe for what, my dear sir?”

  “As to that, I cannot say.”

  To hide his confusion, Khaavren busied himself in pouring more klava, adding cream and honey, and drinking. At this moment Lar, who had slipped away unseen, returned with a plate full of warm biscuits, a tub of butter, and a jar of apple marmalade, all of which conspired to put the conversation in abeyance for some few minutes. During this time, Daro, who had spoken little, studied her husband, wondering at his thoughts but unwilling to intrude upon them.

  After a biscuit or two had been consumed by each of the three, the Countess said, “We were not expecting you unti
l next week.”

  The envoy nodded. “In the event, the passage was not as difficult as we anticipated, yet it is a long passage, and through treacherous regions.”

  “I understand. Well, you are welcome here.”

  The envoy bowed his head solemnly and said, “Here is my signet and a letter.” He rose and gave these items into the hand of the Countess, who looked at them and passed them on to Khaavren, who, after making certain of the handwriting and the description contained in the letter, and the authenticity of the signet, gave them back to the envoy. Reading Sethra Lavode’s description, however, caused Khaavren to pay closer attention to the individual before them than perhaps he had hitherto, whereupon he frowned suddenly, and staring hard at the Dragonlord, suddenly pronounced the word “Uttrik.”

  The envoy nodded. “I have the honor to be his son.”

  “Well,” said Khaavren, smiling for the second time that morning, “You resemble him.” Then, no longer smiling, he said, “And how is my old friend?”

  “Alas, sir, he was in Dragaera at the time of the Disaster.”

  Khaavren bowed his head. “I’m sorry,” he said in a voice so low it was nearly a whisper. “I had not known that he was so close by in those last days. I wish …” His voice trailed off from a whisper to less than a whisper—in fact, to silence.