Jhegaala (Vlad Taltos)

by Steven Brust

  “My lord?”

  Saabo was looking me.

  “Sorry, I was thinking. I was remembering things my grandfather told me about the East.”

  “The East?”

  “This country. Fenario.”

  “What did he tell you, my lord?”

  I shook my head on the pillow and stared up at the ceiling. I was getting tired of that ceiling. “Is there a house here?”

  “My lord?”

  “A house of, ah, I’m not sure what term you’d use. Boys and girls who, no, I guess it would be only girls here. Girls who, for money—”

  “Oh!” First he blushed, then he gave me a puzzled look as if wondering how, in my condition, I could possibly make use of a place like that. Then he said, “No, my lord. But there are girls who work out of the Mouse.”

  “I see. And have you made use of their services?”

  He didn’t blush this time, he just shook his head. “I never wished to, my lord. In my youth I, ah, I never needed to.”

  I decided he wasn’t lying, which was unfortunate, because it meant he couldn’t tell me one of the things I needed to know. “Does the Guild run these services?”

  “Oh, certainly, my lord.”

  “And it’s legal?”

  “My lord? Of course. Why—”

  “My grandfather told me it was often forbidden by law, but ignored by custom.”

  “Ah. I see. No, there are no such laws here.”

  And at exactly that moment, with one of the best incidents of accidental good timing of my career, there was the light tapping at the door that I’d come to recognize.

  “That would be my physicker,” I said. “Thank you for taking the time to visit a sick kinsman.”

  He managed a slight smile to go with his bow, and, hat in hand, walking backward, he left as Aybrahmis and the witch came in. I noticed that Aybrahmis nodded to Saabo, who gave him a smile of recognition as well as the polite bow he also gave the witch.

  He wasn’t all bad, was Saabo. But he was still a deferential little wretch I’d like to kick.

  Some time later, Aybrahmis remarked that I was making good progress, and complimented me on being in generally good shape. For someone who couldn’t even stand up to—couldn’t even stand up, I didn’t take it too seriously. The witch muttered and murmured and changed my dressings, and when they were about to leave I said, “A moment, please.”

  Aybrahmis got that look physickers get when they’re prepared to reply politely to an enormity about your condition, or to an impossible-to-answer question about when you’ll be able to do something or other. I said, “What do you know of the Art?”

  “Me?”

  “Yes.”

  “I know how to apply the dressings and poultices made by those who study it; I don’t need more than that.” He seemed slightly offended.

  “Your pardon,” I said. I used my friendly and sincere voice. “I’ve never entirely understood the relationship between the healing Arts and the Art of the witch, and it has become important that I do. In the Empire it is different. There are certain sorcerers who specialize in ailments of the body, and they are the ones we call physickers. Here, I don’t know.”

  I looked back and forth between Aybrahmis and the witch. They both stood over my bed, both with hands clasped in front of them. Aybrahmis looked like he wanted to ask why it was important, but instead he said, “We cooperate a great deal. If I deem a patient requires some medication, a witch will create it. Also, certain urgent problems are best tended by a witch.”

  “So then, other than the most urgent things—such as, for example, me—you might enlist the aid of a witch to concoct poultices, medications—”

  He nodded.

  I kept looking at him. He flushed just the least bit, but didn’t say anything. My nod I kept entirely to myself.

  I said, “Are you familiar with something called nemaybetesheg?” You’ll have to excuse me, but there’s no word in the Northwestern tongue for it. My grandfather, however, made certain I knew the Fenarian word for it when he was drilling me for my first visit back here. “Hard for a physicker to cure, but easy for a witch to prevent, Vladimir,” he’d said. Sometimes I wonder what he thinks of me.

  The physicker’s eyes widened. “I, of course I know it. I never thought to … what makes you think—?”

  “I don’t,” I said. “I don’t have it. I just wanted to know if you’re familiar with it.”

  “Well, there are many of them, not just the Sheep Disease as most people think. And, certainly, I know something about it, but why—”

  “Does it come up often in your work?”

  He frowned. “I don’t believe that is an appropriate question.”

  I laughed. I couldn’t help it. “You look at me like this, and you don’t realize that people did this to me? And that they might be willing to again? When I ask a question of you, it is because it relates to my condition, one way or another.”

  “How could it—?”

  “No. I’m not about to tell you, physicker. And you wouldn’t want to know anyway.”

  He thought that over, then nodded and addressed the witch. “I will join you shortly,” he said.

  “No,” I said. “I need to ask him about this, too.”

  He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Very well,” he said.

  I mostly closed my eyes—the old trick of watching someone from under your lashes. You can’t see all that well, and it isn’t all that convincing a deception. But once in a while it can lull someone into thinking you aren’t paying attention. I doubted I would fool Aybrahmis.

  “Does it come up often in your work?” I repeated.

  “No,” he said. “Hardly ever. Once in a while, when a young man goes to the City, or a visitor …” He trailed off. I chuckled. His nostrils flared and he said, “I am not about to give you the names of anyone I have treated.”

  “I don’t need to know,” I said. “What I need to know is why.”

  “Eh?”

  “I’ve been to the Mouse. I’ve seen the number of girls who hang out there, and I know what they are. How is it you aren’t busy day and night with such treatments? Is there another physicker who handles it?”

  “There are two others in town who are called on by some to—”

  “Does one of them treat this disease among the, ah, the Velvet Ladies, as they’re called where I come from by people I don’t talk to?”

  “Not that I am aware of.” He enunciated each word carefully, the way you do when you feel it is beneath your dignity to be answering such questions at all. In Fenarian, the effect is much more pronounced than in Northwestern, because it takes all the flowing musicality out of the language. It was all I could do not to laugh.

  “Do you do, ah, something to prevent such diseases? Or check for them?”

  “No.”

  “Does one of your colleagues?”

  “Not to my knowledge.”

  I said, “Then explain to me why such diseases are not a constant problem for you?”

  “I don’t know,” he said. “It has simply never been a problem.”

  “And you never thought about it?”

  “I’m sorry, Lord Merss, but I really think—”

  “All right. Thank you. I found what I wanted to.”

  “Good day, then,” he said. “I will see you tomorrow.”

  And I really had found out what I’d wanted to; I’d been watching the witch the entire time.

  After they left, I realized how exhausted I was; but I didn’t sleep. I sat there and tried to tie the last loose ends together in my head. I’m not all that good at that sort of thing. I mean, ideas come to me when I’m talking, or hearing things, or seeing things; and when I’m talking to Loiosh sometimes I can figure them out while I’m explaining things to him; but just sitting there trying to calculate how everything connects doesn’t come naturally to me.

  Still, I made a bit of progress muttering to myself, half out loud. “Well then
, if they did that, he must have been doing that, which is why I thought that …” And so on. A lot of it came together that way, and the pieces that didn’t, even if I didn’t know how they fit, I could tell they belonged on the same table.

  I was still putting things together when I was interrupted by Loiosh saying into my mind, “No luck so far, Boss. How long do you want me to stay with it?”

  “Oh, sorry, chum. Might as well come back now. Should be almost time for food.”

  “Back to it tonight, or is there something new?”

  “I don’t know about something new, but no, you won’t need to keep looking for Tereza.”

  “You found her?”

  “No. And you won’t either. Sorry, I should have told you when I figured it out. She’s dead.”

  16

  B O R A A N My dear, if I have, yet again, accidentally said the one thing that gives you the entire solution, I’ll… I’ll…

  L E F I T T Have a drink?

  B O R A A N Of course.

  [Lefitt crosses to liquor cabinet]

  —Miersen, Six Parts Water

  Day Two, Act III, Scene 4

  Outside, it was mid-day, and they were hard at work in the mills, and the peasants were doing whatever it is peasants do at this time of year. Digging something, I suppose. The window was open to let the stench in. No, I still wasn’t used to it. Well, I don’t know, maybe I was; it was bothering me less than it had before. But I didn’t have so many other miseries before. Not complaining, just stating a fact.

  I had most of it. That is, I now knew who had been trying to do what, and why they’d done it, and who had been stupid (that was me, in case you’re wondering). More, I knew what I could do about it. In general. But you can’t implement a plan “in general.” And, when you can’t move from your sickbed, your options with regards to violence are, let’s say, limited.

  It was irritating. It seemed like I was so close to being able to deal with it, like I had everything I needed if I could just figure out how to get it started. I needed to kick the thing around with someone, to just have someone to bounce ideas off until the answer settled in. I needed—

  Loiosh flew in the window, and before he’d even settled he said, “All right, what happened?”

  “Asked some questions, got some answers, made some deductions.”

  “Deductions? You’re making deductions? I leave you alone for four hours and you start making deductions?”

  “I’m trying to find words to describe how funny that is.”

  “So, going to explain these deductions to me?”

  “After that crack, I’m not sure. Besides, I haven’t fit everything into place yet.”

  “But you’re sure she’s dead?”

  “She has to be. They couldn’t leave her alive with me able to talk, and right now they can’t risk killing me.”

  “Who is ‘they,’ Boss?”

  “Yeah, that’s the big question, isn’t it?”

  “Now you’re sounding smug.”

  “Uh huh.”

  “Smug and helpless isn’t a good combination for you.”

  “Is that a threat?”

  “Damn right it is.”

  “Okay. Just checking.”

  Rocza lifted her head and hissed. Loiosh turned to her and his head bobbed up and down in one of the things jhereg do when they laugh.

  “What was that about?”

  “You don’t need to know, Boss.”

  “You know, Loiosh, I think I could get used to having you fly around and find out things for me while I just sit and do the thinking.”

  “Heh. In a year you’d weigh three hundred pounds.”

  “So?”

  “Hard to run from the Jhereg when you weigh three hundred pounds.”

  “Okay, good point.”

  “Boss, think this might be time to let me know what’s going on?”

  “I think it’s time to figure out what to do about it.”

  “I could help more if I knew.”

  “Yeah, but I’m enjoying keeping you in suspense too much. I’m an invalid, you must permit me my little pleasures.”

  “Boss—”

  “Okay.”

  I thought for about a minute. “We have a three-legged stool: the Count, the Guild, and the Coven. None of them trust each other, none of them like each other, none—”

  “You’re going to kick one of the legs in.”

  “Exactly.”

  “How?”

  “Still working on that.”

  “How did you know, Boss? I mean, about the stool?”

  “Well, there are bits I still need to confirm.”

  Meehayi came in with my meal. Loiosh remained quiet, as he knows how much I hate talking during meals.

  Meehayi didn’t. “I saw old Saabo was here,” he said as I laboriously used a silver spoon to bring stew from a wooden bowl—first time I think I ever experienced that combination.

  “Yes,” I told him after I’d swallowed. “We had quite a nice talk.”

  “Good.”

  “You don’t like him, do you?”

  He jumped back as if I’d slapped him. “What do you mean?” I waited him out. “I, I mean, he’s older than me, so he isn’t a friend or anything.” I kept waiting. “No,” he finally said, setting his jaw as if daring me to object. “I don’t.”

  I nodded. “I wouldn’t either if I were you.”

  He seemed startled. “Why? What did he say about me?”

  “Nothing. Your name didn’t come up.”

  “Then why—?”

  “Because you’re a peasant, and he doesn’t think much of peasants.”

  “Well it happens that I don’t think much of—” He cut himself off.

  “Don’t blame you,” I said. “But then, I can’t say too much about him myself; he’s kindred, after all.”

  Meehayi looked at me carefully. “Is he? I mean, really?”

  “He is,” I said. “He really is. And if more people had believed that—ah, never mind. Sorry. Thinking out loud.”

  He cleared his throat. “Lord Merss—”

  “Vlad.”

  “Vlad. I haven’t said it, but I’m sorry for what happened to you.”

  “Thanks. So am I. But it’ll be set right soon enough.”

  He cocked his head. “It will?”

  I nodded and took a sip of wine, pleased that I was able to lift it without difficulty. It was wonderful. “As sure as my name is Merss Vladimir,” I told him.

  He seemed to accept that, if I’m any judge of grunts.

  I said, “Is it always like that?”

  “Like what?”

  “With Saabo. The mill workers looking down on the peasants.”

  “Yeah, well, we don’t have a lot to say them, either. They stink.”

  “I noticed that you frequent different establishments.”

  “What?”

  “You drink in different places.”

  “Oh. Yeah, most of us. Except sometimes some guys will go into the wrong place to stir up a fight. It doesn’t usually happen, though. The Guild jumps on it pretty quick.”

  I nodded. “Yes, I suppose it would be bad for business.”

  I smiled to myself. Nothing new there, but confirmation of what I’d suspected was always nice.

  Meehayi finished helping me eat and left again, still looking slightly bewildered.

  After he’d gone, Loiosh said, “All right, Boss. Care to explain?”

  “I’ve got a sort of idea, but it won’t work unless all three—Count, Guild, and Coven—are in each other’s pockets, because otherwise I can’t make it work. I’d suspected, but until today I wasn’t sure.”

  “Okay, Boss. What did you find out?”

  “The tags in this area don’t have a problem with Sheep Disease.”

  “Which means?”

  “Which means there is a business arrangement between the Guild and the Coven. Mutual benefit, mutual dependence.”

  “Oh. What
is Sheep Disease?”

  “You don’t want to know. You’re a jhereg; you’re immune. Be happy.”

  “But—okay.”

  I tried to sit up; failed. I still didn’t know how to knock out that one leg of the stool. Loiosh was silent as I went over what I knew yet again, and got nowhere.

  Who should I go after? Dahni? His role in this, it turns out, had been one of the easier ones to figure out. But no, he was done. I couldn’t use him. Probably no one could use him. If he was lucky, he’d have made his way out of the country by now. Orbahn? No, he was too smart; he’d put it together.

  I tried to sit up again, and failed again; sat back sweating and breathing heavily. I scowled.

  “Take it easy, Boss. You’ll give the physicker heart failure.”

  “Thanks, Loiosh.”

  “For what?”

  I didn’t answer for a while. I just sat there and smiled while my brain went click, click, click—just like it had before, just like in the old days. Yes. They may have broken my body, but my brain still worked. If you think that isn’t important to someone in my condition, your brain doesn’t work.

  I nodded to myself. Loiosh said, “Does it have to be now?”

  “What?”

  “I understand you want to settle things, Boss, but is there any reason you can’t come back in a year and do it?”

  “Funny you should say that. If you’d asked a few minutes ago, I’d have said forget it—just like I’m saying today—but a few minutes ago I wouldn’t have been able to give you a good reason.”

  “Oh, I see. Okay, Boss. What’s the great reason?”

  “Now there’s no need. I can settle things right now. Today.”

  “You can kick out the leg?”

  “Yes.”

  “And be sure the right one wins?”

  “There is no right one, only a wrong one.”

  “Who’s the wrong one?”

  “The Coven.”

  “All right. But how are you going to set this off from flat on your back?”

  “I’m not. Meehayi is.”

  “I can’t wait to see how that works out.”

  “I can’t wait to be done with this, and out of this town.”

  “That’s the first thing you’ve said that I’ve agreed with in more than a week.”