"Presumably he also restored the ear you lost to a broken bottle in yet another tavern brawl?" "Er, yes."
"Inspector Danolarian Scryverin of the Wayfarer Constables, you know that you are not Danolarian Scryverin, I know that you are not Danolarian Scryverin, and you know that I know that you are not Danolarian Scryverin. I also know that you know that I could be very indiscreet about what I know about you, and that you would prefer that nobody else should know what I know about you."
"Very knowledgeable of you, Your Majesty."
"Did you kill Danolarian Scryverin?"
"No."
"Then what?"
"It was in Diomeda, when the Toreans invaded. They turned on free beer and wine in the city for an entire night, to get the locals sympathetic to them. The next morning I found Danol's body on the banks of the Leir River. More people died of the drink that night than died in the fighting for Diomeda. I looted his papers. It was easy to change identities in the confusion."
"Who were you before that?"
"A humble Torean refugee," I said as respectfully as I could, and I heard her laugh softly.
"The only Toreans in Diomeda were sailors and marines who were with the invasion fleet. Four years ago. That would make you rather young then."
"Nineteen."
"Really? Sailor or marine?" "Deckhand."
"Interesting. An educated youth would have been made a cabin boy, a shipmaster's clerk, or a navigator's apprentice. To enlist as a deckhand implies that you wished to conceal your excellent education. Perhaps a pregnant girl somewhere back on Torea? Or perhaps a pregnant sister, and her dead lover's blood on your knife?"
"It was a matter of honor," I said vaguely.
"I thought as much."
My eyes were beginning to clear, and I could see the blue
tracery of a tether casting wrapped tightly around me. I could also see a darkly dressed figure kneeling nearby, wearing a pack and snowmask. Two spires of pale light were growing out of the palms of her hands, and they were already about ten feet in height. As they grew, they faded. From my general reading, I knew this to be the etherwings casting. An experienced sorcerer can cast a spike of energies, split it, and mold it into two mighty wings that weigh nothing at all. A sorcerer so powerful that even the minor gods are nervous about offending can grow a double spike. I knew that the empress was not to be trifled with, but had not suspected her powers to be in this sort of league. The casting did seem to be a strain on her, however, because she was breathing heavily.
"Your eyes must be recovering by now, Danolarian. Can you see that I have ... lost a great deal of weight?"
"I'll be sure not to tell anyone, Your Majesty," I replied at once.
"You had damn well better tell them! I worked hard to lose those one hundred and thirty pounds, and I want everyone to know it. Three years as empress! My word was law. Orgies ... almost daily. My pick of the most delightful... expensive and exotic foods. Several dozen lovers ... or was it several hundred? When I fled ... had to be shipped out... in a firewood wagon. Quite humiliating."
It seemed to me that the spikes of faint, shimmering light were about a hundred feet high when she spoke some words of power that caused them to separate. As the two spikes folded outward they grew broader, flattening into intricately patterned, delicate structures, like dragonfly wings. Occasional gusts of wind pummeled them about.
"That is the hardest part of the casting done," Empress Wensomer panted with relief. "I shall soon be gone. Your tether casting will collapse around dawn."
"But why flee, Your Majesty? Your rule was wise, there was peace and prosperity. Nobody else could have so cunningly conducted the Inquisition against sorcerers while sending the Secret Inquisition Constables out to rescue them. What shall I say to my master?"
"What indeed?" she panted, now fashioning harness castings and control tendrils for the enormous wings. They
glowed very faintly, like a tapestry of spiderwebs, and they probably weighed even less. "Excess began to make me ... very sick. I was confined to my bed
... without company. Had time to think. Dangerous pastime, thinking. Do you know ... why magic is like too many really wild orgies?"
"Why— What? I, er, no," I confessed. "I have no magical talent, and I've not ever been to an orgy."
"Both are bad for you in the long run," she explained, her breathing now becoming easier. "Vices should be enjoyed sparingly, and with a guilty conscience. Magic is like that, too. Before the Inquisition we had magical academies churning out an entire sorcerer class! There were whole industries based on magic. Then our sorcerers were stupid enough to link together, and create vast ether machines. They wiped out entire cities and temples with Dragonwall."
"But it was destroyed."
"Hah. Pure luck. The monarchs are right to ban all magic and sorcery. Giant ether machines have destroyed one continent, two islands, and several dozen cities, temples, towns, and castles in just under five years. At that rate the entire world will be merely a thick layer of char and melted rock within a century. When I became empress I banned sorcery in public while supporting in secret. Soon it was thriving as never before, and I discovered that I had organized a mighty and effective secret government. I had also begun to resemble my father. He was not a nice man. I imagined him as the emperor of all Scalticar. I compared him to myself. The resemblance was disturbing in the extreme. I had become empress by accident, but I was about the most dangerous person who could have blundered her way onto the throne." I lay thinking for some moments, shocked beyond bearing. Far from sorcery being a dying and persecuted art, it was a conspiracy to rule the continent.
"This is like a nobleman ordering the slaughter of some village of his own people, so that he can have an atrocity to blame on an enemy," I said forlornly. i
"Bright lad. I disbanded the Secret Inquisition Constables, I put several thoroughly nasty little bastards in places where they had access to dangerous amounts of power and secret information, I destroyed the sorceric government by a series of carefully staged betrayals, and then I vanished." I had been a founding member of the first squad of Secret Inquisition Constables, so I well remembered the incomprehension in our ranks when we were disbanded. Some of us had become very sympathetic to the sorcerers, so we had voluntarily continued with the secret rescues.
The empress began to insert her arms into the harness built into the fantastic wings. The wings trembled and wobbled slightly with every puff of turbulence, even though we were in the lee of the palace and sheltered from the western wind. She stood up, very slowly and carefully. In spite of her heavy clothing, I could see that she was now fit, lean, and strong. My master had warned me that she had the willpower to transform herself from being helplessly overweight to fit enough to join the Special Warrior Service. With three months of manic exercise and dieting, she had done it.
"I am no longer a monarch, Inspector Danol, so tell your master that I've abdicated. And do not cause trouble for these kind Alpindrak folk by telling people that they sheltered me. Last of all, do not try to follow me, or I shall get very, very angry. A pleasure to do blackmail with you, but it is time to go— and don't think about letting the pure and virtuous Constable Riellen, the heartbroken and alcoholic Roval, or the fat and furry Wallas betray me in your stead. I shall hurt anyone who comers me."
"Ladyship, I will be ordered to go after you again."
'Then you will have to face me when I am very, very angry. Pity, you strike me as rather cute. I tell you what, as my last act as empress I order you to stop following me. Oh, and one more thing."
"Yes?"
"I loved it when you played the sun down with 'Evening's All for Courting.' It set me shivering with delight. I might... I might even wish to meet you again, Inspector, under nicer circumstances. Half sister Lavenci might be stupid enough to spurn you, but I am not. Take that as a compliment, but for now, goodbye. It's been a real challenge eluding you."
Without another word Wensomer took a short
run at the railing, jumped up, pushed off over the chasm with one foot, and went sailing out into the darkness. After only a moment I could
see her no more, for Miral and the three moonworlds were all down, and the stars gave very little light by comparison.
Wensomer's tether casting bound me tightly for the rest of the night, so I had a lot of time to think. I thought mainly about Kavelen Lavenci, half sister of the empress. After my colleagues and I had rescued her from the Inquisition Constables, we had gone to a tavern, and there we had danced for a time before I had walked her home. We had kissed at the door, and agreed to meet again. I remember four afternoons spent at Riverfront Market, wandering among the stalls and holding hands. On our last evening together we had shared a groundnut roll for dinner, watching the sun set behind the Ridgeback Mountains; then we had kissed, pressing greasy lips together in the deepening shadows. I had fondled her left breast, and had had my hand slapped for my trouble. I had felt rather foolish and chastened as we walked slowly to the doorway behind which was her home. She had not kissed me goodnight. The next day had seen Constable Riellen released from three weeks in the public stocks for incitement to riot, Constable Roval released from two weeks in the stocks for being drunk on duty, and myself promoted from lieutenant inspector to inspector first class and awarded a field magistrate commission. A three-month tour of duty, with secret orders to seek out the empress, was assigned to me, along with instructions to leave Alberin that day, before Riellen found another crowd to address, or Roval got anywhere near a tavern. I had sent many letters to Lavenci since then, but no replies had arrived at the regional Wayfarer offices that I nominated in my letters.
The annual climb of Alpindrak for the collection of observation sketches had also been assigned to me as a means to search out Wensomer. Lavenci, sister of the empress. The thought conjured a feeling like acid in the pit of my stomach. Lavenci, a kavelen and an academician, as well as a sorceress. She had told me none of that, nor had she discussed allowing the most extreme of intimacies with students and tutors. Then she had slapped my hand when it had merely wandered to her
breast. Why was I so very repulsive? I gazed over the edge of the wall, contemplating the long, long drop to jagged rocks and realizing why suicide can hold such an allure for some lovers.
I was watching the sun rise over the Drakenridge Mountains when the casting finally collapsed and released me. I was numb, stiff and cold, and dismayed to see that clouds were gathering, foreshadowing bad weather. Worst of all, I was wretched to the very core of my soul about what Wensomer had told me. In addition to all that, I was also slightly depressed for failing my master. I had been ordered to find the empress and bring her back. The idea that she had fled deliberately had never entered anyone's thoughts. The concept of sorcerers persecuting sorcerers in the cause of wiping out sorcery so that sorcerers could rule all Scalticar was so confusing that I was still not entirely sure if I had the story right.
The castings on Riellen's door had collapsed while she was still asleep. I entered and woke her.
"Apologies for being so tired, sir, my lungs are not adequate for the thin air," she said sleepily.
"No problem, Constable, in fact you are authorized to sleep in this morning." I took out a silver florin, put half a dozen scratches across the likeness of Empress Wensomer with my knife, then dropped it into her hand.
"Sir, you have defaced a coin of the realm," she said uncertainly.
"I found the empress and spoke with her. She is no longer empress. That is a one-florin bonus for you, because I feel like doing something to celebrate. Now go back to sleep, we'll be going home later today." Wallas had been hidden in the one place I would never have thought to search: my own room. He was on my bed, tied in a sack.
"Cunning bitch was too fast for me!" snapped Wallas as I released him. No creature other than a cat can put quite so much venom into the word
"bitch." He sat on my bed and began to groom himself.
"Brilliant woman," I sighed as I sat on the bec| beside him. "Well, she's gone now."
"As in flown away?"
"Yes, and—hold a moment! How did you know she could fly?"
"I am a cat with a past. She fancied me when I was a man." "Just shows, one does not have to be stupid to be tasteless." "Hah! Pure jealously—and where's my jar of Senderialvin Royal 3140?"
"Well, I suppose you've earned it," I began as I reached into the pocket of my leather trail coat.
I drew out the corked neck of the shattered jan which must have broken when I threw myself down on the balcony after being blinded by the empress. Wallas stared in wide-eyed horror for a moment, then fell sideways on the bed in a dead faint.
Now I went next door and woke Roval, who swung his legs over the edge of the bed and rubbed his face. I sat down on the bed beside him, handed him my half-gill measure, and produced my little jar of rum.
"I am violating my orders concerning you, Constable Roval, but I am in need of someone to drink with just now," I said as I removed the cork. "Will you swallow a half gill with me?"
"Mission failed, sir?" he asked, looking genuinely concerned.
"The mission failed, it is true, but at least I managed to speak with the empress this time."
"Then you are celebrating?" he asked, brightening slightly.
"No. She let slip some words about another woman ... my truelove."
"Lavenci?"
"Aye. The wench has a grubby past and a grubbier present," I concluded miserably.
"I wager she has shared her charms with another since you have been gone," said Roval, shaking his head knowingly.
"Worse, much worse."
"May your revenge be sweet and artful, sir."
"I'd not hurt her," I sighed. "A cat cannot help being a cat after all. No, I shall merely tell her what I have discovered about her. Then I'll say I promised Mother on her deathbed that I'd never consort with naughty girls."
"Did you, young sir?"
"Actually Mother is probably still alive."
"Probably, sir? Do you not care?"
"Of course I care. If she is indeed alive, I shall have to keep avoiding her."
>: >;
We chatted of this and that for the next two hours, until called to the astronomers' 6:30 a.m. dinner—which I chose to call breakfast. After that, I was given a tour of the palace by one of the technical artisans, but he spent more time talking excitedly about the enormous explosion on Lupan than relating the history of the palace. We had what I called lunch with the astronomer general, who was about to go to bed, and after this were formally presented with a satchel of notes and observations for the academy in Alberin. We spent most of the afternoon descending the five thousand stone steps to the gate station. This was made particularly depressing by Wallas complaining about the broken jar of Senderialvin Royal at nearly every step. At the base of the steps I got out my bagpipes and played the sun down again, this time for the guards at the observatory's gate station. The sun had been behind an overcast at the time, but they appreciated the gesture. They then invited us to share whatever the meal is that observatory guards have when the sun goes down, and we spent the night in their bunkroom. Riellen managed to get the guards into a conversation about liberation economics, but within ten minutes both had fallen asleep. Wallas made the mistake of reminding me that I had broken ajar of Senderialvin Royal 3140, which caused me to seize him firmly by the scruff of the neck, stuff him into a sack, and leave him hanging up for the night in the pantry. Roval stole a large jar of cheap wine from the guards and drank himself into oblivion. I dropped the empty jar into the chasm. By then I had been awake for two days and one night, so I slept like a dead man.
At dawn the following morning we had saddled and loaded our horses, and the dragon bridge was being wound out over the chasm when the exhausted astronomer general himself arrived at the gate station. He had descended the five thousand steps from the palace in the darkness to present us with one final dispatch.
'There was another flash on Lupan last night," he panted as he broke his seal on the satchel and inserted the latest observation folder. "It was at precisely the same place as the night before, but fifteen minutes later by the clock. This is very, very significant."
"Why is that, sir?" I asked.
"The Lupanian day is precisely fifteen minutes longer than ours. Both flashes happened at precisely the sarrie local time on Lupan. That could only be due to intelligent beings doing something timed by an accurate clock." We crossed the bridge and set off down the trail, and I contemplated the fact that I was carrying proof of intelligence on Lupan! I had history in my saddlebags! Inevitably, my thoughts strayed back to Lavenci. I dropped back a little to walk with Roval.
"Constable, could I speak with you for a Moment?" I ventured.
"I apologize about the wine, sir," he replied listlessly. "I mean privately, as a friend."
"A friend?" he asked, as if surprised to learn that he had one. "Aye."
"Were a girl to sport with scabby knaves in the most supremely indelicate way, yet give an honorable admirer nothing but chaste kisses and elevated conversation about poetry, what might that very confused youth draw by way of conclusion?"
"He must know she is playing games of power," he said sadly, looking me in the eyes for a rare and fleeting moment before shaking his head and returning his gaze to the trail. "She means to elevate him to within a step of the summit of all hopes, then cast him down by showing how even some muck-shoveling churl is higher in her esteem. It happened to me once. Such a woman brought me low."
"But why?" I asked, aghast.
"For the pleasure of seeing a strong man crushed. For the feeling of power." His words left me with much to think about, and none of
my thoughts were happy. That evening I lit a fire with the reedpaper pages of a letter that I had been writing to Lavenci, then stared up at Lupan for a long, long time, wondering if lovers on that world also did such cruel things to each other.
Chapter Three
THE FALLING STAR
We managed the fourteen-day journey to the pigeon roost at Bolanton in ten days. There I sent the special news ahead to Alberin by carrier bird, as the astronomer general had instructed me to. After that we were low enough for the horses to carry us again, and five days later we reached the bottom of the Cyrelon Rapids. From here the Alber River was navigable all the way to the sea, so we boarded a barge for the two hundred mile voyage to Alberin. For five days I did very little, other than rub medicinal oil into my feet, sew up damage to my uniform, polish my axe, read a book of Sargolan erotic poetry from the twenty-eighth century, talk with Wallas about royal scandals—to distract him from talking about Senderialvin Royal 3140—and sleep. On what turned out to be the last day of our voyage, Roval somehow managed to get his hands on a jar of fortified wine belonging to one of the crew, liberated the contents, and retreated from his memories into drunken oblivion. Riellen practiced her public speaking almost continually, which was mildly annoying, but inevitable.
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