Stammer had stayed with him, though. Throughout it all she had remained loyal and true. He had married her, giving her his only remaining thing of value—Sharbeth’s brooch—as a betrothal gift.
“Why did you stay in Manfort, if you could find no work here?” Arlian asked.
“Where else would I go?” Cover replied.
Arlian had seen enough of the world that he could easily have listed a dozen places, but he did not bother. “Go on,” he said.
That was really all there was to it. Cover and Stammer had survived as best they could, finding whatever work was available. They had had a daughter, their only child, who had died of a fever when she was three.
And then Cover had begun to sicken, and the last of their money had run out.
The last Cover had heard of Shamble had been four years ago; Shamble had continued to work for Lord Dragon or his wealthy friends, doing whatever unpleasant tasks might need doing.
Stonehand had joined the Duke’s personal guard some six years past, and for all Cover knew was still there.
Tooth had disappeared long ago; there had been rumors about involvement with a sorcerer.
Dagger had killed a well-connected man two years after the destruction of Obsidian, and had fled from Manfort; Cover had heard nothing of her since.
And Hide … Hide had saved up proceeds from his work for Lord Dragon, and had opened a fashionable little shop in the Upper City, dealing in baubles and curiosities. Cover and Stammer had never spent much time in the Upper City, and ragged and ill-fed as they were they had not dared venture there in years, but Cover believed the shop was still there.
“And Lord Dragon?” Arlian asked.
“You want his real name,” Cover whispered. “I don’t know it.”
“Do you know where I can find him?”
Cover shook his head, which triggered a coughing fit; when he had recovered and taken his hand from his mouth Arlian saw bright blood smeared across the fingers.
“No,” Cover said. “I only knew of him through Hide. I know he goes by several names, and that he’s important, very rich—he has the Duke’s ear, I think, and knows something of sorcery. It’s said he’s a master in one of the secret societies—maybe there really is a Dragon Society. I meant it as just a turn of phrase, to describe those around him, but perhaps it’s the truth.”
Arlian frowned. He had known, from his stop in Westguard, that Lord Dragon had more than casual contact with the Duke of Manfort; this confirmed it. As for the rest …
“Secret societies?”
Cover waved a hand helplessly. “Rumors. There are said to be secret societies throughout the Lands of Man but most particularly here in Manfort. Societies of lords, societies of sorcerers…” He began coughing again.
“A society of whores,” Arlian muttered under his breath. He suddenly understood that the name of the House of Carnal Society might be a joke of sorts, a cruel parody of these supposed secret societies. “And in which society did Lord Dragon claim membership?”
Cover, still coughing, shook his head helplessly.
He didn’t know. All he could provide was rumors; Arlian saw that now. “I will pay for Stonehand and Hide,” he said. “Two ducats. The others—we’ll see.”
Cover managed to speak again through a foam of bloody spittle. “Thank you,” he said. “Forgive me.”
“Perhaps in time I will,” Arlian said. “For now I will merely withhold judgment.”
He turned and climbed carefully down the ladder.
At the bottom he tucked his hat under one arm as he opened his purse and drew out two ducats, which he handed to Stammer.
“You earned the first that I gave you before,” he said. “Your husband earned these others.”
She stammered, and he held up his hand.
“Go to him,” Arlian said. “He’s very ill; I don’t think he has much longer.”
She gasped, and hurried to the ladder.
Arlian did not watch her climb; instead he beckoned to Black, and the two men started down the stairs.
“He’s dying?” Black asked as they descended. He walked a pace behind, holding the lantern high; the stairwell had no other light.
“He’s coughing up blood,” Arlian said. “I never saw a man do that for long and live. Oh, a few drops from a scratched throat, perhaps, but this blood was bright and red…” He shook his head.
“I take it you feel no need to hasten his end, under the circumstances.”
“None whatsoever,” Arlian agreed.
They had reached the third floor landing; they wheeled onto the next flight down, and continued in silence. They had just started down from the second floor to the first when Black spoke again.
“I take it you feel no need to make any attempts at healing him, either.”
Arlian did not answer immediately; in fact, they were on the front stoop, just a step from the street, when he replied.
“I thought about it,” he said, clapping his hat on his head and tugging his collar up to keep out the drizzling rain. “I’m still thinking about it.”
Black grimaced. “And if you did heal him, would you then slay him?”
“No,” Arlian said immediately. “I’m not so vindictive as that. He robbed the dead of my village, but he’s been punished for it ever since, by his own conscience, and he has not otherwise wronged me—nor anyone, to my knowledge.” He stepped out into the street and turned toward the Upper City.
“Ah—he’s repented?”
“Maybe. He may know what’s in his heart; I don’t.”
Black looked at the younger man’s face. “And do you know what’s in yours, my lord? You seem troubled—isn’t it an easing of your burden to know that you’ve found this man, and he has suffered for the wrongs he committed? While you toiled away in the mine and drove your wagon across the Desolation and fought through the Dreaming Mountains to Arithei, he was not making merry with his ill-gotten gains, but was instead suffering as well. And now, when you are free and rich and able to do as you please, he lies dying on a heap of rags in a Manfort attic. This would seem to me to be a fine display of justice, of Fate working out matters as we would choose, rather than in the perverse and unfair fashion it so often prefers.”
“I suppose,” Arlian agreed unhappily, as they ambled up the sloping street toward the Old Palace. A scavenging dog hurried out of their way, unnoticed.
“Then why do I see you with a face more suited to a merchant assessing losses than one counting profits?”
Arlian stopped walking and turned to look at his companion.
“I don’t know,” he said. “Perhaps I am assessing losses.”
“Is revenge so sweet, then, that you regret the missed opportunity?”
“No,” Arlian said, resuming his pace. “No, that’s not it. I am thinking, rather, of Stammer’s loss—she had no part in any wrongdoing that I know of.”
“And she’s free to leave Cover, should she choose to,” Black pointed out.
“But she loves him. I’m almost tempted to try to help him, just for her sake—but I swore vengeance…”
“A family is a risk, my lord; we all suffer when those we love suffer, whether through their own fault or not, and the entanglements of concern and affection weave everywhere. There’s no scheme of justice in all the world so complex that it might untangle all the strands that bind the innocent to the guilty, the wronged to the blessed.”
“There should be,” Arlian said.
“But there isn’t—unless Fate and the gods are subtler than we know. I’ve learned to live with that; you should, too.”
Arlian shook his head. “It’s all so complicated,” he said. “I could show mercy, have the Aritheians look at Cover—perhaps they could heal him, or perhaps not. But what would come of it?”
Black shrugged. “We never know what’s to come, my lord; we can only make our best guess.”
“And that’s often wrong. When I saved Bloody Hand’s life, it brought me hatred—and
my freedom. I still haven’t decided whether I was right or wrong, or whether he was right or wrong.” He sighed. “I had thought my vengeance would be simpler. Looting Obsidian in the dragons’ wake was an evil thing—I don’t think any could question that. Selling me as a slave, rather than letting me make my own way as best I could, was wrong. I had thought that the people who did those things, when I found them, would be evil, that by killing them I would be ridding the world of a continuing threat to the well-being of innocents—and instead I find Cover a sick, harmless beggar who seems to have hurt no one in years, who is clearly loved by his wife. What if the others are the same?”
“What if they are?” Black responded. “Does that wipe out the wrongs they did?”
“I don’t know,” Arlian said quietly.
“Ah,” Black said. For half a dozen paces neither man spoke; then Black suggested, “Perhaps, if you’re still determined upon your vengeance, you should concentrate on those six lords, then. The mutilation of sixteen young women, and the murder of four, is surely harder to forgive than a mere looting and enslavement.”
“Five women murdered, not four,” Arlian said. “Lord Dragon slew Madam Ril with his own hand.”
“Ah, indeed, five it is—though she was herself a party to crimes against the others, was she not?”
“Yes,” Arlian said. “And if I had killed her, for those crimes … but Lord Dragon cut her throat for failing him, not for abusing her charges.” He bit his lower lip. “She would be just as dead in either case; does it really matter who killed her, or why?”
“Not to me,” Black said. “You are, of course, free to form your own opinion, but I say that dead is dead. And whether she deserved to die or not, there were still the other four.”
“It’s so very tangled,” Arlian muttered.
“Indeed,” Black agreed. “Life generally is.”
They walked the rest of the way in silence, Arlian’s shoulders hunched against the rain.
31
Lord Obsidian’s Debut
Arlian made no attempt to locate Hide or Stonehand over the course of the next few days; instead he threw himself into the preparations for the feast and dance that he was to host, as Lord Obsidian, to celebrate his arrival in Manfort.
He put some effort into his own appearance, even considering asking his Aritheian employees to throw a glamour on him, though in the end he settled for the more natural methods he had learned during his stay in Westguard.
He did, however, teach the Aritheians an elaborate code of signals that he would use, should he have any need of their services during the gala. He taught Black the same cues.
“Do you think,” Black asked, after a final review, “that perhaps you’ve taken rather too much upon yourself?”
Arlian frowned. “How do you mean that?”
“I mean that you are one man—a strong and clever man, with the heart of the dragon, but a single man—yet you’re determined to take on at least seven enemies.”
“I’m not alone,” Arlian protested. “I have you, and Thirif and Qulu and Shibiel and Isein.”
“And the lords will undoubtedly have their own hirelings and allies.”
Arlian shrugged. “The six lords and Ambassador Sahasin and the looters and the mine’s overseers may or may not be too much for me; we’ll see. But they’re just the start.”
“You speak of the dragons.”
Arlian nodded. “The world is not safe for anyone so long as those monsters still live.”
“You stand no chance against any dragon, Arlian,” Black said resignedly. He had told Arlian this before, many times. “No man has ever slain a dragon. It’s not even known whether they can die.”
“I know,” Arlian said. “So I’ll probably die horribly in some cave somewhere.” He waved it aside. “We all die sometime, and if no one ever tries, we’ll never know whether there is a way to kill dragons.”
“You’re mad, you realize.”
Arlian grimaced. “Quite possibly. Seeing one’s family slaughtered, spending much of one’s life as a mine slave, crossing the Dreaming Mountains, drinking human blood and dragon venom—I’d suppose that to be enough to drive a man mad.”
“You didn’t see them killed, save your grandfather,” Black corrected.
Arlian smiled wryly. “Literalist. It was close enough.” He clapped Black on the shoulder. “Come on, let’s get on with it—I want this party to be perfect.”
The first coach arrived at midday. A handful of early arrivals, people who had come on foot but who had been milling about the gates, reluctant to be first to enter, took this as their cue.
Black greeted the arrivals at the great front door, ushering them through the entry hall into a long mirrored gallery some hundred feet long and two stories in height. The servants were waiting with wine and sweetmeats amid a vast display of fine tapestries, elaborate drapery, and artful arrangements of flowers. Perfume had been added to the water in the vases, to enhance the flowers’ own scents, and a lutenist played unobtrusively on a central balcony.
Arlian stood out of sight behind the draperies of another balcony, listening to his guests; he intended to withhold his grand entrance for some time yet. From this post he caught only snatches of conversation, but he found them informative.
“… place cleaned up nicely…”
“… finally have a chance to meet the mysterious…”
“… from the south somewhere. I understand his people have been selling…”
“… probably hasn’t been in here since his father…”
“Eccentric, definitely. I wonder how long he’ll last in Manfort?”
“Dead or fleeing in a month, I would…”
“I don’t remember that picture on the ceiling—was it there before?”
“I would assume, from the name, that he’s dark…”
“You know your mother would never…”
Arlian noted that at least some of his guests had been in the Old Palace before—that was hardly surprising. Speculation about their host was also to be expected. He had hoped for more gossip about the other guests, and remained in place, listening. Perhaps when they had had a bit more time to exhaust the most obvious subjects he would hear more.
He knew more coaches were arriving; the crowd below was growing steadily.
Then there was a stir, and normal conversation died away in a rush of whispering. Arlian risked leaning out for a quick glimpse.
A white-haired man attired in a fine blue coat and white shirt was entering, attended by half a dozen guards in white livery. The crowd backed away, making room for this new arrival.
From the response and the whispers he caught, Arlian realized that this was the Duke of Manfort himself—the hereditary warlord, the only lord whose position bore no relationship to his wealth or business, the person nominally in charge only of the city’s defenses but in practice the closest thing to a ruler the Lands of Man possessed.
The Duke waved to the other guests and looked around.
“And where is our host?” he asked.
Arlian backed away from the draperies, tugged his sleeves straight, then turned and hurried for the stairs. He had not expected the Duke to appear—certainly not so early! It would be very bad form to keep the warlord waiting any longer than absolutely necessary.
On the way across the landing he signaled to a waiting servant, and as he descended the stairs he signed to Isein, the Aritheian woman who was waiting near the bottom. Both hurried away to prepare his entrance.
A moment later Arlian stood ready at the corner just beyond the end of the long gallery. The lutenist ended his piece with a flourish, and four trumpeters stepped out on the other balconies and began a brief fanfare.
The skin at the back of Arlian’s neck tingled, and he knew the Aritheians were invoking the spells he had asked them to ready. He stepped forward, striding into the gallery.
Sure enough, images of brightly colored birds were dancing in great swirling patterns overhead;
Arlian had seen such birds in the Dreaming Mountains and knew the species really existed, but to anyone who had never ventured south of the Desolation he guessed they would appear the exotic creation of fevered dreams, with their vivid green and red and yellow feathers and their long, curling tails.
Tiny lights, like fireflies, flickered from nowhere in the air above the heads of his guests. The scent of roses filled the hall. The fanfare ended in an arpeggio of crystalline tones that Arlian was quite sure never came from any mere piece of brass.
And then the birds and lights froze, the music stopped, and silence fell. Arlian paused in the archway entrance to the gallery, raised his hands, and bowed elaborately. “My friends, new and old,” he called, “I am Lord Obsidian. Welcome to my home!”
Someone laughed nervously, and somewhere the delicate clap of a woman’s hands sounded. Speech returned in a rush amid scattered applause, and men and women in multicolored finery pressed forward to meet their host. The lutenist strummed a chord and began a new air.
Arlian accepted a woman’s hand and kissed her fingers, then said, “Your pardon, my lady, but I believe I must attend another.” He gestured.
The crowd’s eyes followed his wave and saw the Duke of Manfort approaching at a brisk pace, three guards on either side; the throng parted swiftly for him. Overhead the “fireflies” faded away and the bight birds vanished.
“Lord Obsidian!” the Duke called, as he approached. “A pleasure to meet you at last!”
Arlian bowed. “The pleasure is all mine, Your Grace.”
The Duke let out a bark of laughter. “I’m sure! Well, let us enjoy ourselves, then—tell me about yourself.” He held out a hand for Arlian to clasp. “Where did you get the disappearing birds?”
Arlian took the Duke’s hand and looked at him.
He had had a wild notion that perhaps the Duke of Manfort himself was Lord Dragon, but any such thought was plainly absurd. This man was shorter than Lord Dragon—shorter than Arlian himself—with short-cut white hair and a square, smooth face paler than Lord Dragon’s could ever be. His cheek was unscarred, and his watery blue eyes nothing like Lord Dragon’s dark ones. His hand was soft and damp, his smile broad and slightly foolish.
Dragon Weather Page 28