by Dave Gross
"There was a time, of course, when you could have silenced me with a look. What a scary bastard you were, even before you killed me. Ah, my material days. Still, there are advantages to this ethereal existence. That time you dossed down near the festhall, I had just enough room to slip through the wall and peek in at the new talent."
Radu lowered his head but kept his eyes focused on a spot very close to the point from which Chaney perceived the world. Chaney smiled, imagining the assassin's whitening lips, then remembering that Radu no longer had much in the way of lips. That thought made him smile even more.
"If I still had a life to lose, I might think twice before crossing the dread Radu Malveen, prickly, conceited, criminally insane killer from a House of raving no-doubt-on-account-of-profound-venereal-disease lunatics greatest swordsman in Selgaunt. Oh, and pathetic cripple. Mustn't forget the profound and unmanly injuries."
The quick snap of his cloak was the only warning that Malveen had moved. Before an eye could capture the blur that was his single liquid motion, he completed his lunge, extending his slender blade through empty air. While he saw nothing there, something caught his eye from below.
Radu looked down into the sewer water and saw the reflection of his blade passing through the specter of Chaney Foxmantle.
The ghost was almost as slender as Radu, but he was less than half past five feet tall. His fair hair was colorless in death, but some faint blue spark danced in his eyes. Maybe it was the last ember of hope. Maybe it was malice.
Chaney whistled. He looked down at the blade and measured its distance from the place his heart had been.
"Even though I assumed you couldn't hurt me, Seven Sisters and Hopping Ilmater, that was exciting! Good to know for sure, though, don't you think?"
"Foxmantle," warned Malveen, "your insipid rem-"
Radu's eyes darted, seeking something moving out of synchronicity with the ripples of the dark water. He crouched low to view the reflecting water at a sharper angle, watching Chaney's ghost.
There, seven dark figures stood silently in the water, the foul vapors of the sewage mingling with their own indefinite forms. Two looked like street toughs, one a bony old crone, one a dwarf with hairy shoulders, the others middle-aged noblemen of no remarkable features. Their exposed hands were the color of oysters, as were the points of their chins. They hung their heads so low that their damp black hair covered the rest of their faces.
"Who are they?" whispered Radu.
"It certainly took you long enough to notice them. Don't you ever look in a mirror?" Chaney paused for dramatic affect. "What am I saying, of course you don't look in-"
"Who are they?" Radu's voice was full of razors.
"Don't you recognize them?"
Radu's narrowing eyes showed that he did. "They don't look the same as you."
"No, but they died after your rather ignoble defeat, didn't they?"
Radu stared at the shades a moment longer, then he raised his head as if in understanding. He sheathed his sword and strode briskly away.
Chaney chuckled as he watched the man retreat, then gulped as he felt the invisible bonds that kept him within thirty paces of his killer drag him along in his wake.
Radu came to an intersection where three brown streams converged into the wider flow he'd been following. Chaney peered around the corner and saw the amber light of a pair of lanterns twenty feet down one of the passages.
Radu moved silently to the edge of the light.
A well-fed nobleman stood between the lanterns. His velvet gown was heavy with gold thread and tiny jewels, except where sewer mud covered his back and left sleeve. Behind him was a wooden ladder, its second rung freshly broken.
Chaney recognized the fat man as Thuribal Baerodreemer. A generation ago, the Baerodreemers had been among the coalition that brought down House Uskevren, the most powerful of House Foxmantle's allies and the family of Chaney's best friend. Chaney had little use for a Baerodreemer and hoped the man did something to irritate Radu. That could prove entertaining.
"Ah!" Thuribal clutched at his chest as he suddenly noticed Radu's arrival. "You come upon our appointment most stealthily, sir!"
Radu said nothing.
"That is… I mean, naturally you would move with the utmost discretion, a man like you, after all…"
"Boo!" said Chaney. "Come now, Radu. Give the jellyfish a bit of a spook, will you? Humor me, and I'll let you sleep an hour or two tonight."
"It is d-done, then?" said Thuribal. He couldn't hear the ghost's words.
Radu inclined his head slightly.
"Of course it is, of course, of course!"
Thuribal's face was beaded with sweat. He fumbled at his purse and produced a small velvet pouch, which he held out at arm's length. Immediately realizing the rudeness of the gesture, he withdrew it an inch or two for courtesy.
Radu placed his petrified right hand beneath the pouch. Carefully, Thuribal placed it between Radu's curled fingers.
"I assure you, they are of the finest quality, as you required. In the unlikely event you find them wanting-"
"I know where to find you," whispered Radu.
"Er, ehm…"
"Not bad," said Chaney. "Still, I'd like to see him fall down again."
Radu began to withdraw into the shadows.
"Wait!" Thuribal called, stepping forward and slipping in the muck. Chaney almost got his wish. "I, ah, took the liberty of bringing you a new client."
"What?" hissed Radu.
"I know, I know," Thuribal said, hastily waving down Radu's objection in a futile effort to regain his own nerve, "but this is a most special customer, one I am sure you will be glad I brought." He glanced upward and called, "Drakkar?"
A cloaked figured descended slowly through the sewer hole. The top of his deep blue hood was dusted with snow, as were his wide but shallow shoulders. When his feet met the floor, Chaney saw that the man stood as tall as Radu, but his cloak obscured all of his features except for a single brown hand clutching a knotty length of blood-wood. Black thorns studded the crimson surface of the staff, spiraling up from the tip to form a wicked crown of spikes at the head.
"Who's this, then?" asked Chaney.
Radu ignored the ghost's question, as usual. Chaney's gaze fixed upon the shadow beneath the newcomer's hood, and he thought briefly of pushing his own face inside to take a look.
"I thought it would be more convenient for everyone," said Thuribal. "No sense wasting time arranging for another rendezvous, yes?"
The interloper pulled back his cowl. His face was as dark as oiled oak. Fine creases around the black pearls of his eyes spoke of both mirth and cunning. He must have had at least fifty winters, but his hair was as black and wavy as that of any youth. His beard might have been drawn with a pencil, its spare geometry bracketing a strong pointed chin in the Cormyrean fashion.
Drakkar rested his staff in the crook of an elbow and produced a velvet pouch from beneath his cloak. He plucked its strings to reveal the diamonds within.
"I desire a proof," he said.
Radu drew his sword and stepped toward Thuribal.
"What are you doing?" sputtered Thuribal. "I-"
"Oh, no!" said Chaney, clutching his intangible stomach. "You just did one!"
The first thrust came from above. Chaney turned away, but he still heard the sickening clatter as the steel blade smashed Thuribal's teeth. The sword must have severed the man's tongue and jammed it down his throat, for the only sounds Chaney heard from him afterward were muted chokes.
Chaney instantly regretted his earlier wish for Thuribal's misfortune. He sat and hugged his knees.
After the crippling blow, Radu took his time killing the man, far longer than Chaney had observed in any of the man's previous murders.
When the killing blow finally came, Chaney dared to look once more at Radu. The killer had already wiped and sheathed his blade.
Drakkar glanced at what was left of Thuribal. "This is not what I had hoped
to see," he said. "I require an irreversible killing."
Radu leaned against the sewer wall. His posture seemed insouciant, but Chaney knew better. He hugged his ghostly knees all the tighter, bracing for what was to come.
The corpse of Thuribal Baerodreemer turned white as ash, clothes and all. Seconds later, it disintegrated into fine powder. Before the stuff could melt into the sewer, a silent wind swirled it up into a grotesque, friable mannequin. Chaney guessed the phantom was invisible to mortal eyes, but there had been no other witness to Radu's previous killings.
None who lived, that was.
As if reading the ghost's mind, Drakkar sketched a shape in the air and ran two fingers over each eyelid. His black pupils flashed viridian, and his eyes widened as he detected the dusty specter.
"Ah," he said in the confident tone of a man who doesn't fully understand what he sees but wishes his audience to think otherwise.
Thuribal's phantom twitched, its hands clawing at the air, head straining to turn away from its killer, mouth yawning wide as its face turned inexorably back toward Radu. Its granular form thickened and flowed, wavered one last time, then cascaded into Radu Malveen.
Radu shuddered and turned his head slowly to the side until his neck popped. With the collar hiding his mouth, the only reaction Chaney and Drakkar could see was the flicker of his black eyes. The three tiny moles beside his left eye briefly converged into one dark blot.
Chaney felt the same bone-hollowing ache that followed each of Radu's murders, and he heard the liquefying howl of the other ghosts join his own involuntary wail. Most of all, he felt the rapturous agony of life suffusing Radu's body, bolstering his unholy continuation.
The first time Chaney had felt the euphoric torment was when he died upon Radu's soul-devouring bone blade. Moments later, Radu turned the blade on his own brother rather than let him confess to their enemies. Stannis Malveen was already undead, however, a sea-rotted vampire whose infernal essence shattered the bone blade, spraying its shards into his killer's body. Since then, the voracious power resided in Radu, consuming the souls of his victims no matter what weapon he employed.
When it was over, Chaney saw an eighth spectral figure join the undead procession behind Radu. Thuribal's ghost looked up at Chaney, astonished at its fate.
"I'm sorry" Chaney said quietly.
Thuribal lowered his gaze to the shadows at his feet, unmoved by the sympathy of his fellow spirit.
"Perfect." Drakkar smiled, raising a hand to draw a glyph in the air before Radu. "Now, after I cast a few spells on you to verify-"
Radu parted his cloak to show the hilt of his sword.
"Or perhaps you prefer not," said Drakkar, lowering his hand and backing away. He made a taut smile, the practiced gesture of a man used to accepting corrections from a superior. He carefully proffered the pouch of diamonds. "Let us agree upon the time for another meeting."
When Radu inclined his head in agreement, Chaney stared at the other ghosts and sadly shook his head.
CHAPTER 4
A SOUND OF THUNDER
"Where is Lady Shamur?" demanded Erevis Cale.
A trio of chambermaids stared at him dumbly, their mouths forming fearful little moues. Cale knew his bearing could awe the staff of Stormweather Towers, and usually he was glad of it, but he had no patience for hesitation in a crisis.
"Speak, one of you!"
The eldest of the three found her voice. "She left her chambers in search of Lord Thamalon."
"Where?"
The maid shrugged, then saw the danger in the butler's eyes.
"Upstairs," she blurted. "Perhaps the solar?"
Cale dismissed the servants with a chop of his hand, and they scurried away, the tiny bells on their turbans tinkling. The sound was meant to warn when a servant approached, so one could still a conversation or pull one's trousers up, but that night Cale found the jingling more irritating than practical.
Minutes earlier, a terrific peal of thunder had shaken Stormweather Towers, and lightning momentarily blinded all of its inhabitants. Strangely, nothing was burned, and the guards stationed outside reported no unseasonable weather. They had seen flashes only from within the mansion windows.
Such a magical effect was unlikely unless an intruder had penetrated the House defenses. Cale lamented once more the death of Brom Selwyn, the house mage who'd given his life in defense of the family a year earlier. He'd advised Lord Thamalon that a replacement was imperative to House security, but even he had to agree that contracting a trustworthy spellcaster could be a long and difficult process.
If one of the Uskevren's many rivals had found a way past the wards…
Cale set aside the speculation. He was searching for the master of the house, whose own thunder he'd expected but not heard since the lightning. Once he conferred with Thamalon, he could do more than order the house guard to seal the mansion.
He passed through the front hall in two dozen long strides, then climbed the grand staircase three steps at a time.
Cale picked up the lamp always left beside the glass doors and raised the wick. He lifted his light and entered the solar.
It was a vast garden chamber filled with burlbush, honeyvine, and lady's promise, among dozens of other varieties transplanted from forests both near and remote. From pots suspended from the ceiling spilled still more flora, interrupted here and there by bright petals nurtured unseasonably beneath glass windows. Amid it all stood a great fountain, its water trickling down huge chunks of basalt sheathed in Lady's Lace moss before flowing away in a serpentine stream filled with silvery blue fish.
"Lady Shamur?" he called, knowing there would be no answer.
He silently scolded himself for following Lady Shamur rather than trying to go directly to Thamalon. Why had he done that?
He answered his own question as he picked up the lamp and stormed to the last place he'd seen the mistress of the house.
Earlier in the day, Cale had overheard Lady Shamur ordering the maids to tidy mistress Tazi's bedchamber. It was unlikely she intended a guest to inhabit her daughter's room, so Cale suspected she had reason to believe her errant daughter's return was imminent.
If so, why had Cale not already known? Apart from his many contacts among Selgaunt's thieves' guild, he might have expected a message from Tazi herself. Since the young woman had left Stormweather months earlier, Cale had received no word from her.
That silence cut him to the heart, for he had once, perhaps foolishly, believed he meant something to her.
Whatever good is in me exists because of you, he'd written to her, before adding in Elvish: Ai armiel telere maenen hir.
You hold my heart forever.
When he wrote those words, Tazi lay on the edge of death, and he'd sworn to avenge her.
In the days that followed, he forsook his hopes of leaving his past behind him and once more donned the leathers of his former profession. The killer in Cale not only fulfilled his promise to Tazi but also discovered that his future portended to bring him as much darkness as his past held.
Cale returned to Stormweather Towers as a newly awakened cleric of Mask, the Lord of Shadows. While he'd eliminated the current threat to the Uskevren, doing so had required him to delve so deeply into the machinations of the Night Knives that he knew he would never escape his bonds to the dirty underworld of the city-not while he remained in Selgaunt.
After Tazi at last recovered from her soul-shattering injuries, she'd made no acknowledgement of Cale's letter. Whether she rejected his feelings or was simply waiting for the right time to speak of them, Cale could only guess. He longed to resume their late-night conversations and the secrets they shared about their mutual avocation.
When she left the city to pursue an enemy of her own, he realized he couldn't force her to accept his help, even if he wasn't already sworn to serve her father. He could only abide and hope that one day she would speak to him. Cale realized that day might never come. He'd had his chance to ask her about her
feelings, and without taking it he watched her leave Stormweather Towers.
The most he could hope for was word from her mother that Tazi had finally returned home. If so, then he would soon have the chance to ask his questions-if he dared.
Another flash of light seared Cale's vision, and he felt the floor rumble beneath his feet. He dashed toward the grand stairway.
At the mouth of the east wing, he encountered a trio of house guards. They saluted briskly and awaited his orders. Since the death of their captain, Jander Orvist, Cale had been their commander. He meant to appoint a replacement, but Thamalon insisted that the men would continue to look to Cale for orders despite any promotions among their own ranks. To tell the truth, Cale enjoyed his interaction with the soldiers. It made him feel more a part of House Uskevren, not a solitary figure whose best work was done at night.
"The east wing is clear, sir."
Cale nodded. "I will check the library. You check the kitchens, then the stables."
"Yes, sir!"
The guards hastened toward the stairway, their hands over the hilts of their long swords.
The library was dark, as it should never have been. Even when the occupants desired low light, a dozen lamps of continual flames normally flickered around the walls-just one of the late Brom Selwyn's lingering contributions to Stormweather Towers. Cale noticed that the hall sconces nearest the library were dark, but those ten feet or farther away still flickered in their glass receptacles.
Cale frowned at that. It meant there was definitely destructive magic at work.
He paused at the entrance, straining to sense any intruder. He heard nothing unusual, but he smelled lamp oil. After an instant's consideration, he set his own lamp on a hall table and plucked one of the functioning magic lights from its holder. Despite the orange flames within, the glass was cool to the touch.
Cale slipped into the library, crouched low and balanced to change course in an instant. His lanky limbs moved as smoothly as river reeds in a breeze. Soon he discovered the source of the odor.
Near Lord Thamalon's writing desk, upon the fine carpet, a dark stain was still spreading from the ruins of another ordinary lamp. Beside the spill, a small table lay overturned, its contents scattered on the floor along with the painting Master Tamlin had sent his father. There was one other strange addition: a white length of exquisite Sembian lace.