by Emma Bull
Then it occurred to him that his daughter was a magician. She could have escaped, and, if so, where would she have gone except to see him? If this had happened, she could walk into an ambush intended for him.
He dug his heels into his horse's flanks.
•
"I would never have recognized you," said Arenride. He had found them because someone in his employ had identified Brajii.
Jolesha stared pitiably up at him, trying to make sense of the relief on Arenride's face. Next to her, Brajii stood motionless, in the shadows of a tall deserted house on Meadowhill Road. Jolesha had drawn strength from the woman, but Brajii had accepted the blame for Kaloo's escape and for the loss of the Gate: after all, had she not hatched the scheme to kill Dashif, Jolesha would still have possession of it.
As the silence dragged on uncomfortably, Jolesha said, "Arenride, I've lost The Gate."
"The artifact?"
"Yes. Yes, it was stolen."
"We must get it back." He said it lightly, as if such things could be found anywhere. "Do you have any idea how lovely you are, without that hideous guise you wear?"
She lowered her head. "I'm not." No one had ever said that to her.
"Well, now. Do we have any idea at all what happened to it?"
''The girl has it. KaIoo."
"Who?"
"Dashif's daughter."
Arenride's eyes grew wide. "Dashif has a daughter?" He looked accusingly at Brajii, who looked away. "It seems there are things my ally neglected to tell me."
Jolesha said, "I thought the only way to be safe would be to … Well, we were going to kill Dashif. We kidnapped his daughter to bring him into a trap—"
Arenride began to laugh. "Everybody wants to kill the poor fellow."
There was a hiss of indrawn breath from Brajii. She said, "I do, for one."
"I know that," Arenride replied darkly.
"And your people were willing to give me a chance before."
"Not 'my people' in the sense you mean, but there you and I choose different ways to define our lives and our living. In any case, it was a chance you couldn't take advantage of, though you had ample opportunity."
"Something protects him."
"Yes," Arenride agreed. "It's called 'skill.'"
"No, there is more."
"I doubt that."
"Four times now—"
"I know, Brajii, all too well. But never mind. You wish another chance? Fine. I think that one more chance can be arranged, because we must retrieve that artifact."
"We can't find the girl."
"Where does she live?"
"She won't go back there," said Brajii. "It was near there that we took her."
"Then, where else?"
"I don't know. I don't know her well enough to know where she'd feel safe. But we have arranged for Dashif to meet us behind the Catspaw in half an hour. We can still be there, without his daughter, and—"
"And die," said Arenride. "He will be there already, waiting for you."
Brajii sighed, and for a moment she looked as if she would cry. "Of course. I know. We had intended to be there long ago," she said. "Now I don't know what to do. I'm not made for complexities. My skills are stealth and aim and reflex."
Arenride smiled. "I can think of one place she might go. To her father's."
Jolesha stared bitterly at Brajii, who took the weight of that glare as fit punishment. "If so," she said, "we are defeated."
"Not at all," said Arenride. "If Dashif is out waiting for your ambush, we can, perhaps, be at the Palace before him."
"What, in his chambers?" said Jolesha.
"Where better to catch him off guard? I've never done this, because it's the sort of option one uses only once, but I think circumstances justify the risk."
"Give me a chance at him," said Brajii. "Please."
"Happily," said Arenride. Shouldering his blunderbuss, he said, "Come, then, to the Levar's Palace." And he offered Jolesha his arm. It was not at all in keeping with the mood or the business at hand, yet somehow, she felt, it was right.
6 THE ACT
There were four guards at the main gate. One was a woman with very dark, very short hair who always smiled at Kaloo when she came with Dashif. The guard smiled even though Dashif wasn't with her, and Kaloo made her way around to the side and into his—her father's—private entrance. She unlocked the door with the key he'd given her months before, stepped inside, and fumbled with the lock for a while in the darkness of the stairwell before succeeding in locking the door behind her. She had no idea how many hidden observers might have watched her enter.
Climbing the long, narrow stairs was, somehow, different from when Dashif was with her—even more lonely and frightening. She opened the door into his front room and didn't know if she was relieved or disappointed to find it empty. Hesitantly, she checked his bedchamber, and then the kitchen, but they were empty, too.
She clenched her hands, still frightened, then sat on the edge of a chair to wait for him. She noticed again how empty the room was, with nothing to look at except the portrait of herself, done months ago. She began to understand why he wanted it.
The minutes crawled on. What good had escaping done? She had no way of knowing where he was, no way of reaching him. He might have run his head into the noose anyway. Right now, this minute, he could be dead, could be bleeding in an alley, and she probably wouldn't even know it for hours.
Dead. She fingered the leather thong that held the pouch around her neck, and her thoughts returned once more to the woman who was—had been—her mother. What had passed between the two of them, Erina and Dashif? Dashif never spoke of it, T'Nar wouldn't. And Erina was, well, odd.
There was a thing Kaloo knew for certain, however: She was very glad that the strange cylindrical object had fallen into her hands. It was her connection to her ancestry in a way that Dashif could never be. Given time, she would understand all of it, who she was, why she had been raised in such strange circumstances. She wasn't going to part with it before then.
The door opened. Her head jerked up. For an instant, she saw him before he saw her. He was not guarding his thoughts. Something in his face brought Erina's words to her mind: He needs to be happy again. She was on her feet and moving, trying not to think about what she was doing or if it betrayed anyone. She wouldn't look at the astonishment on his face as she put her arms around him. For a second, all she could sense were the contrasts; his leanness compared to T'Nar's bulk, the immaculate white ruffles that folded under her cheek and smelled of sweet closet herbs instead of T'Nar's rough shirt and smell of oakum and pitch, the cautious way his hands settled on her shoulders instead of T'Nar's fierce hug. Then she recognized the thing that was the same. There was safety here, yes, and love. She thought of the shattered bottle that had been patiently drawn back together. Her love and her luck touched broken pieces, tried to sense the unity that should have been and draw them back together. Not yet, she knew, but in time she could do it. With patience. Carefully she tried the word upon her tongue, whispering it into the ruffles of his shirt, not yet ready for him to hear her say it aloud.
•
Dashif felt tears come to his eyes. "I thought you were taken," he said.
"I escaped," Kaloo said, her voice only a whisper.
He nodded. "I'm sorry you became involved in these things. It won't happen again." Well said, Dashif, he told himself. But how are you going to ensure that? He considered the matter while he sent someone to tell Pitullio that he was back.
She said, "Could they come after me here?"
Dashif shrugged. "I can't see why they would."
"I … I stole something from one of them."
"Oh? What?"
Trembling, she held up the leather pouch that she'd hung around her neck. "It is a thing that lets you talk with—"
Dashif, recovering from amazement, threw his head back and laughed. "Of all the—my dear, you are certainly my daughter. That little pouch contains exactly wha
t everyone in Liavek and his troll are looking for. May I have it?"
"No!" said Kaloo.
Dashif frowned, and considered. "My dear, I don't think you know what you have there."
"I spoke to my mother," she said.
Dashif licked his lips. "Oh."
"I don't want to give it up."
Dashif sighed. "I won't take it from you, Kaloo. I promise. But you can't keep it. You'll have to see that. It is why people are following—"
He was interrupted by a knock at the door, which turned out to be a messenger announcing that His Scarlet Eminence would be pleased to see him at once. Dashif looked at Kaloo and frowned. He didn't like the idea of leaving Kaloo alone again—not even in the safety of his rooms.
"Come along, Kaloo. There are some people you should meet. We'll resolve this by and by."
"All right, Father," she said, and he stared at her, a lump in his throat and, yes, even a tear in his eye. Without another word, he led her toward the offices of His Scarlet Eminence.
•
Jolesha, behind the other two, glanced at every doorway, every window, every ledge as they approached Dashif's private entrance. This was a mad thing they were doing. At the small doorway, Brajii turned to her and said, "Stand back. We're going to have to break it down."
"Why?" Jolesha asked. Glad to do something other than fret, she stepped past them and studied the lock. It looked, from the keyhole, like a simple mechanism; she wouldn't even need special tools. Crouching, she borrowed one of Brajii's finer crossbow bolts and used the tip to wedge back the tumblers. Arenride offered her a small dagger no larger than his little finger, and with it she tricked the lock. All in all, it was distressingly easy and she said as much.
"The door isn't the danger," Arenride said. "We're under surveillance right now. My presence will confuse them, but that won't last long." He shrugged then and unslung his wheel lock blunderbuss. Brajii, on the step below him, had her crossbow cocked and ready. Arenride pushed the door open.
They froze there for a moment, until Jolesha was ready to scream from frustration at not knowing what they saw. Then Arenride said, "It's empty. We were wrong."
"No," said Brajii, and led the way forward. Jolesha entered the room behind the other two, frightened, but reassured by their presence. It was as stark as a room at the Sri'dezj Inn in Ka Zhir. Brajii walked in and picked up a white sun hat from a chair. Jolesha recognized it at once as the one Kaloo had been wearing.
"She's here," said Brajii.
Arenride nodded and carefully checked the adjoining rooms.
"What now?" asked Jolesha.
Arenride stood next to a door and said, "This leads to a hallway, with a pair of guards stationed at the far end. Beyond them is another pair of guards. Beyond them are the offices of His Scarlet Eminence and his secretary. I suspect we'll find who we're looking for there. There are no other guards on duty within two-minutes' run of this area. We should be done with whatever we're going to do by the time they get here." He caught Brajii's eye.
Jolesha trembled.
"Now," said Brajii, "you'll see that I can use this thing." She hefted her crossbow.
Arenride wound the mechanism of his blunderbuss and put his left hand on the doorknob.
•
Pitullio studied Dashif and the girl, and smiled just a little. "I take it she's here for a reason, Count Dashif."
"You are correct," said Dashif.
Pitullio nodded, walked over to Resh's door and called through it, "Your Eminence. Count Dashif is here."
"Very well," said the Regent from the other side. "Come in, Dashif, and you, too, Pitullio." Pitullio opened the door, stepped through it, and stood aside. Resh, who seemed to be playing with model ships on a map but wasn't, nodded to him and said, "Very well, now—who is this, Dashif?"
Dashif looked down at Kaloo and smiled. He'd always enjoyed moments of drama, thought Pitullio. "Your Eminence, I'd like you to meet Kaloo, my daughter."
Resh stared at Dashif and at the girl. His jaw worked. He said, "What is her connection to this affair?"
Dashif shrugged and said, "She is my daughter," as if that explained everything.
"Why is she here?"
"She was kidnapped by our enemies. They had hoped to kill me, using her as a lure."
Resh shrugged. "Very well. A pleasure, Kaloo. Now, Dashif, get her out of here. We need to resolve—"
"Our enemies have most likely followed her. I'll not leave her unprotected until she is safe." He smiled. "Besides, she has something you want."
"Indeed?"
"Yes. A certain pouch containing a certain artifact that—"
"She has it."
"Quite."
Pitullio stifled the laughter that came to his throat. "Well done, Dashif," he said under his breath.
Resh turned to the girl. Pitullio was surprised at the intensity of the Regent's stare. He must be even more worried about it than he'd let on.
"Give it to me," said Resh.
The girl shook her head and looked up at Dashif, as if for protection.
Dashif sighed. "Kaloo, you must understand—"
"Forget the explanations," said Resh. "I want that thing. Dashif, take it from her."
The girl moved away from Dashif until she was in a corner of the office with the desk between her and Resh, and Dashif between her and Pitullio, who stood in the doorway.
"I think," said Dashif, "that she'll be willing to give it to us once we explain—"
"Girl," said the Regent, "I want that—"
Which was as far as he got before he was interrupted by shots, screams, and yells from outside. Dashif raised his eyebrows, Pitullio wished he had a weapon handy. "We're being invaded, it seems," said Dashif coolly.
Resh looked as if he were about to choke. He reached into his desk and drew out a large, ungainly wheellock pistol that, as far as Pitullio knew, he'd never used. But he seemed prepared to use it now. Dashif nodded, took his own pistols into his hands, and said, "I suggest, Pitullio, that you also find yourself a weap—"
Then he stopped, staring. The pistol in the Regent's hand was pointed at the child. "Give me the artifact, girl," said Resh. "Now."
The four of them stood there, frozen. Pitullio looking at Resh, Resh looking at Kaloo, Dashif looking at the pistol, Kaloo looking at Dashif.
Then the scuffling sounds became louder and closer, and Pitullio moved away from the door. Dashif turned his head toward the door as Arenride burst into Resh's office, a blunderbuss in his hands, followed immediately by a tall woman holding a cocked and loaded crossbow.
•
All Dashif could see were the blunderbuss and the crossbow swinging to point at him, to kill him. All he could think about was the pistol pointed at his daughter's head.
What had kept Dashif alive for all these years, as much as anything else, was the ability to think and act rationally when the moment for action came. He still had that ability. He knew, since he knew how fast he was, and had had the flintlocks on his pistols specially altered, that he had time to cock and aim both pistols before any weapon was discharged at him.
There was, in the strange half-world of split seconds, plenty of time to decide on precisely where he wanted each of his four bullets to strike. That he had to divide his attention and aim was no trouble to him, for he was a marksman. He knew precisely which targets he wanted, and why. Before anyone else in the room could do anything, then, he was able to bring both of his pistols to bear.
The thunder of his weapons filled the small room. The roar and echoes overwhelmed the sound of the crossbow spring releasing its bolt; the explosion as Arenride's blunderbuss fired seemed only to stretch the first blast into an endless reverberation. Somewhere nearby, Palace guards came running.
It didn't matter.
•
When it comes right down to it, a body is a body.
The most important characteristics of a person are those things that make him unique, interesting, and worth whateve
r special attention he merits from friends, enemies, lovers, and business acquaintances. But the things that make a corpse unique, interesting, and worth special attention matter to no one but embalmers.
And the transformation of a human being from one state to the other happens so quickly that the human mind can no more conceive of that space of time than it can truly conceive of the state of non-life.
Three bodies lie on the floor, each having found its own unique position from which to approach rigor mortis. There is little of interest there; let us turn to the living.
•
He stood motionless, unwilling to make the effort to understand what had just happened. He found himself staring hardest at the body of the woman with the crossbow and wondered why, since he didn't know her. He licked his lips, shook his head, and, just in case it still mattered, moved over behind the desk to pick up the wheellock from the fingers of the corpse that had been the Regent. It made him feel better to hold the weapon. Then, only half-conscious of his actions, Pitullio moved around to where Dashif's daughter stood crying.
Jolesha looked from body to body to body. She saw the tall man step around the bolt embedded in the floor and take the unfired wheellock. She turned to Arenride and said, "I don't understand why he killed the Regent instead of you. I thought he—"
"Shhh," said Arenride. "Not now."
•
Jolesha watched as the tall man put his arm around Kaloo, who began sobbing into his chest. He spoke to her in whispers, then carefully removed a familiar pouch from her neck. He tossed it to Jolesha, who held it to herself and avoided looking down at Brajii, who had an ugly pair of holes in her forehead.
Arenride put his arms around her.
•
"I'll take you home," said Pitullio.
"My father—"
"I know, sweetheart." He was surprised at how close he was to crying tears he hadn't cried in thirty years. He wondered who they were for.
Six guards arrived, and stopped as they saw the bodies, as unsure as anyone else how to react. Pitullio straightened up suddenly and spoke to them, while pointing to Arenride and Jolesha. "These people need to see Her Magnificence, the Levar. Escort them. This girl is under my care. I'll take her home. See to transportation, one of you." He looked around and muttered, "I have no idea who's going to see to the future of Liavek."