The Fall of Ventaris

by Neil McGarry

  Lysander artfully changed the subject with an intriguing tale of a group of keepers who’d abandoned the Gardens of Mayu and set up a rival sect in the Narrows, the poorest and most desperate part of the Deeps. No one knew if such keepers were simply involved in a political game or this was the first sign of a true religious schism.

  The ale flowed, the tavern grew noisier, the ganymedes drunker and through it all the stories unreeled. Lords and ladies and bastards and thieves all caught up in a romantic rush. Banquets and masques stretching through nights of intrigue and scandal. Balconies and gardens filled with hedonistic revels and riches to beggar the imagination. She glanced at the tables around them and wondered how many others were telling the same tales, here or in a thousand other winesinks scattered about the Shallows. How many rubbed their hands over such stories, like jewels, gloating over each before tossing it aside to reach for the next? And how far would they be from such wonders when the morning fog rolled in and it was time to head for Wharves or Market or Trades for another long day of work?

  “...and no one knows what the empress will do,” Lysander was saying to Brenn and Denys, pulling Duchess out of her musing. Squeak was oblivious, head on the ale-puddled table, snoring softly. Squeak had never been able to hold his drink.

  “What do you mean?” she asked, straightening in her chair. Lysander gave her a remonstrating look, aware that she’d been woolgathering instead of hanging on his every word.

  “I mean that a White who breaks his vows is a scandal even Violana can’t ignore.” He took a sip of wine, his expression unreadable.

  Brenn frowned. “So what? She can just have his head off, or throw him in a dungeon, or whatever she wants. She’s the empress, she can do as she likes.” Duchess shook her head. She and Lysander knew well enough that in Rodaas, no one did just as he liked.

  Deneys was red-eyed from drink, but his wits were still about him. “I’m not so sure. The Whites have been chaste for...well, for a long time. If one breaks his vows that means something even to the empress.” As the official guard of the imperial family, Whites were held to a higher standard than mere blackarms or army-fodder.

  Lysander nodded. “He’s right, although I don’t think this is the first time a White has kept a mistress. The problem here is that this mistress had a child.”

  Brenn scoffed. “You’d think she’d have done the smart thing and gone to a midwife to be rid of it, but that’s a mother for you.” Brenn was notoriously unsympathetic to the plight of women. “Would have been better for her and better for...what did you say his name was?”

  “Pollux,” Lysander said. “I hear he’s a dream though, the kind to make any woman witless – and a few men, as well. Tall, strong, and eyes like...” His words were drowned out by another roar from the gaming tables, but Duchess could imagine the rest.

  “So this Pollux has a child?” Deneys interrupted, trying to catch the thread of the tale again. He shook his head sadly when Lysander nodded. “Living proof of the crime, you might say.”

  “I still don’t understand.” Brenn was getting haughty. “She’s the empress. She makes the laws.” Duchess rolled her eyes, and noticed Lysander doing the same. No one with any sense truly believed the empress did anything other than sit her throne and nod off from time to time.

  “It’s not that simple,” Duchess pointed out. “The Whites are as old as the city itself. According to legend their order dates back to the founding of Violana’s line.” One of the many bits of history she’d picked up from her father’s library. “Even the empress can’t just disregard a tradition as old as that one, and I can’t imagine she’s happy that something like this has come out.” She paused as she noticed all three of them looking at her oddly, no doubt wondering where she’d come by such lore. She shut her mouth and took another swig.

  “How did it come out?” asked Deneys, one eye still on her.

  “That,” said Lysander importantly, “is where Takkis comes in.” Takkis was the sheriff of Temple District, she remembered. She didn’t even know what the man looked like, but unlike Sheriff Ophion of the Shallows he had a reputation for unimpeachable integrity. His men were referred to as the Saints only somewhat ironically. “Somehow Takkis found out about the child, although what he was doing investigating a White I don’t know. In any case, Pollux is now sitting in a cell in the sheriff’s guard house, until either he dies of some mischance or the empress finds a graceful way to dispose of him. I imagine she’s hoping for the former.”

  “I still don’t understand why an empress can’t stand up to a blackarm, but it’s none of my affair.” Brenn yawned hugely, clearly done with the conversation. “I’m off for home. I spent every sou I had with you ladies and I need to work tomorrow. Can’t look pretty if I’m up all night.” He rose unsteadily to his feet, gesturing imperiously. “Walk me home, Deneys, and help me carry this one.” He waved towards Squeak, but Duchess knew Brenn was hoping to end the evening in Deneys’ bed. A vain hope, she thought, as Deneys conducted all between-the-sheets activities as business, and by his own admission Brenn was out of money. Still, Deneys went along readily enough, and between them they hoisted Squeak and dragged him from the tavern.

  After they’d gone, Duchess drained her cup. “I never heard of blackarms spying on Imperial Whites,” she said at last. “Sounds to me like someone’s using Takkis for reasons of his own.”

  Lysander picked up what was left of Deneys’ drink. “To embarrass the empress, right? I suppose it’s the reason you keep someone like Takkis around in a place like Rodaas. Then again,” he added flatly, “these days you see cat’s-paws everywhere.”

  She didn’t know how to take that comment, no more than she knew how to make things between them right again. “Did you just move to this city?” she replied. “I can’t help seeing what’s already there. Take a man known for integrity and put him between the empress and her own guards....”

  Lysander laughed, almost naturally. “Now you sound like Minette.” He signaled to a serving girl for wine. “Next you’ll be beating me at tiles, too.”

  “So if Pollux is in jail,” said Duchess, refusing to be baited, “where is this mistress?”

  “Dead of fever, or so I’m told. I was about to get to that before Brenn rushed off in another sad attempt to bed Deneys.” He held up a hand. “Before you ask, I don’t know her name, or the name of the son Pollux gave her. The boy’s six summers or so, which means Pollux must have moved heaven and earth to keep a secret that long.”

  “He must have loved the mother very much,” Duchess said, for the moment all Silk. She wondered what it would be like to have a man so in love he would flout centuries of tradition. Most of the men she knew lacked any honor to discard, and cared little for tradition. Steel was more practical, however, and was already making connections. A man who could keep a secret, trained in all the martial skills an Imperial White required, willing to risk his very life for a bastard child. Temptable, but with a sense of honor. Such a man could be a useful lieutenant...assuming of course he were willing, and not locked in a cell and surrounded by blackarms.

  “I suppose so. But she’s gone now, and Pollux must have been trying to find someone to take care of the boy when Takkis found him out,” Lysander was saying. “Now the court is in a terrible fix. They can’t very well approve of what Pollux was doing, but if they execute him publicly it brings shame on the empress herself.” His wine arrived and he drank as deeply as if it were his first and not his fifth. “The only thing sweeter than summer wine is summer gossip,” he gloated. Then he looked away, out over the crowd.

  Still not fully there with her, then. No talk of anything real. She pushed aside her dismay and toyed thoughtfully with her empty cup, focusing again on the practical. “Lysander,” she asked after a moment, “what would happen if Pollux were to die in prison?”

  “Most like the court would probably breathe a secret sigh of relief, quietly hand the body over to the cult of Mayu, and then forget the whole thing h
appened. Saves them a world of trouble.” Although well in his cups, he did not miss the gleam in her eye. “I’ve seen that look before. It’s usually followed by, ‘Lysander, I’m about to suggest something insane.’” He eyed her with suspicion as Duchess sat quietly, her mind whirring. “If this is about Takkis, don’t even start. Someone might be using him to hurt the empress, but you don’t have a shred of proof.”

  She tried to smile, but it wasn’t in her. “Who said I needed any?”

  * * *

  They left the Bier just before the owner threw them out, spilling into Pike Street with the other patrons. Although she and Lysander left under their own power, others were less able and some had to be heaved into the street by the Bier’s staff. By morning those unfortunates would be picked clean by the lightboys, who were as adept at cutting purses as they were at guiding nobles.

  Her apartments were larger but Lysander’s garret was closer, so they turned in that direction. She tried several times to bring up his failure to appear that morning, but each time something stopped her. Instead she found herself approaching the topic sideways, by mentioning how, like Minette, she needed help.

  “If you want spies, you don’t have to look very far,” he said after hearing her out. “But chances are that any spy in your pay is taking coin from three more people, and selling out each to the others.” He gazed up at the sky thoughtfully, although the stars were, as usual, hidden by the cloud cover.

  She winced. He was correct, of course, and she’d never know the true from the treacherous. She bit her lip. “All right, maybe I don’t want spies around right now. I’m thinking about someone to watch my back. A sellsword?” she said.

  Lysander shrugged. “That’s simple enough. There are lots of blades in the Deeps, and if the gold is good every one of them is for sale.”

  “For sale to my enemies as well,” Duchess pointed out. “I don’t want some thug who’s as likely to stab me as to save me. I need someone with...a code of honor.”

  Lysander hooted laughter. “Honor in the Deeps is like virginity in a whorehouse: for enough money, everyone will claim it.” He rubbed his neck. “Whoever you hire is going to be getting involved in some shady business, right? Nobody with honor would have helped you with the Eusbius job.” It was said lightly enough, but she sensed sharpness beneath.

  They climbed the stairs to the garret, which was, as usual, a mess: clothes stacked to knee-level and empty wine bottles scattered about. The hearth was cold, but in summer no fire was needed. Lysander lit some candles while Duchess picked her way through the mess and took a seat on his bed. They sat in silence for a long time. Duchess watched Lysander in the flickering candlelight. He did not look back. Finally she could take it no longer and her anger burst out of her in a rush.

  “You and the girls don’t usually drink at the Bier. Must have been a special occasion to make you forget our meeting.” Lysander did not reply for a long moment, then he simply nodded, which just infuriated her all the more. “No worries though,” she snapped, touching her bruised cheek. “Got into a bit of a scuffle, but it wasn’t anything I couldn’t handle.”

  He said nothing.

  She found herself babbling. “Worked out fine in the end. I’ve got a whole plan in motion already. The girl worked out fine — just has some problems with the guild, but I’ve already got something going there, too. Didn’t need you at all, in the end, it turned out. So it was all for the best, really.”

  Lysander sighed and turned away.

  “I guess I’ll just have to take it that way from now on, then? That’s just how things are now that...” Her voice caught and she felt tears forming. She was not going to cry in front of him, not now. She bit her lip hard enough to draw blood, trying to calm herself. “I didn’t see Poor Gabe tonight, nor Pete,” she said, casting about for a new line of attack. “Are they too good for the rest of us?”

  “For us? No.” His emphasis on us excluded her. “Gabe’s got some client in the Foreign Quarter.” Lysander’s voice was flat, his expression blank. “A Ulari merchant who likes to tell Rodaasi boys what to do.” A candle went out and he relit it from one of its brothers. “And Pete’s dead.”

  She gaped. “Dead?” She almost laughed, it seemed so ridiculous. “Manly Pete? I thought...but he....there’s no way. I mean, he was seeing a woman now. The one with the husband who’s always away?”

  “You know that wasn’t trade, and a ganymede’s got to work, doesn’t he?” Lysander’s expression was unchanged. “Women are always safer, but most of them don’t feel the need for a ganymede, and most of the rest don’t have the silver. So when the man’s a bit shady...well, we all take our chances.” He stood and moved to the window. Lysander hadn’t survived the Deeps without being careful, but even so his kind lived a precarious existence. They went unprotected by the blackarms or even a brothel-keeper like Minette. The girls relied on Lysander’s guidance to keep them safe. Thanks to him none of them had died since...well, since she’d known him. Until now.

  “We all told him this job was a bad idea, but he wouldn’t hear it,” he said reflectively, staring out into the Shallows. “Men who fuck women always think they’re invulnerable, like the world wouldn’t dare stand in their way, and Pete was no different.” Bitterness tinged his voice. “But he forgot that to anyone up the hill he’s just another ganymede.”

  Duchess stood. “Wait...you all knew? Denys and Brenn and Squeak?” She stopped. Oh gods. “This just happened. That’s why you weren’t in the Deeps.”

  He rounded on her. “Believe it or not, Duchess, the whole world does not revolve around you.” He kicked over a pile of clothing. “Anyway, I never thought you’d go running off into the Deeps alone like an idiot.”

  “I didn’t just...I mean I...” She had no ready answer, because if truth be told, she had been an idiot. “How was I supposed to know? You’ve been so...since...”

  He said nothing, but his hand went to his own cheek.

  Guilt blew away her anger like a gale, and they sat in silence for a long time. “So he’s dead,” she managed at last. “And you just drank the night away?”

  “I guess you think we should have wept or asked the radiants for a funeral pyre?” He kicked away a wooden cup and the roach that had been hiding beneath it scurried between the floorboards. “Pete’s not the first of us to die, just the first you know about.”

  She blinked, uncertain how to feel about that revelation. “What happened to him?” she asked, unsure she wanted to know.

  “Adam Whitehall happened to him,” Lysander replied dryly. The name was vaguely familiar, and she took a moment to refresh her memory. Then the tale came flooding back, of knives, blood and murdered boys, leaving her cold.

  “He did it again,” she muttered, feeling weightless. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “We’ve all got our secrets, haven’t we, Duchess?” His words were another blow in the belly, a strike far worse than any she’d gotten from that woman in the Deeps. She struggled to breathe, tasting smoke in her mouth. Lysander made no move to comfort her and the cold silence went on forever. Despite herself, she felt the tears running down her cheeks.

  “You know, don’t you?” she croaked. “I loved you from the first, that day in the alley in Market...do you remember?” Something in her tone must have caught him, for his eyes softened. He nodded wordlessly. “I loved you because you were this shining golden boy who listened and took me seriously and who never asked me for the truth. You let me have my lies.”

  She put her face in her hands to hide her tears. She wanted to go to him, touch him, and wished he’d do the same, but neither of them moved. She took a shuddering breath. “Don’t ever think I’ve forgotten what I did to you. In my dreams I hear the Brutes and their voices and I wake up thinking I’ll never see you again. And then I do see you again but it’s different. Because of me.” She looked up at him nakedly, certain he could see her tears but no longer caring. “I don’t know how to make it right, Lysander. Mayb
e I can’t make it right because...you called me Silk and Steel, but I don’t think either of us really understood just how cold and hard that part of me is. Because no matter how much I love you, no matter how much I regret it” — she took a breath — “I think I would do it again.”

  He watched her for a long moment, candlelight shining in the blue pools of his eyes. “Honesty at last,” he murmured. “Thank you.”

  “You were right...I have kept secrets, and you do deserve better than that.” She wiped warm wetness from her eyes and took a breath to steady herself. Everything the old baker had ever taught her, every instinct he’d instilled, rose up as if to choke her. She swallowed it down. “My name’s not Duchess, but I guess you knew that.” He was silent, watching her. “Everything I told you about how I came to live with Noam was a lie, too. The old man pounded it into my head to never, ever tell anyone the real story. Gods, I spent so much time being Duchess that for a long time I forgot I was anything else.” She clenched her hands into fists, watching her knuckles turn red, then white. “Before I came to the bakery I lived in Scholars District. With my sister, and my brother, and my father. He was a scholar himself. His name was...Marcus Kell.”

  Lysander’s eyes went wide. “The Marcus Kell? The War-of-the-Quills Marcus Kell?” He sat back, mouth dropping open.

  She nodded, trembling. “He had three children, and I’m the youngest. My name – my real name – is Marina.” She paused. “I know this must sound strange, but...” She trailed off as a rueful grin split his face. “What?”

  “Actually, it explains a lot,” he admitted. “Of course I knew from the day we met that you were no cobbler’s daughter. How many of their like are friends with Minette?” He sat beside her. “And all that history you knew, emperors and empresses and laws passed a hundred years ago...sometimes it was like talking to a scholar!” He laughed gently. “I figured you for some noble’s by-blow that he hid in the Shallows from a jealous wife. I never imagined...” He shook his head. “Marcus Kell’s daughter. Mayu’s mercy. How did you wind up in Noam’s bakery?”