A guard, ignoring once more the dull ache in his chest and the occasional stab of pain shooting down his left arm, walked out from the guard annexe to begin his rounds, making his way to the Lakefront District and the wall that divided it from the Daru District – the nightly murders had begun clustering to either side of that wall. Maybe this time he’d be lucky and see something – someone – and everything would fall into place. Maybe.
He had put in a requisition for a mage, a necromancer, in fact, but alas the wheels of bureaucracy ground reluctantly in such matters. It would probably take the slaying of someone important before things could lurch into motion. He really couldn’t wait for that. Finding this killer had become a personal crusade.
The night was strangely quiet, given that it marked the culmination of the Gedderone Fête. Most people were still in the taverns and bars, he told himself, even as he fought off a preternatural unease, and even as he noted the taut expressions of those people he passed, and the way they seemed to scurry by. Where was the revelry? The delirious dancing? Early yet, he told himself. But those two words and everything behind them felt oddly flat.
He could hear a distant storm on the plains south of the city. Steady thunder, an echoing wind, and he told himself he was feeling that storm’s approach. Nothing more, just the usual fizz in the air that preceded such events.
He hurried on, grimacing at the ache in his chest, still feeling the parting kiss of his wife on his lips, the careless hugs of his children round his waist.
He was a man who would never ask for sympathy. He was a man who sought only to do what was right. Such people appear in the world, every world, now and then, like a single refrain of some blessed song, a fragment caught on the spur of an otherwise raging cacophony.
Imagine a world without such souls.
Yes, it should have been harder to do.
After a rather extended time of muted regard fixed dully upon a sealed crypt, four mourners began their return journey to the Phoenix Inn, where Meese would make a grim discovery – although one that, in retrospect, did not in fact shock her as much as it might have.
Before they had gone five hundred paces, however, Rallick Nom drew to a sudden halt. ‘I must leave you now,’ he said to the others.
‘Kruppe understands.’
And the assassin narrowed his gaze upon the short, solemn-faced man.
‘Where,’ Rallick asked, ‘will this go, Kruppe?’
‘The future, my friend, is ever turned away, even when it faces us.’
To this bizarre, unlikely truism, Coll grunted, ‘Gods below, Kruppe—’ But Rallick had already completed his own turning away and was walking towards the mouth of an alley.
‘I got a sick feeling inside,’ Meese said.
Coll grunted a second time and then said, ‘Let’s go. I need to find me another bottle – this time with something in it that actually does something.’
Kruppe offered him a beatific smile. Disingenuous? Really now.
Seba Krafar, Master of the Assassins’ Guild, surveyed his small army of murderers. Thirty-one in all. Granted, absurd overkill, but even so he found himself not quite as comfortable – or as confident – as such numbers should have made him. ‘This is ridiculous,’ he muttered under his breath. And then he gestured.
The mob shifted into three distinct groups, and then each hurried off in a different direction, to close on the target at the appointed time.
Come the morning, there’d be a newly vacated seat on the Council. Blood-drenched, true, but it would hardly be the first time for that, would it?
Shardan Lim saw before him a perfect future. He would, if all went well, finally step out from Hanut Orr’s shadow. And into his own shadow he’d drag Gorlas Vidikas. They would be sharing a woman, after all, and there would be no measured balance in that situation, since Gorlas was next to useless when it came to satisfying Challice. So Gorlas would find that his wife’s happiness was dependent not upon him, but upon the other man sharing her pleasure – Shardan Lim – and when the first child arrived, would there be any doubt as to its progeny? An heir of provable bloodline, the perfect usurpation of House Vidikas.
He had set out alone this night, making his casual way to the Vidikas estate, and he now stood opposite the front gate, studying the modest but well-constructed building. There were hints of Gadrobi in the style, he saw. The square corner tower that was actually higher than it looked, its rooms abandoned to dust and spiders – virtually identical edifices could still be found here and there in the Gadrobi District, and in the hills to the east of the city. Vines covered three of the four walls, reaching up from the garden. If the tower had been a tree it would be dead, centuries dead. Hollowed out by rot, the first hard wind would have sent it thrashing down. This deliberate rejection was no accident. Gadrobi blood among the nobles was an embarrassment. It had always been that way and it always would be.
When Shardan owned this estate, he would see it torn down. His blood was pure Daru. Same as Challice’s own.
He heard horses approach at a dangerously fast canter, up from the lower city, and a few moments later three riders appeared, sharply reining in before the estate’s gate.
Frowning, Shardan Lim stepped out and quickly approached.
Private guards of some sort, looking momentarily confused as they dismounted. Their horses were lathered, heads dipping as they snorted out phlegm.
‘You three,’ Shardan called out, and they turned. ‘I am Councillor Shardan Lim, and I am about to visit the Vidikas estate. If you carry a message for Lady Challice, do permit me to deliver it.’ As he drew closer, he offered the three men a comradely smile. ‘She is a delicate woman – having three sweaty men descend on her wouldn’t do. I’m sure you understand—’
‘Forgive me, Councillor,’ one of the men said, ‘but the news we deliver is bad.’
‘Oh? Come now, no more hesitation.’
‘Gorlas Vidikas is dead, sir. He was killed in a duel earlier today. We were instructed to ride to his widow first, and hence on to Eldra Iron Mongery. It means we got to go right back the way we come, but the foreman insisted. As a courtesy. As the proper thing to do.’
Shardan Lim simply stared at the man, his thoughts racing.
‘Weren’t no duel,’ growled one of the other men.
‘What’s that?’ Shardan demanded. ‘You there, step out.
What did you just say?’
The man was suddenly frightened, but he moved into the councillor’s line of sight, managed a quick bow and then said, ‘He was assassinated, sir. The foreman kept saying it was all legitimate, but we saw it, sir, with our own eyes. Two knives—’
‘Two knives? Two knives? Are you certain?’
‘Because of the other duel, you see, sir. It was revenge. It was murder. Councillor Vidikas killed another man, then this other one shows up. Then out flash those knives – so fast you couldn’t even see ‘em, and Councillor Vidikas topples over, stone dead, sir. Stone dead.’
‘This is all sounding familiar,’ Shardan Lim said. ‘Listen to me, you three. One of you, ride to the Orr estate and inform Councillor Hanut Orr. The other two, go on to Eldra, as you will. I will inform Lady Challice. Then, the three of you, find a decent inn for the night and tell the proprietor to treat you well, and to bill House Lim. Go on, now.’
There was some discussion as to who would go where, and which inn they’d rendezvous at when the tasks were done, and then the three men rode off.
Thunder to the south, getting closer. He could hear the wind but it was yet to arrive. Shardan Lim walked up to the gate, pulled on the braided chime in its elongated niche. While he waited for the doorman to arrive, he thought about how he would deliver this grim news. He would need a grave countenance, something more fitting than the dark grin he was even now fighting.
She was a widow now. Vulnerable. There was no heir. Cousins and half-relations might well creep out of the woodwork, mediocre but grasping with sudden ambition. Proclaiming ascendan
cy in the Vidikas bloodline and so asserting their newly conceived rights to claim stewardship over the entire House. Without strong allies at her side, she’d be out before the week was done.
Once Hanut Orr heard the report, and gleaned whatever he could from the particular details, his mind would fill with the desire for vengeance – and more than a little fear along with it, Shardan was sure. And he would not even think of Challice, not at first, and the opportunities now present. The next day or two would be crucial, and Shardan would have to move sure and fast to position himself at her side and leave no room for Hanut Orr once the man’s own ambitions awakened.
An eye-slot scraped to one side, then closed again with a snap. The gate opened. ‘House Vidikas welcomes Councillor Lim,’ said the doorman from his low bow, as if addressing Shardan’s boots. ‘The Lady is being informed of your arrival. If you will kindly follow me.’
And in they went.
She hesitated, facing the wardrobe, studying the array of possible shifts to draw on over her mostly naked body. Most were intended to cover other clothes, as befitted a modest noblewoman engaged in entertaining guests, but the truth was, she couldn’t be bothered. She had been about to go to sleep, or at least what passed for sleep of late, lying flat and motionless on her bed.
Alone whether her husband was there or not. Staring upward in the grainy darkness. Where the only things that could stir her upright included another goblet of wine, one more pipe bowl or a ghostly walk in the silent garden.
Those walks always seemed to involve searching for something, an unknown thing, in fact, and she would follow through on the desire even as she knew that what she sought no garden could hold. Whatever it was did not belong to the night, nor could it be found in the spinning whirls of smoke, or the bite of strong drink on her numbed tongue.
She selected a flowing, diaphanous gown, lavender and wispy as wreaths of incense smoke, pulling it about her bare shoulder. A broad swath of the same material served to gather it tight about her lower torso, beneath her breasts, firm against her stomach and hips. The thin single layer covering her breasts hid nothing.
Shardan Lim was showing his impatience. His crassness. He was even now in the sitting room, sweaty, his eyes dilated with pathetic needs. He was nothing like what he pretended to be, once the façade of sophisticated lechery was plucked aside. The charm, the sly winks, the suave lie.
This entire damned world, she knew, consisted of nothing but thin veneers. The illusion of beauty survived not even a cursory second look. Cheap and squalid, this was the truth of things. He could paint it up all he liked, the stains on the sheets remained.
Barefooted, she set out to meet him. Imagining the whispers of the staff, the maids and servants, the guards – never within range of her hearing, of course. That would not do. Propriety must be maintained at all costs. They’d wait for her to pass, until she was out of sight. It was their right, after all, their reward for a lifetime of servitude, for all that bowing and scraping, for all the gestures meant to convince her and people like her that she was in fact superior to them. The noble bloods, the rich merchants, the famous families and all the rest.
When the truth was, luck and mischance were the only players in the game of success. Privilege of birth, a sudden harmony of forces, a sudden inexplicable balance later seen as a run of good fortune. Oh, they might strut about – we all might – and proclaim that talent, skill and cunning were the real players. But Challice held the belief that even the poor, the destitute, the plague-scarred and the beleaguered might possess talents and cunning, only to find their runs of fortune non-existent, proper rewards for ever beyond reach.
Servants bowed, and that they needed to do so was proof of just how flimsy the delusion of superiority was.
She opened the door and walked with dignity into the sitting room. ‘Councillor Lim, have you been left here alone? No one to provide you with refreshments? This is unacceptable—’
‘I sent her away,’ he cut in, and she saw that his expression was strange, conflicted by something but in a most peculiar way.
‘You have not even poured yourself some wine. Allow me—’
‘No, thank you, Lady Challice. Although, perhaps, I should pour you one. Yes.’
And he went over to select a decanter and then a goblet. She watched the amber wine slosh into the crystal, and then flow over before he righted the decanter. He stared down at the goblet for a moment, and then faced her. ‘Lady Challice, I have terrible news.’
Then why do you struggle so not to smile? ‘Ah. Speak on, then, Councillor.’
He stepped forward. ‘Challice—’
All at once, she sensed that something was deeply awry. He was too excited with his news. He was hungry to see its effect on her. He had no interest in using her body this night. And here she had arrived dressed like a fancy whore. ‘Forgive me,’ she said, stepping back and attempting to draw the shift more modestly about her.
He barely registered the gesture. ‘Challice. Gorlas has been murdered. Your husband is dead.’
‘Murdered? But he’s still out at the mining camp. He’s—’ and then she stopped, stunned at how disbelief could so swiftly become certainty.
‘Assassinated, out at the camp,’ Shardan Lim said. ‘Was it a contract? I can’t imagine who would . . .’ And then he too fell silent, and the regard he fixed upon her now was suddenly sharp, piercing.
She could not face the question he looked ready to ask, and so she went to collect the goblet, unmindful of the wine spilling over her hand, and drank deep.
He had moved to one side and still he said nothing as he watched her.
Challice felt light-headed, unbalanced. She was having trouble thinking. Feelings and convictions, which arrived first? Truths and dreads – she was finding it hard to breathe.
‘Challice,’ Shardan Lim whispered, suddenly standing close. ‘There were other ways. You could have come to me. If this comes out, you will hang – do you understand me? It will take your father down – the entire House D’Arle. The whole Council will be rocked to its very foundations. Hood’s breath, Challice – if anyone discovers the truth—’
She turned to him and her voice was flat as she said, ‘What truth? What are you talking about, Councillor? My husband has been murdered. I expect you and the Council to conduct an investigation. The assassin must be found and punished. Thank you for taking upon yourself the difficult task of informing me. Now, please, leave me, sir.’
He was studying her as if he had never truly seen her before, and then he stepped away and shook his head. ‘I’d no idea, Challice. That you were this . . .’
‘That I was what, Councillor?’
‘It may be . . . ah, that is, you are within your rights to claim the seat on the Council. Or arrange that someone of your own choosing—’
‘Councillor Lim, such matters must wait. You are being insensitive. Please, will you now leave?’
‘Of course, Lady Challice.’
When he was gone, she stood unmoving, the goblet still in one hand, the spilled wine sticky under her fingers.
A formal investigation. And yes, it would be thorough. Staff would be questioned. Improprieties revealed. Shardan Lim himself . . . yes, it would be occurring to him about now, as he walked the street, and he might well change his destination – no longer back to his house, but to the Orr estate. To arrange, with growing desperation, the covering of his own tracks.
But none of this affected her. Shardan Lim’s fate was meaningless.
She had succeeded. She had achieved precisely what she wanted, the very thing she had begged him to do. For her. For them. But no, for her.
He had killed her husband. Because she had asked him to. And it was now almost certain that he would hang for it. Shardan would talk, pointing the finger so that all eyes shifted away from him, and his accusation would be all fire, blazing with deadly details. And as for her, why, she’d be painted as a foolish young woman. Playing with lowborn but astoundingly ignorant
of just how vicious such creatures could be, when something or someone stood in their way. When obsessive love was involved, especially. Oh, she’d been playing, but that nasty young lowborn thug had seen it differently. And now she would have to live with the fact that her idle game had led to her husband’s murder. Poor child.
Her father would arrive, because he was the sort of father to do just that. He would raise impenetrable walls around her, and personally defend every portico, every bastion. Aim the knife of innuendo towards her and he would step into its path. He would retaliate, ferociously, and the sly sceptics would quickly learn to keep their mouths shut, if they valued their heads.
She would be the eye of the storm, and feel not even a single drop of rain, nor sigh of wind.
Challice set the goblet down. She walked out into the corridor and proceeded without haste back to her bedroom, where she collected the glass globe with its imprisoned moon. And then left once more, this time to the square tower, with its rooms crowded with antique Gadrobi furniture slowly rotting to dust, with its musty draughts sliding up and down the stairs.
I have killed him. I have killed him.
I have killed him.
Hanut Orr adjusted his sword-belt and checked his rapier yet again. He had come close to beating the hapless mine guard to glean every last detail of the events surrounding the assassination of Gorlas Vidikas, and he now believed he had a fair idea of the grisly story behind it. The echoes tasted sour, personal. Once he learned where the first man’s body had been delivered, he knew where this night would take him.
He assembled his four most capable guards and they set out into the city.
Two knives to the chest. Yes, the past never quite went away, did it? Well, finally, he would be able to deliver his long-delayed vengeance. And when he was done there, he would find the one man who was at the centre of all of this. Councillor Coll would not see the dawn.
He dispatched two of his men to Coll’s estate. Watch. Any strangers show up, they don’t reach the damned gate. We are at war tonight. Be ready to kill, am I understood?
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