The Assassins of Thasalon

by Lois McMaster Bujold

“I’m perfectly safe in this company, Sura,” she reproved mildly. Which he must have agreed with, or he wouldn’t have left her side. In a good simulation of a man escorting a woman to inspect the wonders of the palace, he and Alixtra strolled into its further reaches.

  Des, Sight. While Pen had never seen Learned Tronio before in his life, he didn’t need to go by physical descriptions to pick the man out. Which was fortunate, given the number of aging imperial bureaucrats and senior Temple functionaries present, some in Temple vestments. The press of souls in this room was almost painful—anxious or curdled with worldly desires or seething with varied emotions—but there were no demons among them.

  He flared their senses in a wider sweep. Ah—one other demon in the building aside from Alixtra’s Arra, almost as young. Belonging to another Temple sorcerer, probably, but lacking the depth, distortion, and darkness required. Pen would know it when he’d found their quarry. It wasn’t as easy to be sure they weren’t missing him somehow.

  “Tronio’s not in here,” he murmured to his two remaining companions. “Let’s try the next room.”

  There they found and sampled the food and drink advertised, banked up on trestle tables in a display of excess testifying to their host’s wealth, but no stray sorcerers. Someone did find them, however.

  “Oh, Lord Bordane,” said Tanar brightly, combining greeting to him and warning to Pen and Iroki. Pen smiled in a friendly fashion, schooling himself not to react. Iroki, too, held his default mild mien.

  “Lady Tanar, what an unexpected pleasure.”

  Bordane was a middle-sized man in his mid-thirties, typically Cedonian in coloration, albeit with his dark hair dressed in a queue with gilded ribbons, and wearing elaborate robes that must have been uncomfortable in this heat. His face was short of handsome but serviceably well-looking, clean-shaved, and not without intelligence. His soul was stressed, but so were many here, including Tanar’s.

  “I couldn’t pass up the chance to show off to my visitors one of the finest palaces in Thasalon,” said Tanar, no hint of her nerves showing on her surface. She went on to introduce Pen and Iroki by their assumed aliases, if not in a way that would lead inevitably to friendly or at least polite questions.

  The fending failed. “A Wealdean sorcerer?” said Bordane, decoding Pen’s formal garb without difficulty. “What brings you to Thasalon?”

  “Minor Temple business, but I seized the chance to visit your renowned libraries and temples,” said Pen, making sure his Cedonian speech was laced with a noticeable Wealdean accent. “Oh, and I was instructed by my archdivine to bear a message to one Learned Tronio, who I understand is a respected and active Temple assistant in high Cedonian affairs.” Tanar only choked a little. Pen went on, “I was going to seek him through the main chapterhouse of my Order, but it occurs to me—might he be here tonight?” He tried to radiate the air of a man seeking to shortcut an assigned chore that was blocking his more tourist-like ambitions.

  “I saw him earlier, but with so many going in and out, I could well have missed his departure.”

  “Ah, too bad. It will have to be the chapterhouse, then,” said Pen, feigning a lack of disappointment.

  “You two should take a look in the next courtyard,” said Tanar. “It has an especially fine garden fountain.”

  Bordane nodded encouragement. “Lady Tanar, will you walk with me?” he asked, offering his arm.

  “I actually did hope I might get a word with you tonight,” Tanar said, with a pretty air of confession.

  Bordane brightened. Apparently, his last five years had made him a less clumsy and impatient suitor, for he merely said, “I am at your service, Lady Tanar.”

  Pen was fairly sure Bosha would not have liked this, had he been present, but Pen could see no danger to her in a chat with the lord in a space so full of other guests. He accepted his palpable dismissal by the pair, and led Iroki off.

  Inspection of the fountain courtyard, and two others, discovered no Tronio, though they were latched upon by the local Temple sorcerer Pen had sensed earlier, a younger man bearing a demon only one life old. He was quite amazed by Des, and full of questions. Pen spun out a few likely anecdotes about the Bastard’s seminary at the great university at Rosehall in the Weald, easy enough since he’d attended there for three years in his youth before being granted his degree as a divine—his first, Des’s fifth. The fellow knew of Tronio, and spoke of admiration for his skills, but was too young to be of his set. He’d noticed their target here before the speeches, but not after. Pen peeled him off with difficulty, making false promises to further their acquaintance later in his visit.

  “Your disguise was a pretty shrewd choice, looks like,” murmured Iroki. The other sorcerer had accepted Pen’s story without hesitation, though he’d obviously been uncomfortably aware of Iroki without quite knowing why, the god, thankfully, not being anywhere near immanent within the saint presently. Pen had once been sternly told by another saint that the god did not come when called like a dog, but only in His own chosen time. Pen hoped—all right, prayed—the Bastard would appear when needed.

  “Seems so,” agreed Pen. “What now? Further in?” Could Tronio be closeted in some private apartment on business—or pleasure, for that matter?

  Easily, opined Des.

  Though probably not in the servants’ quarters where Alixtra and Bosha had gone to seek Kittio. He hoped they’d found the boy safe and slipped him out of the palace by now. The plan had been to connect mother and son with one of the waiting Xarre wickermen, and send them off at once to be taken back to hiding at the Xarre mansion. Depending on how events played out in the other part of the night’s scheme, the rest of them would all rendezvous there by midnight. Maybe.

  Pen thought they had left Tanar for far too long, but she was much more in her milieu here than anyone except Bosha, and less likely than him to find trouble. Pen and Iroki tried several more courtyards and levels, including, somewhat by accident, descent into a labyrinthine cellar complex, definitely servants’ territory. Despite his dark-sight making the blacker corridors readily navigable to him—Iroki gripped Pen’s shoulder for guidance in a few pitchy stretches—Pen was starting to wonder if they could find their way out again.

  Coming out of one passage they stumbled upon the vaulted cisterns, sounds weirdly echoing off their walls and waters, air clammy and cool. This had to mark the lowest possible level of their explorations, apart from maybe the sewer drains, which Pen didn’t think he needed to check.

  Thank you, murmured Des dryly. Are you ready to give up this fruitless hunt yet? I really don’t think Tronio is still here.

  I’m afraid I agree. And curse it. His quest for the sorcerer was bound to become more dangerous once the man was alerted by Kittio’s disappearance that things were starting to go very wrong. Methani would be riled, too.

  Time to go find one of those stairways back up that they’d passed in the black corridors. The first flight they came to would do as well as any, as they could sort out their location better once on the surface. Penric wheeled, brushing at a fog-like tendril trying to caress his face—not a vapor risen off the silk-dark cistern. Half-a-dozen harmless old ghost smudges had attached themselves to Iroki in the course of their search and were following him around like stray dogs trailing a butcher’s wagon, which he’d endured with his usual patience.

  And then, abruptly, they were found by something not like that.

  The agitated ghost was so fresh and well-defined he might have been mistaken for a man still alive, apart from being translucent and leached of color. He appeared to be some age around sixty, hair receding from his forehead, his coiled queue behind probably gray even before this transformation, running a little to fat, beardless. He still wore the memory of the elaborate clothes and jeweled rings he’d died in. They’d seen many men of the type upstairs, although not him.

  He pawed frantically at Iroki, mouthing voiceless words that Pen could almost lip-read. He turned around and around, arms waving i
n protest and rage. His striking fists passed like faint drafts from the cistern through the material bodies of the live men he’d accosted.

  “Woah,” said Iroki, stepping back. The revenant followed, swarming him. “That’s a new turn for me.”

  “Only just died,” said Pen, who had seen the like before. “Or only just killed. Not a natural death, not even a sudden one. This feels like murder.”

  Iroki glanced toward the ceiling. “At a party?”

  “Has to be.”

  “Looks too old to be the sort to get into a fight like the young bravos.”

  “Aye, I don’t think that was it.”

  Iroki studied the ghost. “He should have been taken up by his god by now. Too shocked to assent?”

  “Some like that are. They usually calm down enough by their funerals to be gated through by the ceremonies. There’s this varied period in which they can still be saved if they’re helped to it, before they start to lose so much of themselves that they are incapable of assent. Or ascent. I’ve done that kind of funeral invocation a few times. And been answered, more than once.” He looked sideways at Iroki, still uncomfortably being pawed at. “I’d imagine your prayers would be even better.”

  “Only for the one god. Eh. I can try, I guess.” After a moment’s thought, he lowered himself to his knees in a prayer of supplication, hands up, fingers spread wide. To Pen, the formal posture always looked like a person desperately surrendering on a battlefield. Which might not be so wrong.

  After a few meditative breaths, Iroki’s abstracted expression grew peculiarly serene, a faint almost-smile turning his lips that made the hairs try to rise on the back of Pen’s neck. The cellar setting reminded him of the bottle dungeon, also the lowest pit of a life’s trials. Could he hope for a similar boundless mercy to flow here? The ghost was still raging.

  “Oh,” said Iroki after a moment. “My.”

  Not the resonant, unmistakable voice of the god himself, entrancing and terrifying. The mix of disappointment and relief at this left Pen vaguely faint.

  Iroki thumped back on his heels, gazing in wonder at the ghost. “That one is sundered.”

  “I can see that.”

  “No… It’s not that he’s not assenting. In fact, I’d say he’s downright demanding. But the god won’t have him.”

  “A soul that the Bastard won’t take? That’d call for some heroically bad behavior on the part of our late companion, here.”

  “I couldn’t feel any of the rest of the Five trying to reach out, either. I sometimes sort of can, not clear like my god though. But this was just… empty. Scary empty. Not an empty street—the street itself gone. Like stepping out the door and your feet hitting air.”

  Pen swallowed against the growing cold in the pit of his stomach. “Do you think that ghost could be Methani himself?”

  “That seems… likely, come to think about it,” said Iroki. “I’ve seen a lot of old sundered spirits, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen one as sundered as that fellow.” Nervously, he licked his lips. “None too happy about it, neither.”

  “You know,” said Pen in unease, “I think we need to get out of here. Collect Tanar and leave this palace as fast as we can. If it’s Methani—well, any of those men, but especially if it’s Methani—and his body hasn’t been discovered already, it will be soon, and then this place is going to be thrown into so much chaos…”

  “Ayup,” Iroki agreed, climbing to his feet. “Which way?”

  “That, I think,” said Pen, pointing up the black corridor they’d come in by. “There were stone stairs around that first turning.”

  They walked together, steps quickening. To Pen’s dismay, the sundered ghost followed them, or at least Iroki, dogging his heels like the most obnoxious of whining beggars.

  “Think he’ll try to come home with us?” Iroki asked in worry as they discovered the stairs. He kept his hand on Pen’s back as they climbed through the dark. It was shaking.

  “Gods, I hope not. I think he was very attached to his palace, so maybe he’ll stick here.”

  A door opened at last onto a small back court; the stars overhead and the few lanterns were among the most welcome light ever to greet Pen’s eyes. They jogged toward an archway that seemed to be the right direction, judging from the murmur of voices seeping through it. No screams yet.

  “When we get among the people,” Pen panted, and not from the exertion, “we should walk. And pretend like we’re not seeing, um, him.” Which wasn’t going to be easy, as the gray image raved around and around them.

  “Right,” said Iroki. He kept his eyes forward, trying not to flinch at the violent, if substance-less, movements.

  To Pen’s relief, they found Tanar promptly in the entry court, seated on a stone bench and chatting somewhat distractedly with another woman, who was wriggling her feet in her jeweled sandals as if she’d been standing on them too long, probably the case. Tanar looked up, her face brightening, as they approached. She didn’t, thankfully, seem to sense their ghostly follower in any way, though the thing redoubled its frenzy. If any other of the Sighted present glanced this way, it would be a disaster. Get out of here before that happened…

  Pen’s “It’s time to go,” crossed Tanar’s “We should leave now.”

  She bade a polite farewell to her seatmate and rose to her feet. “Did you find what you were looking for?”

  “No. Unfortunately. We’ll have to hunt another day. We found something else, though. Tell you about it later.”

  “Sura left with Alixtra, right?” Tanar asked anxiously.

  Pen scanned the chamber for Bosha, not finding him. If he’d been here, he’d surely have joined his lady. “The last I saw of them was when they went to carry out her errand. But we need to leave now regardless. I’m sure they’ll catch up with us later.”

  To Pen’s surprise, Tanar didn’t argue with this. “Yes. Let’s go. Maybe the wickermen will have word.” She swept toward the exit with all the directness Pen could have wished.

  To his intense gratitude, their personal haunt fell behind at the steps. After miming wails, it turned to float disconsolately back to the entry court, seeking someone else to vent its futile fury at perhaps. Pen wondered if that young sorcerer was still present. He was in for a nasty surprise, if so.

  Wicker carts were lined up neatly along the street outside, their haulers variously dozing on the seats to await their patrons, chatting or dicing with each other, or gone off to a nearby tavern to wait till called for. A similar number of horse-drawn carriages would have made a congested, noisy, and manure-strewn mess. They found a lone Xarre cart about halfway along the row. The tabarded wickerman jumped up and saluted Tanar.

  Tanar’s gaze searched for the second cart. “Did Master Bosha return?”

  “Yes, my lady, a while back. He sent the lady guest—she had a strange boy with her—on home. Was, uh, he supposed to?”

  “Yes. But where did he go?”

  “Back inside. To look for you, I’d thought.”

  “I didn’t see him.” She glanced back up the palace steps and bit her lip, clearly torn by conflicting desires.

  “He has money on him, yes?” said Pen uneasily.

  “Of course.”

  “So he could hire a chair or a cart himself to get home. Or walk, if he doesn’t mind a long hike and getting his fine boots dirty.” As she continued to dither, he went on, “You at least should go home, and see to Alixtra. Iroki can ride escort.”

  “Will you stay and find him?” she asked Pen.

  Pen couldn’t think of anything he wanted to do less. In the face of this hesitation Tanar added quickly, “Do you have enough coin for a cart yourself?” She reached for the purse at her waist.

  Pen held up a stemming hand. “Yes, no need—” As the big hazel eyes silently beseeched him, he folded. “Yes, I’ll find him.”

  Hooo boy, muttered Des.

  Right. At least he wouldn’t be going back in there alone…

  He helped
Tanar and the saint into their cart seat, murmuring to Iroki, “Tell Tanar and Lady Xarre everything. But wait until you have her safely back.”

  “Understood.”

  The wickerman expertly turned his cart about, took his place at the drawing shafts, and trotted off into the city night. As willing to get home as any horse, Pen expected.

  With an ocean-deep reluctance, Pen made his way back to the palace steps.

  Chapter 13

  In the entry court, the development Pen had feared—well, one of them—was in full spate. The shocked young Thasalon sorcerer had been fastened upon by the frenzied ghost, which was batting and silently screaming at him.

  The sorcerer looked up. “There! That’s the man!” He pointed at Pen.

  Pen jerked back.

  Hold, said Des intently. He can’t know anything.

  “There is a ghost here, there is!” cried the fellow, almost in tears.

  A little crowd of men and women around him were trying to soothe him, apparently under the impression that he was very drunk or possibly hallucinating. “Calm down, young man,” said one, and “Fetch a physician,” another urged over his shoulder. A cadre of uniformed palace guardsmen had been discreetly circulating all evening, with the duty of quashing any troubles among the guests from excessive wine-sickness to violent altercations. A couple of them drifted to over to see what was happening.

  “The Wealdean sorcerer! He can testify I’m telling the truth!”

  Pen gulped and trod forward. Why this Thasalon crowd would look to a total stranger rather than one of their own, Pen wasn’t sure, apart from the fellow’s youth, and, yes, state of inebriation. But there were sound reasons why three Temple sensitives had to cross-certify any uncanny accusation or evidence brought to an official judgment. Pen supposed two was a start.

  Pen manufactured a look of surprise, remembering just in time to color his measured speech with that Wealdean accent. “I’m afraid he’s right. I don’t know the deceased, but it appears to be an older man, quite distraught. As ghosts sometimes are, when death is sudden and the disruption of it prevents them from immediately reaching their god.”