Skirmish: A House War Novel

by West, Michelle

  He reached out, carefully, and lifted Jewel’s left sleeve, examining its hem, its weight, the fabric itself. He lifted it, exposed its sheen to as much sunlight as a crowded green let in, and slowly let it fall before he moved—still on his knees—toward the train. This, he touched with at least as much care, paying particular attention to the beaded crystal, the gold embroidery, the onyx stones that anchored the single strip of black.

  “The cape,” he said, rising, “does not suit.”

  She almost laughed; for a moment he sounded like Haval.

  “But the dress is acceptable?” She reached out and very, very firmly placed a hand on the head of her cat—a cat the guildmaster had failed to notice. Nor had he looked up at the trees, or at Celleriant. He had eyes for nothing, at the moment, but the dress itself.

  “The dress is, in my opinion, a Work,” he replied. “I do not believe I have ever seen this fabric before—and I have inspected many, many varieties in my time in the guild. The beading does not seem to adhere to the dress by something as workmanlike as thread; nor does the onyx. ATerafin, I ask you again, where did you get this dress?”

  Jewel surrendered. “Snow,” she said, “This is Master ADelios, one of the most important men in the Empire.”

  The master so indicated frowned, blinked, and shook his head. “That’s a rather large cat,” he said.

  “He is. The dress was a gift, however, from him.”

  The blinking grew far more pronounced. “You are serious.”

  She nodded. Snow was watching the guildmaster with far more concentration than his norm; it made Jewel nervous. She kept her hand where it was, and briefly considered the advantage of collars and leashes. The disadvantage—mostly attempting to put one on—outweighed it, possibly by a lot.

  “Does that cat have wings?” the Guildmaster asked.

  “He does.”

  “My eyes are not what they used to be, and I was preoccupied. You are saying this cat made this dress?”

  “Yesss,” Snow replied.

  The Guildmaster blinked and turned to the silent woman who waited at his elbow, looking like the patron saint of patience in one temple or another. She nodded without speaking.

  “You made this, yourself?”

  “Ye-ess.”

  He frowned. “May I ask where you came from?” As if talking to a giant, winged cat, while disconcerting, was within the realm of his usual reality. Jewel had always heard rumors that Artisans trod the very fine line between sanity and insanity.

  “Pardon?”

  “Where did you come from? This dress—it speaks of Winter. Or the end of Winter—at night. It hints at loss, but at dawn; it speaks, Snow. Did you do that? Did you make such a thing?”

  It was Snow’s turn to blink. Jewel, however, glanced at Avandar, and then her attention was caught by Celleriant. If the guildmaster hadn’t noticed the Arianni Lord, the Arianni Lord now noticed him. He was silent as he moved to stand closer to Jewel. But it wasn’t for her protection; he was watching the maker-born man with as intent a fascination as she’d ever seen him show for the merely mortal. “My Lord,” he said to Jewel. “Might I speak with the stranger?”

  Jewel hesitated, but nodded as Master Gilafas ADelios finally noticed Lord Celleriant of the Winter Court and the Wild Hunt. The older man’s jaw fell open as if it were broken. He turned back to Jewel. “This—this man—he serves you?”

  “He does.”

  “Do you know what he is?”

  “She does,” Celleriant answered. “But the wonder to me, Guildmaster, is that you do; you see it clearly. You understand what you see.” He took a step forward and said, “When have you walked in the Winter realm?”

  “I—I—”

  “You don’t need to answer that question,” Jewel said, taking one of his arms—his shaking arms—in both of her hands, as if he were in need of support. She glanced much more pointedly at the young attendant, but the attendant stood meekly by, watching the guildmaster’s expression with a mixture of resignation and fear.

  ADelios, for his part, seemed to be unaware of either Jewel’s hands or her words; he didn’t pull away; he didn’t acknowledge them at all. His expression was odd; he wasn’t afraid of Celleriant, although he had a clear idea of what or who he was. “I saw the Winter Queen,” he told the Arianni Lord.

  “And you yet live?”

  “I know some part of how to walk that road in safety, if such a thing is truly possible,” was the more dignified response. “But I lost—I lost someone—there. I lost an—” he shook his head. “Have you come from the Court of the Queen?”

  “I have come from the Queen’s host, but I will not return to her side unless—or until—Jewel ATerafin is dead.”

  “How long have you served her?” he asked, pressing his point as if Celleriant presented no danger at all.

  “For some mortal weeks,” Celleriant replied. He wasn’t angry; he was, if Jewel was any judge of the immortal, curious.

  “Then you were with the Queen of Winter until that time?”

  “I was.”

  The guildmaster closed his eyes, tilting his head upward, as if seeking sunlight, or the warmth of its promise. Eyes still closed, he said, “Were there mortals among you?”

  “There were those who were once mortal.”

  At that, ADelios opened his eyes. He was pale. “I will not play games with you, but I will make you an offer instead.”

  Both of Celleriant’s brows rose. “An…offer?”

  “Answer my questions. Answer them truthfully.”

  “In return?”

  “I will make you any object it is within my power to make.”

  Jewel almost stopped breathing. She glanced, wide-eyed, at her liege. It had never occurred to her that the autocratic and somewhat unfriendly guildmaster of the richest guild in the Empire might desire any information that Celleriant had; he wasn’t a mage, and study of the ancient was in no way his specialty. Nor did his words imply that that was his interest; there was an edge of desperation to them.

  “You are maker-born,” Celleriant said.

  “I am. I am the Guildmaster of the Guild of Makers—an entirely mortal organization, I’m afraid.”

  “The talent-born are entirely mortal,” Celleriant replied. “And of the talents, it is the strangest. Very well. I will entertain your questions, and if I do not feel that they impede my oaths or my duties, I will answer them.”

  “A mortal girl entered the Winter realm when the roads were passable.”

  “The roads are very seldom passable to the merely mortal. I will not lie to you, Guildmaster; I have some respect for the makers. If I cannot answer your questions, I will ask for no boon. But if I can, remember what you have promised.”

  ADelios managed to look offended, but it was a shabby display; Haval would have smacked the back of Jewel’s head for such transparent acting. “It was several years ago. She—she had a task set her. She was not merely maker; she was Artisan, and of a power that only legend now contains. She was young. She was not beautiful, not in the—”

  “Beauty is not a shared language between our kind,” Celleriant said, in a much softer voice. “You cared for her.” It was not a question.

  The old man—and he seemed old, now—smiled bitterly. “She was in my care, yes. I am not certain why she chose to venture upon the hidden roads; she did not speak often of her gift or her compulsion. But she lived in Fabril’s reach, with me.”

  “Fabril?” Celleriant said. “You almost make me feel young again, Guildmaster.”

  “Fabril is dead, of course. But he created some part of the building which the guildhall now occupies.”

  “That would explain much. She came to the road, and she met my kin?”

  “She walked to the road with two broken artifacts, and she remade them. I did not ask her how; I’m not sure she could answer in a way that would make any sense to anyone who was not maker-born.”

  “You fear they killed her.”

 
“I—” he looked away. “I am certain she is still alive.”

  Celleriant frowned. “Did this mortal girl cause harm?”

  “She did.”

  “To the host of the Queen?”

  “Yes.”

  “How?”

  “I believe she cut them down. With a sword.”

  Jewel was staring at the maker. “How is that even possible?” she finally asked.

  But Celleriant said, “I know how, ATerafin. I think I might even understand why.”

  “Then explain it to me,” the guildmaster said. “She was not—I would swear she was not—a violent child; she was not willful except in the way the maker-born are. I remember the carnage—”

  “She could not do what she had to do if she did not kill.” Celleriant’s smile was cold and slender. “We are not close in the ways mortals often are; we do not huddle together for company or our own protection. That is not the way of my kind. But we understand some of the forces behind the greater workings. We have our own craftsmen, our own artists—and art, like love, is in the eye of the beholder.

  “Nothing great is worked or made without cost. Nothing. And I believe I know what she wandered the path to make—or remake. No, have no fear; I will not mention her task further. But I will tell you this, although I do not think it will grant you any peace. She could not complete her making without bloodshed. Had she not been upon the Winter road, she might have walked in abandon through your mortal streets, and untold numbers of your kind would have perished before the blade could be quenched.

  “I remember the moon and the road of that night. I remember the girl.”

  “What happened to her?”

  “She gave the items so precious to her into the keeping of another mortal, one less foolish, and far less driven, than she. They were the only things she might use to survive if harm was intended, but it was not her own survival that was her concern—and it has ever been that way among the maker-born. You are that mortal?”

  ADelios bowed his head.

  “Then I will tell you only this: she is not dead. She is alive. I cannot say she is happy, because that has no meaning. But it is Winter, and the seasons have not turned. They would drive a normal mortal mad, but the Artisans have always been mad; they are immune to the fixed season, and they see things in the snow and hear words in the wind; they see, in the shapes of trees and the fall of shadows something to grasp and take and change.

  “Will she—will she return to us?”

  “Can she resurrect the dead? No. She will never return to you. But in some fashion, she may find peace, and in some fashion, Guildmaster, she may be of great aid to us in the war to follow.”

  “And if I asked if I might see her again?”

  “Then you ask about the hidden ways, the Winter road, and you are aware of the risks involved.” Celleriant glanced at Jewel. “The roads will not long remain hidden, Guildmaster. If you seek to find her again, you must ask my Lord for her mercy.”

  “The Winter Queen—”

  “I told you; I serve Jewel ATerafin, until her death. It is she who can grant what you desire—but at a cost that she at least does not fully understand yet.”

  Jewel, whose hands were still around the older man’s arm, said, “It is not yet time, Gilafas ADelios. But the time will come, and you will know it. Come to me then, if you can.” Unfortunately for Jewel, those weren’t the words she’d intended to say, and she had no idea where they’d come from; she just knew, as they ended, that they were the truth.

  He accepted them that way, as well; any other man of power and political cunning would have been all over the words in an attempt to pick them apart. She did not understand this man at all. Had he not been such a significant power, it wouldn’t have mattered. She let go of his arm as he turned—but he turned toward her and caught both of her hands in his.

  “Don’t thank me,” she told him, before he could speak. “It’s not with me that you made your agreement—and I can’t imagine that Lord Celleriant will ask for something small or inconsequential in return.”

  But the guildmaster shook his head. “If you can, indeed, give me the opportunity to see that child again—to apologize to her—I will be forever in your debt.” He released her hands and pulled back, dropping into a bow that would have caused Haval to cringe. Clearly, if one had enough money, anything was acceptable.

  “I very much like your dress, ATerafin,” he finally said, before he allowed himself to be dragged off.

  “There is more to this city than I would have thought possible,” Celleriant said softly, once the guildmaster was beyond sight.

  “There’s probably more to any mortal city of any size than you’d think possible,” was Jewel’s sharp reply. She had watched the guildmaster walk away, and she had watched, with consternation, the way the gathered members of her House now looked at her. She wondered how much they’d seen or what they’d heard, and what they now made of it, because Gilafas ADelios bowed to very, very few, and most of those had crowns of one sort or another on their heads.

  “Well done, ATerafin,” Avandar said quietly, which only compounded her sense of unease. He glanced at Lord Celleriant. “Fabril’s sword and rod?” he asked; his voice barely carried.

  Celleriant raised a brow, and rewarded him with the hint of a smile. “You are perceptive, Viandaran. At a later point, you might explain it to our Lord; she does not understand all of what was said.”

  “She does understand that she’s been talked about as if she’s not actually here, on the other hand,” Jewel said sourly.

  Angel, who had been quiet throughout the long morning, laughed. She was surprised by the sound, surprised for a moment to see him standing to one side of the tree, watching, a half smile on his face.

  “I was wondering,” he said, as she walked toward him, “if the dress had entirely absorbed you.”

  She raised a brow and he laughed. “I guess not?”

  “No. But you look impressively intimidating, if that counts.”

  “It counts for something,” she replied. “But I think it might be expensive in future.”

  “The future,” Angel told her, with a grave nod to the terrace, “has arrived in force.”

  The Ten had come.

  Haval watched Jewel discreetly as the first of The Ten—in order of arrival, and not, in Haval’s opinion, significance—made his way down the terraced steps. The Wayelyn was dressed in a somber suit that was appropriate for the occasion, itself a bit of a surprise. The least powerful of The Ten in any practical measure, he was also the most wont to shed, as he called them, the restrictions of the patriciate. On the other hand, his House Council had gathered about him like vengeful schoolmasters; where he looked slightly ill at ease, they looked watchful. The Wayelyn was the first of The Ten to see Jewel ATerafin.

  He was also the first to stop dead in his tracks; his sudden lack of motion a deliberate choice, and one that garnered attention. The one thing the man could do at whim was draw such attention; he did it unconsciously, the way his more mature counterparts in the Hall of The Ten drew breath. Haval had never paid particular attention to House Wayelyn; he considered the ambitions of its putative head to be, if not beneath notice, then unworthy of his full intellectual rigor.

  The head of the House, in his black and white—colors which did not, admittedly, suit him—immediately made his way toward where Jewel now stood. Various members of the House, and various merchant houses, had made their way toward her on one pretext or another; at least three were trading rivals of some minor note, in his opinion. They had, of course, withdrawn, given the nature of the occasion—but they had not withdrawn so as to be out of line of sight of her.

  She was not, lamentably, aware of this; Haval, however, was.

  “I trust you are enjoying the view?”

  Haval raised a brow at the Lord of the Compact. “I would thank you not to stand there; you are blocking my light.”

  “Very clever. I imagine that you are not yet queu
ed to join the mourners?”

  “I am very, very far down the list, as you are no doubt well aware; I have, however, been cleared for access as a modest clothier with an unimpeachable reputation.”

  Duvari’s expression soured further, although most would not have noticed the change; Duvari was not a man given to any expression that implied friendliness. Or humanity. It was one of the qualities that Haval admired. Haval considered himself too lazy to adopt such a formidable and severe bearing for any length of time; it was far too much work for the very meager amount of information he might obtain. No, Haval’s preferred methods were ones he had long practiced. He liked to observe.