Vallista--A Novel of Vlad Taltos

by Steven Brust

  “It’s pretty much the magic focus for the entire place.”

  “I guess it could be. But I don’t know any details. I haven’t made much of a study of sorcery, beyond what everyone knows.”

  It’s hard to explain to someone what you don’t understand yourself. “Okay,” I said. “I’ve got some of it. The manor wasn’t built here, it appeared here. I put that together when I saw all the dead plants—never mind. I found a cave, with sorcerous markings on it, that was, well … think of it as an anchor, all right? They built it, and one of the parts of it had to—”

  I broke off.

  “What?” she said after a moment.

  “I think I have it,” I said. “Paths, hallways, doors, necromantic mirrors. The mirrors provide a way to turn physical motion into motion through worlds, which sometimes means through time. That’s how it got here. There are places it is anchored—like the cave under the cellar, and the Halls of Judgment, and the place in the past where they started construction. The mirrors work like Morrolan’s windows—”

  “What?”

  “Uh, never mind. The thing is, all the pathways in the manor, controlled by the mirrors, are sort of, well, think of it like they’re stacked on top of each other. Zhayin’s idea is to be able to make additional pathways to different worlds, that you can reach just by opening a door or walking down a hall.”

  I felt myself frowning. “Only, he hasn’t done it yet. All he has is a way to reach the Halls, the future out from the courtyard, and the past—the anchors. He hasn’t built any of the pathways, just a lot of places where they can go, which is why right now they turn into just odd rooms placed in strange places; it’s like he set up a bunch of sheaths but hasn’t put the daggers in them yet. Why hasn’t he? Oh, right. Harro said the manor had just recently been completed.

  She nodded. “Two days ago is when we shifted. I’ve been living in the manor for years and years, but it was next to the old castle, by the river, and then we were suddenly here.”

  “That’s it, then,” I said. “Time.”

  “Pardon?”

  “Pathways in space are pathways in time, when you’re going between worlds. I’m sure if the Necromancer were here she could explain it so it made sense, but that’s the best I can do.”

  “I don’t—”

  “It’s all about Tethia, and you, and Harro, and Gormin.”

  “I’ve never met Tethia.”

  “Yes, exactly. Because she died, you see.”

  “When?”

  “Yes, exactly. When. When and where. That’s the part that’s hard to wrap my head around, but it sort of makes sense.”

  “You’ve lost me.”

  “Tethia died here, in the manor, in the past, but was trapped in the now.”

  She shook her head.

  “Try it this way: Tethia was involved in casting those spells for a couple of hundred years. You never met her, because her part of things involved being in the future.”

  “The future?”

  “Uh, the then future, the now now.”

  “I don’t, wait, I think I see what you mean. She did her work here, near Adrilankha, in the time and place where the manor was going to be.”

  “Yes, casting the spells that would allow it to exist.”

  “But how did she get here? How did she move through time that way?”

  “My head hurts.”

  “Sorry.”

  “No, it’s okay. I’m working it out, I think. Try this: She didn’t really move through time. In the Halls of Judgment, there are a lot of times and places to choose from, maybe an infinite number, I don’t know. But while Zhayin was overseeing the building of the physical structure, Tethia was spending her time in the Halls of Judgment, making the magical connections that corresponded to it. When they were both done, the manor appeared here.”

  “But Tethia was…”

  “Yeah, okay. She was in the Halls of Judgment, with her spells following pathways to here and now, and she was here and now, with spells sending pathways to the Halls.”

  “But you said she wasn’t traveling in time. That’s where I’m lost.”

  “Yeah, me too.”

  I really did feel like I was on the verge of a headache. You know that feeling that hits you when you put the pieces of a puzzle together and it all instantly makes sense? I like that better. “Okay,” I said, speaking slowly as it worked its way through my skull, “In the Halls, in the travel between worlds, time and place are part of the same thing. So, if she was in the Halls, she could find a place that was a time. That’s what she was connecting the manor to. You can think of it as a place and a time above us, that touches our own. That’s why she kept calling it a platform.”

  “That sort of makes sense. But then, what happened to her?”

  “That’s what I’m going to find out.”

  She nodded. “There’s a sorcerer here. Maybe—”

  “Discaru. Yeah. He wasn’t helpful. And I’m pretty sure he’s no longer around.”

  “Oh?”

  I took that as an invitation to tell her more and declined by not saying anything. She seemed to think that was an excellent choice, and did the same. I broke first. “How are you?”

  “M’lord?”

  “With what I told you. About Gormin and Harro. How are you doing with it?”

  “It’ll take some time to settle in.”

  “Will it be hard to act normal with Harro? I mean, if you even want to?”

  “I don’t know.”

  I shook my head. “I just don’t understand it. I can’t wrap my head around it.”

  “Around what?”

  “You two. You and Gormin, I mean. You’re together, all is well, then his House changes, and, boom, everything’s different. It isn’t even that his station changed, because it didn’t. It’s just his House. How can you let that—”

  She was quiet for a few seconds as I broke off and stared into space. Then she said, “What?”

  I shook my head, my brain spinning. “That’s it,” I said finally. “It all ties together. The Houses. The Cycle. The Empire. The Disaster. Stagnation. Catalyst. All of it.”

  She waited patiently until I started to get up, then she said, “Vlad, you can’t just leave it like that.” Her tone was one of amusement, but she had a point. I sat down again.

  “Sorry. Too much, too fast. And, yeah, this affects you.”

  “How? What?”

  “I don’t think I can explain it, except to say that you—I mean Dragaerans, all of you—have been fu—messed with. And it permeates everything you do, even who you let yourself love, and it was done deliberately by the Jenoine because they wanted to see what would happen.”

  “Ah.…”

  “You’re very nice. You don’t want to say ‘You’re crazy.’ That’s sweet.”

  She put on an Issola smile, but didn’t say I was wrong.

  “Okay, believe it or not, whatever. A lot of this I’ve known for years, some of it is new and I’m putting it together, and my head is spinning. But just tell me this: why is it so unthinkable to marry someone from another House?”

  “Well, because … you wouldn’t understand.”

  “No, I wouldn’t. But the odd thing is, you don’t either. You know it, you feel it, but you don’t understand it.”

  She looked at me, then slowly returned her eyes to the stage.

  “Sorry,” I said. “This must be making you uncomfortable.”

  She said, “Maybe we should talk about your problem.”

  “Sure.”

  “Maybe if you explain it? I mean, what exactly you’re trying to do.”

  I shrugged. “All right. There’s a girl named Devera. She was born in the Halls of Judgment. Her grandmother is a goddess, her—”

  “Which goddess?”

  “Verra. Her father is the shade of Kieron the Conqueror.”

  “Go on.”

  I blinked. All right, well, if she was just going to accept all that as if it were
reasonable, I might as well tell her the rest. I went through the conversations I’d had, the things I’d seen, the oddness of the room design, my conclusion about Lady Zhayin, and about the mirrors. She didn’t say anything, but nodded at a few of my conclusions, and winced when I spoke of killing Discaru and the thing that had once been Zhayin’s son.

  When I’d finished, she was quiet for a long time, then she said, “Devera.”

  “What about her?”

  “You described Devera appearing and disappearing. Why does she keep doing that?”

  “Um. Yeah. I guess I just thought, well, because of her nature.”

  “That doesn’t answer the question though, does it?”

  “No, I suppose it doesn’t. You’re right.”

  “So?”

  “So, you’ve got me asking the right question, now how do I figure out the answer?”

  “I can’t help you with that.”

  “Every time you say you can’t help me, it means I’m about to learn something.”

  She smiled at the stage. “I think that’s more you than me.”

  “Maybe. Well, okay. It isn’t just her nature, or she’d do it all the time. And it isn’t just the manor, or it would be happening to everyone.”

  “Which means?”

  “It’s the interaction.”

  She nodded.

  I laughed. “Well, good then. In order to understand how the place works, I need to figure out why Devera keeps disappearing, which I can do as soon as I’ve figured out how the place works.”

  She smiled at the stage again. I wondered if the balcony was getting jealous. She said, “Well, none of the rest of us vanish. That gives you lots of people to talk to.”

  I chuckled. “That’s true. Polite of you. Except…”

  “What?”

  “Tethia.”

  “What about her?”

  “She also vanished abruptly.”

  “But, isn’t she a ghost? You said she was a ghost. I mean, ghosts do that, right?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve only ever met one before this.”

  She nodded. “And I’ve never met any.”

  “And I think she’s pretty much confined to that one room, whether she’s a ghost or whatever else she is.”

  Hevlika nodded. “That makes sense.”

  “So I guess I’ll go talk to her.”

  She nodded.

  “I doubt I’ll run into you again.”

  “It’s been a pleasure.”

  “Thank you. For dancing.”

  She smiled and nodded, and I went through the door.

  * * *

  I had a theory.

  I returned to the room where I’d slept, grabbed the rope hanging from the ceiling and pulled it twice, and waited. The wait went on far longer than it should have; I was about to conclude that my theory was wrong, or else you just can’t find good servants, when Gormin appeared, looking hesitant.

  “Sir? You rang twice.”

  “Yeah.”

  “The call for Harro is once, and for me it is three times, so I was uncertain—”

  “My mistake. I meant you.”

  “Very good, sir.”

  “Who is two?”

  “No one, at present.”

  “Of course. I’d like to speak with you. Want to sit?”

  “I’d prefer to stand, sir.”

  I knew he’d say that, but I had to ask. I sat down in the chair. It was like a repetition of the little drama I’d played out with Harro just an hour before. Or maybe that was the rehearsal, and this was the performance.

  I said, “You remember me, don’t you?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I mean, from before, when you drugged me and tried to interrogate me.”

  He stared over my shoulder and was silent.

  “Answer,” I said. “Do you remember me?”

  “I didn’t recognize you at first. And then I wasn’t sure.”

  “But now you do, and you are.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Good. I’m not altogether pleased about that, you know. Especially because to me it was only yesterday. But you suspected that, didn’t you?”

  He did his “staring over my shoulder” thing again. If he kept that up I was going to get irritated.

  “Answer me,” I said. “Did you suspect that?”

  He nodded.

  “So you know about paths through time.”

  “I—know there are odd things. There are rooms we are not permitted to visit, and restrictions as to with whom we can speak. And I’ve known for a long time that my lord Zhayin was working to solve the problem of a structure that could reach other worlds.”

  “But not that he’d solved it?”

  “Not then,” he said.

  “When?”

  “Two days ago, I heard a scream. I tried to see where it came from and became lost. Eventually I reached a window, and we were on a cliff.”

  “And that was your first clue that the entire manor had moved?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Who screamed?”

  “I don’t know, sir. I asked Discaru if he knew anything and he told me it was none of my concern.”

  Well. Salute me and call me General. I hadn’t expected that. A mysterious scream, just as the manor is appearing at its new location. Another piece fell into place. I let it buzz around in my head for a minute, then I said, “Well, interesting as that is, it isn’t what I wanted to talk to you about.”

  He cleared his throat. “No, I imagine not.”

  “And it isn’t about the unpleasantness when we met before, either.”

  “Sir?”

  “It’s about Hevlika.”

  His jaw clenched, and he again fixed his eyes over my shoulder. I waited it out, and he said, “What about her?” His voice was a lot smaller.

  “I know what happened. I know who had you expelled from the House.”

  “Yes,” he said. “Harro. He was in love with her.”

  I blinked. And there was another surprise. “Okay,” I said. “I hadn’t expected you to know that. When did you find out?”

  “When he appeared. I suppose a couple hundred years ago.”

  “Have you talked to him?”

  “There didn’t seem to be anything to say, sir.”

  “And you never spoke to her about it?”

  “How could I?”

  “Yeah, how could you. Tell me something else.”

  “Sir?”

  “The food. It comes from the old castle, doesn’t it?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “The servants cook it, bring it through the mirror room?”

  He nodded.

  “Why?”

  “Sir?”

  “Why not bring staff here? There’s a really nice kitchen, a big pantry. Why not use it?”

  “I don’t know, sir.”

  “Good. Yes. Perfect.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “No, but I think I might be starting to.”

  “What—?”

  “No, don’t ask. It’s bubbling around in my head, and there are still things I don’t get. But it’s the mirrors, and it’s Discaru, and it’s Zhayin. And it’s the front door.”

  “The front door, sir?”

  “When I first spoke with Zhayin, he was surprised that I was able to get in, and he was surprised that the front door wouldn’t open. Had you ever gone in or out of that door?”

  “Of course. Many times.”

  “I mean, since the manor arrived here on the cliff.”

  “Oh. No, I haven’t had occasion to.”

  “Right. And what about the other door?”

  “Sir? What other door?”

  “Exactly. A house this size with only one door to the outside?”

  “Well, there is the door to the courtyard.”

  “Yeah. And there’s one on the side that goes to—have you ever gone out that one?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Don�
�t. It’s disturbing.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Necromantic paths to alternate worlds, doors that opened to different times but not really because you couldn’t go anywhere—

  “Are you all right, sir?”

  “I think I’m getting a headache.”

  “Would you care for some springroot tea? It has been known to be efficacious—”

  “No, no. I’ll be fine.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I will figure all of this out.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Adron’s Disaster changed everything.”

  “Sir?”

  “I’m just starting to realize what that means. You wouldn’t, because you’re living it, it’s part of your life. But I’m getting it.”

  “I don’t—”

  “Dragaeran history, as it was, started with the explosion that created the Great Sea of Amorphia, and it ended with Adron’s Disaster.”

  He got that look you get when you don’t want to rile up the madman. I ignored it and kept going. “Right now, you’re operating on inertia. But none of the old rules apply. Everything’s changing. The Houses. The Cycle. All of it. And you could be part of it, old guy.”

  “Yes, sir, no doubt—”

  “All you have to do to be part of it is walk up to Hevlika and say, ‘I love you.’ See, I’m the most romantic assas—Easterner you’ll ever meet. But it’s true. That’s how this place, Precipice Manor, came to exist. Part of that same disruption, knocking holes in things. It’s shaken up everything. And one thing it’s going to do is change the Houses. Go ahead. Do it. Just go up to her—”

  “I could never.”

  I looked at him. I thought about Cawti, and the way she used to look at me, and the way she looked at me now, and I wanted to hit the idiot over the head with a chair. I knew it was none of my business, but I wanted to.

  “Fine,” I said. “Tell you what. How about you just go watch her dance. See where it leads from there.”

  He sighed. “If only I could.”

  “Why can’t you?”

  “My duties—”

  “Right. I have the feeling your duties are going to be considerably lighter soon. I’d go and watch her when she dances. She likes having an audience.”

  “I—all right. And sir?”

  “Hmm?”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “About?”

  “Drugging you.”

  “Oh. I never blame the dagger for where it’s pointed. Well, almost never.”