Living With Ghosts

by Kari Sperring

  That went against Merafien nature, just like Valdarrien of the Far Blays, who had no more right than the lieutenant to come back. The marketplace was damp, irritable with chill and mud and worry. Amalie’s face looked pinched as she made her purchases, and the wares seemed dulled, spoiled by weather and waiting. She was as dependent upon the goodwill of the river as anyone else, and as likely to suffer should it turn.

  As they made their way back to her house, he said, “Your ship isn’t back yet.” It was not a question.

  She looked at him. “Yes. How did you know?”

  “You’re unhappy, save by odd moments. When you think no one is attending, you worry.”

  Her house was pleasantly warm. The street door opened straight into the shop. An apprentice was serving a customer at the high counter. Behind it, the journey-man cast up accounts at a lectern. They went through the connecting door at the rear and up into the kitchen. Amalie gestured for Gracielis to put her parcels on the table and sat on a stool to remove her pattens.

  The housekeeper began to unpack the parcels. “No fish, madame?”

  “It wasn’t fresh. I thought we might use some of the salt meat instead.” Amalie pulled a face. “I know it isn’t popular with the boys, but . . .”

  “Them!” The housekeeper could not have been more contemptuous. “They should be grateful you feed them so well.” The lieutenant’s ghost, who enjoyed her acerbity, shadowed her as she moved around the large room trying to look down her dress. “You’re staying to eat?” she asked Gracielis. He looked at Amalie, who nodded. “Take those shoes off, then. Madame’s chamber is no place for your mud.” Amalie looked at her reprovingly. “Fresh cleaned, it is. And you can’t sweep a polished floor with come-hither looks or pretty manners.”

  “I am,” said Gracielis, “a mere parasite. Ladyheart, I beg you, persuade Madame Herlève to forgive me or I’ll die of grief.”

  “And a nice mess you’ll make doing it,” Herlève said, flicking him out of her way with a hand. “Upstairs with you, Gracieux, and make madame smile. That’s your job, isn’t it?”

  “I hear and obey.” Taking Amalie’s hand, he led her up the short flight of stairs to her large second-floor chamber. It was, if anything, even warmer than the kitchen. He evicted her tabby cat from the daybed and bowed. “Madame.”

  “Ridiculous creature! Whose house is this, anyway?”

  “Madame Herlève’s, surely?”

  “You’d be forgiven for thinking so.” The cat leaped back onto the couch and stood beside Amalie, looking disgruntled. The lieutenant’s ghost, appearing suddenly through the floor behind them, made the animal jump. Gracielis frowned at the ghost. It looked unconcerned and dropped itself into the best armchair.

  Sometimes, Gracielis wished he knew how it did that. It could not actually move any objects and generally walked through most of them. But from time to time it seemed quite able to treat them as solid. If he had the secret, he could tamper a little. He would enjoy watching the ghost fall through something unexpectedly.

  Amalie said, “Bring me the chocolate set, will you?” He fetched it from the corner cabinet and then rang down for hot water. He sat on a footstool to watch her prepare.

  Carefully, he said, “Your ship?”

  “No news.” She sighed. “I can stand the financial loss, but such events are bad for morale, especially in this political climate. And to cover immediate overheads I may have to sell one of my upriver contracts. Things may be tight for a while.”

  “Then you shouldn’t buy me presents.”

  She shrugged. “It isn’t that bad.”

  “Is something else worrying you, apart from the ship?”

  The chocolate was made. She poured him a cup and passed it across. “There might be. You remember that my late husband’s brother trades in the north? I buy some of my fur trim from him.”

  “I remember.”

  “Well, he’s had worrying news from his Lunedithin agent. Apparently they’re getting less willing to trade their fur and amber and a few other things under the terms of the present treaty. They say Prince Keris is getting old and forgetful. And then . . .” She looked at him, hesitated. “Well, I have reason to believe we’re being undercut.”

  “You and your brother-in-law?”

  “No. Not exactly. The Merafien Haberdashers’ Guild.”

  “Ah.” He blew on his chocolate. “That’ll be my countrymen.”

  “Probably.” Again, she paused. Then: “The heir to Lunedith is rumored to have Tarnaroqui sympathies. My nephew Jean is in his suite. He’s keeping an eye on things for me.”

  “Shall I see if I can find anything out?” He often heard rumors through his fellow professionals, with their network of clients from all classes. “To date, all there is on the street regarding the new ambassador is that he’s said to have rather odd tastes.”

  “I don’t want to know. At least, not unless I need to resort to blackmail!” She smiled. Then she shook her head. “I’ve been meaning to ask, have you heard anything about the trouble there’s been in the new dock?”

  “A little. It’s said it began with a fire in a riverside cabaret.”

  “Yes, I’d heard that, too. But . . .” She frowned. “My guild master has a ship down there. It came in just before the trouble started. Word is that the rioting is over, but no one has as yet been given access to any of their cargoes, or to the crews involved.”

  “That’ll be due to the excise men.”

  “I daresay.” She shrugged. “Didn’t you tell me that one of the girls who works Silk Street has a lover in the Port Authority?”

  “Chirielle, yes.”

  “Could you ask her about it? I’ll pay, of course. I could use being owed a favor by the guild master.”

  “Of course.” He bowed. “I haven’t seen her lately, but I’ll ask.”

  “Thank you, love.” Amalie held out her hand. Rising, he took and kissed it. “That’s nice. What would I do without you?”

  He kissed the inside of her elbow. A little indistinctly he said, “Nothing so interesting as you do with me, I trust.”

  She shivered a little and stroked the side of his face. The lieutenant’s ghost watched in faint anticipation. He ignored it, bending down to kiss her throat. “I am to make you happy, am I not?” he said. “Madame Herlève ordered it. Shall I obey?”

  “Lock the door first,” said Amalie.

  Thiercelin’s game of solitaire was not coming out. He frowned at it, then shuffled the cards together into a heap. He sighed. That had been, by his count, the sixteenth game. None of the others had come out, either. Moodily, he began to lay out a seventeenth and poured himself yet another cup of bad wine from the carafe on the table. He stared at the cards and set blackly about trying to win.

  He had been playing for perhaps ten minutes when a shadow fell across the cards. From behind him, an accented voice said, “You might, perhaps, move the double-coin.”

  Thiercelin turned. Gracielis stood at his shoulder, arms folded, head a little to one side. Annoyed, Thiercelin said, “Where have you been? I’ve been looking for you for days.”

  Gracielis was dressed for outdoors. Over his slashed doublet and breeches, he wore a heavy green-lined cloak, and on his head was a wide-brimmed hat. The odd-colored gloves of his calling were tucked through his belt. His shoes and stockings were grimy. He smiled. “I’ve been busy. My apologies.” Sitting, he picked up Thiercelin’s cup and drank from it. His lips were over the same spot where Thiercelin’s had touched. “You’ve chosen poorly. My landlord has better wines than this. Of what were you thinking, when you dealt those cards?”

  “None of your business,” Thiercelin said. “If I’m going to be hungover, I might as well do it cheaply.” Gracielis was taking off his hat. He raised his elegant brows, reproving. Thiercelin said, “Stop that.” And then; “Busy doing what?”

  The brows climbed higher. Gracielis said, “Shopping.”

  “Shopping?” Thiercelin could not quite supp
ress the slight rise in his tone. “All week?”

  “Part of it.”

  “And the rest?”

  Gracielis looked at him sidelong. “I had . . . commitments. Had I known you needed me urgently . . . Do you deal from the right or from the left?”

  “The right,” Thiercelin said. “Do stop fidgeting about that drowned card game! It isn’t important.”

  “Games,” said Gracielis, “can be of vital importance. Sometimes.” And he looked down, his long lashes delicately set off against his white skin. He was quite ridiculously beautiful. “Is the deck your own?”

  Thiercelin ignored him. He was not going to be vulnerable to that silken grace. He said, “I only want to talk to you, Graelis.” He stopped as the diminutive escaped him and looked down.

  Gracielis sighed melodramatically, placed one elegant hand over his heart. “Shall I be consoled?” And then, “Graelis?”

  Thiercelin let the second comment pass. He said, “I’ll buy you a drink. Failing that, you’ll have to look to your current lady friend.” He looked his companion over. “She seems to be able to afford you.”

  Gracielis turned his painted gaze upon himself, admiring, amused. “Perhaps.”

  There was an oval topaz brooch pinned on the doublet. Reaching over to touch it, Thiercelin said, “Certainly, I’d have said.” Gracielis made no answer. He was looking at the solitaire, and frowning a little. “So,” Thiercelin said, “is that a result of your shopping?”

  “No. It was a gift from a lady.”

  “With whom you shop?”

  Gracielis looked up. His expression was guarded. One hand dropped to cover part of the cards. He said, “There’s more than one lady in Merafi. And not a few gentlemen.”

  Thiercelin gave up. Summoning a waiter, he ordered a bottle of rather better wine and a plate of sweetmeats. “Not,” he said, “as durable as topaz. My apologies.”

  “Not so.” Gracielis mixed wine with an equal amount of water and drank. “It can’t be pawned, so it’s far more permanent.”

  Thiercelin looked thoughtful. “Perhaps I should buy you dinner?” Gracielis made a diffident gesture. Thiercelin laughed. “If the food here is edible?”

  “It’s excellent, of its kind, but you may think it plain.”

  “I’m sure I’ll survive.”

  Across the table, Gracielis raised his cup in salute. “My thanks, then. But,” and he smiled, “I wasn’t hinting.” He was charm to the bone. One might not resent it.

  “I can afford it,” Thiercelin said. He looked down.

  Gracielis said, “Tell me about the cards.”

  “Why?”

  There was a pause. Then Gracielis said, a little diffidently, “I can see . . . a something in them. But the deck and the spread are strange to me.”

  “It’s a simple solitaire.” Thiercelin picked up a card and studied it. “The general idea is . . .”

  “I understand the principle. I wanted to know your thoughts.”

  Thiercelin looked up. “You’re nothing if not persistent. If you must know, I was thinking about you.”

  The painted eyes widened the slightest fraction. With a finger, Gracielis traced the outline of one of the court cards. “The valet—a servant, a young man, a message. Aspected in stone, so the relationship will endure. And here, the sword, aspected in flame. Judgment and truth. And not a little danger.”

  “I don’t believe in fortune-telling.”

  “Nor do I, when I do the reading.” Gracielis said. “I have clearer vision for the past. The sword lies over another of its kind, aspected in wind, for the north. You’ve seen Iareth Yscoithi.”

  “That’s a safe guess.” Thiercelin, discomforted despite himself, looked down and said, “And predictions of long acquaintance are doubtless good for your business.”

  “I have no idea,” Gracielis said. “Perhaps I should try it.” He paused, then added, “You are under no financial obligation to me, including your kind offer of dinner.” Thiercelin was silent, playing with his lace. “It was your solitaire.”

  That much, at least, was incontestable. The rest . . . Thiercelin looked up, expecting to find compassion in the painted eyes and found instead that Gracielis was not looking at him at all. Rather, his gaze was fixed on some point to his right. Glancing over, Thiercelin could see nothing of interest. Quietly, he said, “I’m sorry.”

  Gracielis met his eyes and smiled. “It’s nothing.” His hand, passing over the cards, muddled them into a heap. “A game only. But you have seen Iareth Yscoithi.”

  It was a pretty hand and a graceful one. Watching it, Thiercelin said, a little absently, “Yes.” And then, “Is it a trick?”

  Gracielis looked inquiring.

  “The card business. ‘You’ll have a fine heir and make wise investments.’ All that.”

  “Have I said such events would occur?”

  “No, but . . .” The persistence of it still troubled Thiercelin. “If it’s not a trick, then . . . ?”

  Gracielis had collected the cards into a neat stack. Picking them up, he weighed them in his hand. “You might call it a nervous habit.”

  “What?”

  There were mysteries woven into the hazel eyes. It was nearly irresistible. Thiercelin shivered again. Gracielis said, “I’d read for myself to reassure you, but I always get my own cards wrong.” He turned the top card over. “Thus. A favored second child, probably female, gifted in the numerical arts.” He shrugged. “You wanted to talk to me about Iareth Yscoithi.”

  “I suppose so.” Thiercelin felt dizzy, caught up in Gracielis’ sudden changes of direction. Drawing in a long breath (and the air, too, was dizzying, heady with Gracielis’ perfume), he said, “I saw her at the Lunedithin embassy. I told her about Valdin.”

  “Indeed.”

  “She . . . I don’t know . . .” Again, Thiercelin hesitated. “She seemed so remote.”

  Gracielis said, “It’s been six years.”

  “Yes, but . . . This must be important to him.” Gracielis frowned. Thiercelin said, “Well, why else am I seeing him?”

  “It’s a matter of binding.”

  “Yes, I remember. But you said it wasn’t me, so surely Iareth . . . ?”

  “I don’t think so.” Gracielis rested his chin on his hands. “What I saw wasn’t a person, or not exactly one, anyway.”

  Thiercelin sighed. “Iareth hardly seemed to care at all. It was just an oddity to her.”

  Gracielis rose and came around the table. He put an arm about Thiercelin’s shoulders. He said, “I don’t know Iareth Yscoithi. But it seems to me that it’s her nature to disguise her feelings.” He was very close. His perfume covered Thiercelin like a veil. There was a moment of stillness. Thiercelin could feel something beginning to uncoil within him. Not desire precisely, but some gentler thing, as though he had reached an acceptance without knowing it. There was a pulse at the base of Gracielis’ throat, a blue vein beneath the translucent skin. It would be warm in that hollow, scented. Gracielis was leaning a little forward and the rose lovelock hung temptingly close. He was beautiful . . . In his mind, Thiercelin turned his face into those curls, breathed in their perfume, discovering if the fragile skin would really bruise at a touch. At a kiss. Gracielis’ lips were parted. His breath grazed Thiercelin’s cheek. His painted eyes were dark with concern. He had attention for no one in the room but Thiercelin. Thiercelin put a finger out to the lovelock, stroked it, tentatively. Gracielis was quite still. One might imagine anything from him. His skin would taste of flowers . . . It was, after all, a matter of desire. In the moment of realization, Thiercelin froze.

  Yvelliane.

  He had already betrayed her by seeking out Iareth Yscoithi. To do this other thing . . . Swallowing, Thiercelin turned away. Some years ago, before her marriage, Yvelliane had been seen regularly with Gracielis. He had no rights over her past. And if, in her present, she preferred Firomelle’s company to his, then it was still no excuse for betraying her. She had never said she di
d not care for him. Sometimes, before Firomelle had become ill, in the early part of their marriage, he had begun to believe that she might even love him. He should be grateful that she made any space at all for him, given all the calls upon her time. If, lately, she seemed no longer to value him, it was only because she was so tired, so anxious, so overworked. Perhaps this current temptation was in itself only a reflex of his love for her, a seeking after comfort in arms that had once held her. Better to think that than to believe he might simply want Gracielis. And above all, he did not want to do anything that could harm Yvelliane.

  He said, “Graelis, please don’t.”

  Gracielis drew away, leaving only a hand resting companionably on Thiercelin’s shoulder. Thiercelin ventured a glance at him. Gracielis’ face showed only kindness. Thiercelin said, “Forgive me. It isn’t you. I just can’t cope with this now.”

  Gracielis said, “But perhaps you’d like us to be friends?” Thiercelin flushed, nodded. “So. Then it would be wrong of me to take umbrage if sometimes you give consideration to something more.”

  That was one way of putting it. Thiercelin smiled, shaking his head, “I suppose so.” The hand was still on his shoulder, small and slight and narrow-boned. Thiercelin touched it. “But you will behave.”

  Gracielis removed his hand and used it to push back his hair. “I always behave.”

  “I’m sure,” Thiercelin said. One of the inn staff was laying bread and plates and cutlery on the table before them. Watching her, he said, “You may be right.”

  Gracielis sat back down and looked inquiring. “Iareth Yscoithi,” Thiercelin said. “I’d thought, I don’t know, that I knew her, I suppose. She was here for several months with Valdin. I spent a fair amount of time with them. She was . . .” He was reaching now for long-suppressed memories. Old wounds did not always heal clean. “She was reserved, yes, but not unapproachable. Whereas now . . . Perhaps I was wrong. Perhaps I never knew her. She’s so cold.”