Living With Ghosts

by Kari Sperring

  “That has appeal,” Joyain said.

  “I’ll fetch glasses.” Amalie went out. The two men sat in silence, apart from the clock on the mantel. Gracielis stared at the ceiling. He had a name now for his rival and a means of learning more. He might act, save that he lacked strength and training and knowledge. It would be no fair fight, himself against Quenfrida and Kenan. Especially if Kenan was undarios. Assuming, of course, that a person with clan background could become undarios in its fullest sense.

  There was no one else who would help Merafi. He was Tarnaroqui. It was not his problem. It was beyond him. He sighed and closed his eyes. He had made his choice when he sent his message to Yvelliane via her estranged husband. He would have to live with it.

  Amalie interrupted his thoughts. She spoke a little too cheerfully, and he knew he had again distressed her. She was saying, “Do go in, monseigneur,” and then, “Do you know my nephew, Lieutenant Joyain Lievrier? Jean, this is Lord Thiercelin duLaurier of Sannazar and the Far Blays.” Gracielis opened his eyes. Thiercelin stood in the center of the room. Joyain, too, was standing. Amalie said, “We were about to have a drink—a little early, I grant you, but—would you care to join us?”

  “Thank you,” Thiercelin said, bowing to Joyain. “I already have the honor of knowing the lieutenant.”

  “Really?” Amalie steered him to a chair.

  Joyain said, “We met through official channels. The embassy.” His voice held a curious edge. He avoided looking at Thiercelin.

  “Oh, of course. Madame of the Far Blays is First Councillor,” Amalie said.

  The conversation turned on desultory matters for the next half hour or so, mostly between Thiercelin and Amalie. Gracielis found it easier to listen than to participate, and few remarks were directed at him. Joyain, too, was largely silent. At the end of the half hour he rose, kissed Amalie’s cheek, bowed to Thiercelin, and excused himself. Amalie showed him out, then, returning, said, “I believe you have matters to discuss. I’ll be in the shop if you need me.”

  Gracielis said, “I can’t steal your room . . .” But she only smiled and shook her head at him as she left.

  There was a small silence. Thiercelin broke it. “You look better.”

  “Thank you.”

  “I delivered your message.”

  “You’re kind.” Gracielis hesitated, trying not to fidget. He did not look at Thiercelin. “It was Lieutenant Lievrier with whom you dueled, wasn’t it?”

  “Yes.” Thiercelin sighed. “Except that it didn’t happen. There was an interruption . . . Valdin . . .”

  “Yes, I know.” Gracielis spoke with thinking. He sighed, and looked at Thiercelin.

  Thiercelin rose and came to sit on the end of the daybed. “I doubt the lieutenant told you.”

  “No.” Gracielis had no intention of elaborating. He said, “Have you seen Iareth Yscoithi again?”

  “Are you going to tell me what’s going on?” Thiercelin made himself more comfortable. “I have all day. I’m wholly at your disposal.”

  Gracielis let his lashes hide his eyes. “You’re appropriating my line, I think.”

  “Hmm,” Thiercelin said. “Tell me, Graelis. Or are you meaning not to?”

  “No, I’m prevaricating.” Gracielis smiled. “It’s hard. It touches upon matters which are in some wise . . .”

  “Forbidden?”

  “Yes.” Gracielis hesitated then switched to Tarnaroqui. “You know what is meant by undarios?”

  “ ‘Perfumed-death,’ ” Thiercelin translated absently, back into Merafien. “No, I don’t think so.”

  “It’s a matter of belief. A species of religious order.”

  “The famous assassin-priests?”

  “Yes, and more. It’s a discipline. To be undarios . . . It’s to possess a certain type of understanding or vision.”

  “Seeing ghosts?”

  “Amongst other things. One doesn’t have to be undarios to have that or other, lesser powers.” He caught Thiercelin’s eye. “Card-reading. Poisoning. The manifold arts of pleasure.”

  Thiercelin folded his arms. “Now, why does that sound familiar?” Gracielis looked reproachful. “All right, Graelis, I’ll control my credulity. You’re telling me you have this discipline.”

  “I have some of the training.” Gracielis felt some of the old bleakness settle upon him. “I lack certain strengths . . . I have sight, but no power.” He forced himself away from it. “I was taught always that the forces open to my kind may not be awakened in Merafi. Well . . .” He hesitated, looking toward the window. “I was misled.”

  Thiercelin’s eyes narrowed. He said, “Explain.”

  “Something is awake here, which doesn’t belong and which intends you harm.” Thiercelin’s brows lifted. Gracielis said, “You’ve already seen a forerunner of it.”

  “Valdin? He’s alarming, I grant you; but he’s hardly a citywide threat.”

  “He no longer belongs here. But he’s come. And where he’s come, others may follow. Will follow. Forgive me.”

  “I wasn’t assuming this was your fault.” Thiercelin said. “Is this why you . . . ?”

  Gracielis looked at his maltreated hands. It would be easy to lie. He said, “No.” He was cold. He was too close to betrayal. “To be undarios, to enter upon that path . . . There are bonds formed. There’s someone in the city I’ve known almost all my life. Three nights ago, when I dreamed, and after, I felt a working, colored by her touch. After you had gone, I . . . summoned her. I can’t tell you how, but the means weren’t permitted to me. I hoped to persuade her to undo what she’d done. I succeeded only in angering her.” He shivered. “She refused.”

  Thiercelin said, “And that’s why . . . ?”

  “More or less.” It might not be said, even to Thiercelin. It could not be explained. He could not bear to be laid so open. “She rejected me.” He would not break. He would not grant to her that power, not from memory alone. He had no other choice.

  In any case, he had been replaced. Kenan stood now where he had in Quenfrida’s regard. Unless he chose to buy that back in blood and treachery. He said, “You must be careful. She isn’t finished. There’ll be sickness and flooding and death.”

  “This friend of yours is undarios?”

  “Undaria. Yes, and she has at least one colleague.” Thiercelin looked at his hands. Then he said, “As an informer, shouldn’t you be telling this to Yvelliane? Or didn’t she believe you?” Gracielis was silent. “I’m sorry, Graelis, but this all sounds so . . .”

  “Un-Merafien? As it happens, I’ve already taken steps to do that.” He sighed and added, more to himself than Thiercelin, “It will have to suffice, if she grants the time . . .”

  “What?” Thiercelin said. And then, receiving no reply, “There is no place, Varnaq. I looked it up on the official maps of your country.” Gracielis looked at him in surprise. “Does it matter?”

  “Yes . . . I keep thinking I know you. But you see things, you deal with powers . . . you report to Yvelliane—and no doubt to this countrywoman of yours—Who are you, Graelis? I think I need to know.”

  It no longer mattered. His life was counted out in the measure of Quenfrida’s convenience. Gracielis reached out a careful hand to Thiercelin. “I can’t tell you my birth name. I was never told it. But in the temple whose property I am, I’m Gracielis arin-shae Quenfrida.” His lips quirked. “Varnaq is one of the minor places of punishment, in Tarnaroqui belief. Reserved for those who cheat at cards and commit crimes against taste.” Thiercelin frowned. “I am, as you have known me, Gracielis de Varnaq, gigolo and spy.” Thiercelin’s hand tightened on his. Gracielis inhaled and changed the subject.

  “When you see Iareth Yscoithi, would you ask her about another in addition to Urien Armenwy? Kenan Orcandros?”

  “The envoy?”

  “Yes.” Gracielis hesitated. “I need to know about him.”

  “You could come with me and ask Iareth yourself.”

  A memory of water
falling and of level green eyes . . . It was not his past, and he would not succumb to it. He said, “No.” And then, more gently, “At present, as you can see . . .” He indicated his abused wrists.

  “Later, maybe. Your Madame Viron tells me the injury is minor.”

  If Quenfrida allowed him a later. Gracielis smiled a little. “Perhaps.”

  Thiercelin looked down at their hands, and his face was strange. But he said only, “I’ll hold you to that.”

  Power. Kenan could sense it, feathering across his skin, lighting sparks of recognition. Down there, down in the depths something waited for him, old and strong and valuable. This was what Quenfrida had meant when she sent him here. This was the root of Merafi, waiting for his touch, his blight upon it. He doubted that the scholar who had led him here had the least idea of the significance of the place. The man had walked down the shallow steps and along the passage beyond chatting about sally ports and lower guard chambers. A fool, but a useful one so far. Kenan could already see several ways in which that usefulness could and would be extended. The girl—Miraude—was less useful but potentially interesting. Handled correctly, she might be employed to discover something of the plans of Yvelliane d’Illandre. Following at the rear of their small procession, Kenan watched Miraude almost with approval. Slight and silly and no threat to him. He could, he decided, afford to expend a little more time on her. Besides, he found her body appealing. Ahead of him, she tripped on the uneven floor, and he put a hand under her elbow. She looked back at him in surprise and he smiled thinly. “Be careful.”

  “Thank you.” She freed herself gently, returning his smile.

  The passage was cut into the rock, sloping down toward the river, following the line of a low rock spur. There were similar tunnels under the keep at Skarholm, carved out into the crag long before the days of Yestinn Allandur, the breaker of covenants. At the base of those tunnels lay the heart of Skarholm itself, the Chamber of Clans, once the assembly place of the clan-heads in the time before Yestinn invented kings. Perhaps Yestinn had built this echo of it here as a sop to the weaker clan leaders of his time. The scholar’s pool of lantern light reached no more than a handful of feet ahead. Had he the choice, Kenan would have extinguished it. He was Orcandros. His eyes were apt in darkness. His ears were sharper still. They were higher than the river, but he could hear it, distantly, dropping and gurgling along its course, back-noted by the steady slow brush-brush of the tidal estuary. Two waters, one salt, one sweet, and rock, all close, all entwined. This place hallowed Merafi and sealed its opacity to ancient powers. In this place he could enact a working to match what he had begun with Valdarrien’s blood six years before.

  He would not need Allandurin blood this time: that was already present. He could taste it in the sour air. He just needed to give matters a gentle push.

  The passage came to an end on a long, smooth ledge. The scholar ushered them onto it and held his lantern up high. The light shivered, rippled out into the gloom. They stood on the side of a long oval cave, carved not by hand but by water, its sides whorled and smooth. Here and there, light struck sparks from crystals of quartz. The floor was muddy: small pools of water glistened in the lowest spots. Diagonally from where they stood, a cleft led on into further darkness. “Obviously,” the scholar said, “the cave itself is natural. I speculate that after Yestinn it was used as a cold store of some kind or perhaps a guard point above a water gate, although of course the river has moved its course somewhat since the early period, and the branch that would have come closest to here is heavily silted now. But if you look at the ceiling, you can see that the cave must have been used by Yestinn himself or one of his early heirs.” He raised the lantern as high as he might.

  Miraude gasped. Kenan hid a smile behind his hand. Across the roof animals were painted in wide bands of faded color. Allandurin eagle, Orcandrin otter, Artovanin bear. Each of the clan signs marched there in appointed order, following each other round in a flattened circle, all save the eagle, who flew in the center.

  At home in Skarholm, the animals were carved into the rock, showing proper respect. At home, no creature came ahead of any other. That was as it should be. Kenan intended to ensure that those days would return, for Lunedith, at least.

  “You note,” the scholar said, “the clan badges. The same creatures appear on the tapestries in the Grand Audience Chamber of Rose Palace and on the wood panels in the Great Hall of the Old Palace. It recalls our joint past, of course.” He made Kenan a small bow. “I understand there are similar decorations in Skarholm.”

  “Indeed.”

  “Perhaps you might describe them to me some day.”

  “Of course.”

  Miraude peered across the cave. “It’s very cold. What did Yestinn do in here?”

  “It may have been a council chamber of some kind, or a place of meditation. That crack you see over there leads into the cellars of the Old Palace, although the passage itself is blocked off. I’ve been able to make a temporary exit close to the Mercer’s Bridge: a shop owner has kindly allowed me access to his cellar. We’ll be leaving that way. This room retained some use after the first fort was abandoned. I’m hoping to spend the winter working through the household documents from some of those reigns, if I can gain access to them.”

  “I’ll speak to my sister-in-law.” Miraude shivered and stepped closer to Kenan.

  He offered her his arm. “It is indeed cold. When we leave, you must allow me to buy you some spiced wine.” She smiled up at him, taking his arm. He smiled back. This would do. This would do very well. He turned to the scholar. “Shall we continue?”

  It was dusk when Thiercelin returned to his new lodgings. His valet was not in evidence, and the candles were still unlit. Perhaps he should have left instructions with his new landlord. He had not thought about that, earlier, wrapped in his concerns. He deposited hat and cloak onto a chair, and began to hunt for tapers. If Gracielis was right, if he was not mad . . . There was something, after all, that he might do for Yvelliane, if he could expose this Quenfrida and her accomplices. Perhaps then she would understand that he was not Valdarrien, that he loved her, that he could support her. Finding a taper, he nearly dropped it again when a voice spoke to him from the shadows.

  “Hello, Thierry.”

  It was as if his thoughts had summoned her. He was mistaken. Turning, the lighted taper in one hand, he found himself looking at Yvelliane.

  He took a step toward her. “Yviane.”

  “I’m glad you’re so pleased to see me.”

  “I didn’t mean it the way it sounded. I . . . You startled me. I was just thinking about you.” He lit the nearest lamp. “I’m glad you’re here. How did you find me?”

  “Your valet.” Yvelliane took a seat nearby and looked at him.

  “I was going to send a note . . .” He carried the taper round to the remaining lamps, then sat himself. “Can I get you something? Some wine?” She looked even more tired than the last time he had seen her. He wanted to go to her, to hold her. She sat with her spine straight and her hands folded in her lap, cool and forbidding.

  She said, “Nothing, thank you.”

  “Are you sure?” She nodded. He went on, “Listen, Yviane, I . . .”

  She cut across him. “You weren’t here when I arrived. You’d gone to visit Gracielis.” Her voice was chill.

  “That’s nothing. He’s ill and I just . . .”

  “You clearly care for him a great deal. Perhaps I should have applied to him to ask you to cancel your duel.”

  She was still angry. He would never get through to her. Thiercelin ran a hand through his hair and sighed. He said. “Please don’t. I don’t want to argue.”

  “Nor do I.” But her face belied it. “You chose not to come home. I understand.”

  “I just wanted . . .”

  Again, she cut through him, “I do, however, want something from you.”

  “You do?” He gazed at her in new hope. “Anything. You know I . .
.”

  “It’s nothing personal. Royal business.”

  “Oh.” Firomelle. Always and always Firomelle. Thiercelin looked down. His boots were dusty. She had once again retreated behind her armor of duty, and he could not touch her. Nothing changed. Nothing between them ever really changed. He said, softly, “What?”

  “There’s to be a ball at the Rose Palace next week. I need you to escort me. Tell Gracielis that I want him there, too: I’ll provide him with a partner. That’s all.”

  Thiercelin said, “About Gracielis . . . There’s something you should know, something he told me . . .”

  “I don’t want to know.” She began to put on her gloves, tugging each finger smooth with precise, short motions.

  He was tired of barbed remarks and riddles. He wanted simple human contact and kindness. He looked at her with a kind of desperation, and said, “Oh, Yviane, must you?” He rose, made to reach out to her.

  “I don’t have much time, Thierry. Firomelle . . .”

  “Needs you. I have that one engraved on my heart.”

  “It happens to be true.” She rose and began to put on her hat. “Don’t see me out. I’ll expect you at the ball. If you can bear to oblige me.”

  That was unfair. Thiercelin forgot that it might be advisable to placate her, and said so. She favored him with a brief, contemptuous glance. Defensively, he added,

  “You know you only have to ask. I’m not Valdin.” “I thought we’d already discussed that.”

  “I didn’t mean . . . Oh, to the river’s bed with it!” He sighed. “Yviane, we need to talk.”

  “I don’t think so. And, anyway, I haven’t the time.” Obliquely, he remembered Gracielis’ face, speaking of the woman who had rejected him. Such bleakness . . . He could only hope he did not betray himself so clearly. He looked at his feet and said, “Would you talk to me, if you did?”

  “Would you listen to anyone but yourself?” Yvelliane went to the door.

  “Yes,” Thiercelin said desperately.

  She smiled at him, and frost crystallized in his veins. “How tolerant,” she said, and walked out of the room.