House War 03 - House Name

by Michelle West

  “And she sent you the dress?”

  “Oh, no. I’m supposed to start work tomorrow,” she told him. “At the Merchant Authority.”

  He whistled. “Merchant Authority?”

  She nodded.

  “You’re working there alone?”

  “No.”

  “You came here alone?”

  They never came to market alone. The streets weren’t entirely safe for that. She shook her head. “But I’m not here with the others. I have an escort.”

  “An . . . escort.”

  She turned, and looked at the crowd. “See those guards?”

  He nodded.

  “Them.”

  “But . . . they’re House Guards.”

  She nodded.

  “I don’t understand.”

  Smacking herself in the forehead, she said, “We’re living in the manse on the Isle. In House Terafin.”

  He was silent for a moment, and then he smiled.

  “I’m sorry we haven’t come—we’ve been holed up there. Things got a bit crazy just before we had to leave our apartment. But I wanted to come and tell you that we’re all okay.”

  “All of you are living there?”

  Shadow crossed her smile, dampening it. “All of us but Duster and Lander,” she said quietly. “They didn’t . . . make it out.”

  “But Jay’s all right?”

  “Jay’s fine. Just busy. She’s not doing anything you’d disapprove of. I think.”

  He laughed. “You’ve done me the world of good, showing up here. I worried.”

  She caught his hand in hers and pressed it tightly. “I know,” she told him softly. “I’m sorry. We didn’t mean to make anyone worry; we just didn’t think. And I have to get back—but I was here, I was so close . . .” She stopped for a moment and then said, “We all miss you.”

  “Live there long enough, miss, and you won’t,” he told her, still smiling broadly.

  “You don’t know Jay,” she replied.

  “Aye, maybe I don’t. You tell her to take care of herself. And of the rest of you. Carver’s behaving?”

  “Like Carver,” she grimaced. “But he hasn’t gotten us all tossed out on our backsides yet, so that’s something.”

  “What’s Teller doing?”

  “Umm, I think he’s supposed to be given a job, too.”

  Someone shouted for the farmer’s attention, and he snapped an order to one of his sons. “Can’t they see I’m busy?”

  Finch laughed. “You’re always busy,” she told him. She felt a deep and shining sense of affection for this man who had somehow managed to feed them more than they could afford to buy when things were at their worst. He wiped his eyes, mumbled something about dirt. She smiled.

  “Tell your Jay to come down here herself.”

  “I will. Promise.”

  Arann sat in the breakfast nook in the wing, listening to Carver and Angel talk. Jester threw in as many words as he could wedge between theirs; in volume, the den didn’t notice the absence of either Teller or Finch. Arann, on the other hand, valued the silence they often carried with them; there wasn’t much of it here. Jay was still sleeping, and Ellerson had told them all she was not to be woken.

  So it was with some relief that he looked up to see Ellerson standing in the open doorway. He noticed first. Had it not been for the domicis’ loud and familiar clearing of his throat, he would probably have been the last to notice as well.

  “Master Arann,” Ellerson said. “Someone is here to see you.”

  “Me?”

  Ellerson nodded.

  “Unless there’s some other Arann here we don’t know about.” The sarcasm came from Carver, but Arann ignored it. Carver could breathe sarcastically.

  He rose and then looked down at his clothing.

  “Your clothing,” Ellerson told him, “is fine. It will offend no one—certainly not your visitor.” He waited more or less patiently while Arann joined him and then led him out of the room and down the hall to the main doors and the visitor waiting room just in front of them.

  To Arann’s surprise, the visitor was Arrendas ATerafin. “My apologies if I’ve dragged you away from breakfast,” he said, nodding.

  “I was finished anyway.” He looked at the Chosen, and then said, “Nothing’s happened, has it? Nothing’s wrong?”

  Arrendas smiled. “Nothing is wrong.”

  “Why did you want to see me?”

  Arann glanced at Ellerson; Ellerson returned the look, but his expression didn’t shift at all. No help there, but the lack of any implied that Ellerson was content to let Arann handle the discussion on his own.

  “I had word that you might be at loose ends today, with Finch and Teller gone. I’m not on duty,” Arrendas added, although he was wearing his uniform. Seeing Arann’s brow lift slightly, Arrendas added, “I’m due on duty in two hours.”

  “Oh.”

  “If you’re otherwise occupied, I’ll leave.”

  “No,” Arann said quickly, as the raised voice of Carver drifted all the way down to the doors. “I’m free.”

  Arrendas lead him down the gallery halls, walking slowly. He paused in front of any painting, or any stretch of tapestry, that caught Arann’s attention, and he offered a few words here and there.

  “Do you like it here?” he asked, when they reached the end of the gallery.

  Arann glanced at him and then looked away. After a long pause, he nodded. Then, aware that this could be misconstrued, he clenched his jaw and exhaled. “I like it here,” he said quietly. “But I keep thinking of the people who didn’t—didn’t make it.”

  “Didn’t make it?”

  Arann couldn’t tell if the question was genuine or not. After a moment, he shrugged. “Duster,” he said quietly. “She died in the inner holdings so the rest of us could run. And—” He looked at the floor, “Lefty. He disappeared before we came here. Down in the maze.

  “He would have liked it here. I mean, he would’ve been scared of it, but only at first. He would’ve liked the wing, and he would’ve liked the servants. I think he would’ve gotten used to Ellerson. He would really have liked the food.”

  Arrendas nodded attentively and began to walk, slowly, down one of the halls that branched off the gallery.

  “I’d known him for so many years. He—he lost the fingers on his right hand. That was his good hand,” he added. “We took care of each other. He was smarter than I was, but he was afraid of his own shadow.”

  “He wasn’t afraid of yours, though.”

  It wasn’t a question. Arann shook his head. “Not mine,” he said, with a pained smile. “Which is good, because that’s where he stood, most of the time. I told him I’d protect him,” he added, his voice dropping. “I failed.”

  “It’s not in the failure that such intent is measured,” Arrendas told him.

  But Arann, who was often accused of being slow, wasn’t stupid. “Oh? And if The Terafin died while you were on watch?”

  At that, Arrendas nodded, offering Arann a wry smile. “Your point,” he told Arann. “Yes. I would consider that the ultimate failure.”

  “This failure is mine,” Arann replied.

  “And I’m not to try to take it from you?”

  He nodded.

  “Very well.”

  They walked in silence until they reached a set of double doors. These doors, unlike many of the others, seemed to be made of glass. On the other side of them, colors muted in the cool of Corvil, stood the Terafin grounds. “Have you been outside?”

  He nodded. “Torvan brought me.” He waited as Arrendas opened the doors and then slid outside, looking at the sun. It wasn’t warm at this time of year, but it wasn’t cold enough for snow. They’d seen snow; in the holdings, it was both beautiful and deadly.

  But Teller had come to them in the snows.

  Arrendas led him to the same pavillion that Torvan had led him to, but there was a marked difference: It was within sight of men. They were wielding pr
actice swords of the type that Rath had sometimes made him pick up. “House Guard?” Arann asked.

  Arrendas nodded.

  “I’ve been thinking,” Arann said, watching them drill. “About something Torvan said.”

  “Torvan talks a lot,” Arrendas replied. But he said it with a smile; they were friends. Probably good friends.

  “He told me I should consider—consider trying to get a job in the House Guard.” Each word was spoken with care, because Arann wasn’t certain how Arrendas would take this.

  “And?”

  Obviously, not badly. “I’m not—I don’t know how to fight,” he finally confessed. “Not well. Watching those guys drill, I know I’m not that good. I’m big,” he added. “I can fight if I have to—but it’s street fighting.”

  “You’re old to start learning, yes. Have you ever held a sword?”

  “Not a real one. Rath used to make us hold the practice ones. He taught me whatever I know.” He grimaced. “Which was mostly how to get bruised a lot.”

  Arrendas laughed.

  “You think I’m too old?”

  “I didn’t say that. You’re older. It will be harder. But it won’t be impossible, and if you make the decision to try, you’ll work hard enough at it. Most of the House Guards don’t come from the patriciate; it’s not like they’ve spent money on swordmasters. They learn the hard way as well.”

  “Did you?”

  “I came from a family of seven,” Arrendas replied. “We lived on the edge of the inner holdings. I spent some time in the Kings’ army before I applied here. I was perhaps two years younger than you are now when I started to train.”

  “How? The Kings’ armies have age limits.”

  “I lied about mine,” Arrendas replied with a grin. He stretched. In his armor, the cold wasn’t piercing; in Arann’s clothing, it was.

  “I couldn’t have taken Lefty into the Kings’ army anyway,” Arann replied. “But I want to protect them. The rest of my den.”

  “It won’t just be the rest of your den you’ll be protecting.”

  “I know. But I’d learn how.”

  Arrendas nodded. “Join the House Guard, Arann. I’ve reason to believe they’d take you.”

  Arann hesitated, and then, quietly, he nodded.

  “Good,” Arrendas replied, still grinning. “Come,” he added, “and meet your captain.”

  Arann’s eyes widened. “But—but—”

  “You have to start sometime. I believe,” he added, glancing up at the sun, “you’re about two hours late. It’ll be overlooked. Once.” He paused, seeing Arann’s expression, and relented. “The Terafin discussed this with your Jewel.”

  “She didn’t say—”

  “No, but The Terafin keeps her busy—and it’s a necessity. Come.”

  And so, on the eve of the seventh of Corvil, the den gathered in the kitchen. Ellerson watched them. He listened to them talk, and he watched their leader listen. The energy level was high, higher than it had been at any other such meeting. It was also productive and focused. He smiled.

  He did not entirely understand what had brought The Terafin to attempt this approach, but seeing its effects, he approved. He waited by the closed doors. If he was now tolerated in the kitchen, he was still not ordered to sit—and Jewel Markess was well capable of making such a curt and undignified demand.

  Jewel was clearly enjoying herself, right up until Arann lifted his head and started to search for words.

  “Jay?”

  “What?”

  “You told her you wanted me in with the guards.”

  “I told her,” Jewel replied, “that I thought you would make a good House Guard; you’ve the size for it, and the strength—and what you lack in training, you make up for in loyalty. Even I didn’t think she’d react so quickly. Why?”

  “They’ll count on me.” The words, to Ellerson, were like the knelling of bells. He saw, from the subtle shift in Jewel’s expression—and she was not given to subtlety—that she heard something of the same.

  “They’ll count on me to stand and fight, if we need to. To protect the House at all costs. Stuff like that,” he added, slightly self-conscious. “And they don’t care what I used to do. They don’t care where I come from. They didn’t even ask. They just asked me—” he drew a sharper breath now, “asked me to take up arms and take the—the oath.”

  As usual a small amount of bickering followed. Jewel didn’t appear to hear it, although she did make them shut up. Ellerson did, but he dismissed it.

  Jewel reached a hand across the table, and after a second, Arann took it. “What do you want to do?”

  “I don’t know.” He dropped his gaze. “But—but they said, if I serve well, and if I—I distinguish myself, I can be ATerafin. And more than that—if I serve the House well enough, I might one day be one of the Chosen.”

  “Well, what’s the problem anyway?” Angel finally said. “Take the godfrowned oath and—”

  “Angel.” He subsided. “Do you want to take the oath, Arann?”

  “I don’t know. I can’t take it if I can’t keep it. But if I take it—”

  “You don’t serve me anymore.”

  Ellerson watched and listened in a very careful, very still silence. This, he thought, was the first test that young Jewel Markess would face. How she passed it—or failed it—would define much that followed in the coming weeks, months, years.

  “All right,” she said softly—to the den at large. “Get out of here. Go back to watching. I have some things to think about myself.”

  It was not the best of answers; it was, however, better than Ellerson had feared. He watched the den file out, and he waited; Jewel collected a few miscellaneous household items that had mysteriously found their way into the wrong places.

  But she wasn’t angry, and they weren’t ashamed; it was, to them, a game. He thought, at this point, that if they were to leave the manse, they would take nothing but what they had earned.

  Would he be surprised if he turned out to be wrong? He thought about it, watching Jewel’s curved back, her tense shoulders, the elbows she now placed on the surface of the kitchen table. Yes, he thought. Surprised and disappointed.

  Morretz had given him a gift, late in life, that he had not thought of seeking for himself. And watching Jewel’s silent struggle to be what she wanted to be, rather than what she now was, he understood that it was not a permanent gift; like so much that was beautiful, it was ephemeral.

  He had watched the den for months, now, and he understood the role that Arann played—and perhaps had always played—in Jewel’s mind. She was facing, squarely, the loss of that, and it was entirely due to the fact that he could be trusted. As she had trusted him. What he agreed to, he agreed to without frivolity.

  “Well?” he said quietly, when she had failed to move for some minutes.

  “What?”

  “Can you take the street out of the den?”

  “Why don’t you go do something useful.”

  “At your command.”

  “Get lost.”

  “I will, of course, give you privacy should you desire it. But might I also say that there are members of Terafin who serve other organizations, just as The Terafin herself serves the Crowns?”

  She nodded without looking up, and after a moment, he chose to leave her to her thoughts. He did not leave her with them for long, however.

  “Go away.”

  He opened the door, but he paused in it as she called him.

  “Jewel?”

  “You said you serve me.”

  “That is my function.”

  “But you said you were chosen by The Terafin?”

  “Indeed.”

  “And if The Terafin chose to order you to cease your service, would you do it?”

  “I? No. But The Terafin understands that well enough. The only choice I have, besides the choice of vocation—that of service—is whether or not I will take a given master. I believe,” he added, gentlin
g his voice, “that I underestimated both the master and the difficulty when I chose to accept you.

  “However, once I have made my decision, it is made—and it is only unmade in the event of my death, your death, any unusual change in circumstance, or the expiration of any contractual period of time.”

  “What?”

  It was hard, with Jewel, to know whether the language went above her head or not; she was at times deliberately obtuse. “Some people will ask for the service of a domicis for a period of time—say, three years—and at the end of that time, I would then be free to leave.”

  Her frown was slight; she was not, he judged, being deliberately obtuse now. “What about the change in circumstance?”

  “If, for instance, you were somehow to become Terafin—or rather, to become The Terafin, that would warrant a shift of service.”

  “You mean, if I became more powerful, you’d leave?”

  He nodded, seeing, for a moment, the future in the lines of her face, in the open surprise she offered. She was not, yet, what she would be. And what would she be? It was beyond him, in the end. “To serve a person of power is a difficult task, and it often requires power. Few of the domici understand the nature of power; it is brutal, gentle, and subtle. I do not, nor would I, claim it.”

  “I don’t have any choice, do I?” She spoke, he knew, not of his own service but of Arann. In the end, it was not Ellerson’s loss that she feared—not yet, and not truly—but the loss of her kin and her den. She had thought to protect herself from that loss by coming here. She would grow, he thought, to understand that loss was, like power, a subtler thing.

  “You always have some choice,” he replied with care. She looked exhausted.

  “What?” Exhausted, he thought, and frightened—in the way one is frightened not of death but of the lingering, gray life that might precede it. “I can’t keep him. I just can’t. He doesn’t want anything that I don’t want. He wants to be ATerafin.”

  And it was you, Jewel, who gave him that option, that idea; it was you who encouraged the whole of your den to do what was asked of it so that they might one day become ATerafin. You understand, now, or are beginning to understand, that sometimes safety has its costs.

  But, he thought, feeling some pride in her, you accept those costs; the other costs are too high. He cleared his throat. “Many, many boys dream of joining one of the great Houses.”