by Steven Brust
He didn’t appear to take the question at any more than face value. “What beliefs?” he asked.
“This notion of ‘light’ and ‘dark’ forms of the Art. It is new to me.”
“Odd you should bring that up,” he said.
“Oh?”
“I had meant to ask you about it.”
If he saw some expression of surprise on my face, that was all right; it was both honest and in character for the role I was playing. He glanced at Loiosh and Rocza, cleared his throat, and said, “It is obvious you’re a witch.”
“Well, yes,” I said.
“I am not. But it would seem that anything may be used for, ah, different purposes.”
“Well, yes.”
“For good, shall we say, or evil.”
“I had never exactly thought of it in those terms,” I said honestly, “but I guess I know what you mean.”
He nodded. “Well?”
“Uh, well what?”
“How would you describe your own practice?”
I drank some wine, then stared at the glass. It was a very nice glass, hand-blown, thin, delicate. “I have never considered myself evil,” I finally said.
“I imagine no one does,” he said.
“Maybe you could explain why this is important to you? It seems odd you should ask a stranger that question.”
He chuckled. “And impolite? I’m sorry. It has become important.”
I sat back a little. “How so?”
He gave one of those looks people give when they imagine they can look into your eyes and see if you’re lying. Just for the record, that doesn’t work. Well, sometimes it does, if you know what to look for. But don’t bet your life on it. And don’t try it on me.
After a moment, he said, “There is history there, stretching back for some years. That isn’t important right now. More recently, I suspect I have been, ah, harmed by a follower of the darker ways of your craft.”
“Recently,” I said. “How recently? I only got to town a couple of days ago.”
“Last night,” he said.
“Indeed? A busy night—I was harmed as well.”
“I know. I have simply assumed that it isn’t coincidental that, with family in this area, you were sent by your Empress.”
“Hardly. And I don’t think it coincidental that my kin were murdered after I arrived. Do you?”
“Unlikely,” he said laconically.
“I take it you have enemies.”
He nodded.
“So, then,” I said, “perhaps your enemies are mine.”
“Perhaps so,” he said. I could see him thinking, Or perhaps my enemy is you. Which I guess meant he could be telling the truth, or could be as straightforward as a Yendi—that is to say, not.
“Would you care to tell me what happened to you?”
“Why not?” he said. “It’s no secret, or if it is it won’t be for long. Last night, my coachman was murdered.”
Okay, well, I don’t know what I’d expected, but it wasn’t that. I couldn’t say anything for a moment, while the anger I’d been trying to suppress threatened to erupt right here and now. I don’t know what I’d have done—torn apart the room? Thrown his glasses around? Beaten up his butler?
He saw something of what was going on inside of me, I guess, because he flinched.
“Did you know him?” he asked, looking genuinly puzzled.
“Someone,” I said, “is going to—”
“Boss!”
Loiosh was right. I stopped and just shook my head. I took a couple of deep breaths. “How was he killed?”
“Witchcraft, I am told. I haven’t yet learned the details.”
“Who would know them?”
He frowned. “This does not, I think, concern you, my lord.”
“My lord, in light of what happened to my family, I beg to disagree with you.”
“You think they are connected in some way?”
I knew they were connected in some way. “The timing seems significant,” I said. “Unless this sort of thing happens all the time around here.”
He nodded. “Yes, you may be right. But I know of no connection between my coachman or the Merss family, or between my coachman and you. Do you?”
“No. Nevertheless—”
“Then, for now, I do not believe I should tell you any more.”
It was becoming difficult not to say the things I shouldn’t say. I took a moment, then eventually managed, “My lord, I’ll not take up any more of your time. I look forward to hearing from your people.”
“Of course,” he said. “Forgive me if I do not stand. My man will show you out.”
I bowed. He leaned back as if exhausted; I guess I’d tired him out a bit. It would be an odd sort of irony if my visit exerted him to the point where he dropped dead.
The butler guided me down the stairs and back toward the front doors.
“Did you know him?” I asked suddenly.
“My lord?”
“Zollie. Did you know him?”
He cleared his throat, started to speak, then just nodded.
“What happened?” I asked him.
We had reached the front door. He stopped with his hand out toward the iron handle and gave me a look of inquiry. “My lord?”
I shrugged and met his gaze. “You must have a theory about who killed him, and why.”
“Not at all, my lord.”
“Crap.”
He hesitated. “Did my lord know him?”
“No, but the matter interests me. I was told he was killed by a witch.”
“So it would seem, my lord.”
“What was the actual cause of death?”
“Sudden heart failure, my lord.”
“Um. And you’re sure it was a witch?”
“He had the mark.”
“The mark?”
“The witch-mark, my lord.”
“What’s a witch-mark?”
It’s hard to describe the look he gave me. It was a mix of surprise, reserve, disbelief, and courtesy. I’m not certain Teldra could have done it better. I waited him out. He said, “I’m sure I wouldn’t know, my lord.”
“Who would?”
“My lord?”
“Cut it out. Just don’t. I’m in a very bad mood, and you don’t want to make it any worse. Where did you hear about it, and who would know?”
I could see him at war with himself for an instant, but training, or fear, or something else won. He said, “My lord, I would have no idea about such things.”
“All right,” I said. “He had a girl he liked to meet at the inn. What is her name?”
He only hesitated a moment, that time. “Eelie,” he said.
“Thanks,” I said with a bit of a twist on it.
“I shall have the groom bring your horse.” He held the door for me and stood like a statue. I really had no choice but to go through it.
I waited in front, and presently the groom emerged, leading Marsi.
I never did learn the butler’s name. Maybe he didn’t have one.
I gave the stable-boy back at the Pointy Hat a good tip, which he accepted graciously, and then I said good-bye to Marsi, as good a horse as they get, I think; even Loiosh didn’t have anything bad to say about her. Here’s an odd thing: The inn was feeling enough like home to me that I found I didn’t need to conceal how wobbly I was after dismounting.
I got a glass of coffee from the host and went over to what had become “my table” sometime in the last couple of days. Sitting felt good. The ache in my legs passed quickly; it took longer before I had relaxed enough to think clearly. The coffee helped in that, but klava would have helped more. Dammit.
I noticed I was hungry and thought about getting more lamb stew, but changed my mind. Instead I went back out into the street, where the stench pretty effectively killed my appetite. I walked past the docks and saw the factory—excuse me, the “mill”—churning out smoke and stench. I didn’t slow down. I got to the other i
nn and noticed for the first time that they had incense burners about the room. It must have been fairly subtle incense for me not to have noticed, but it worked. I wondered why the Hat didn’t have them. Maybe they did and they were just concealed better.
At this time of the day—it was still early afternoon—I had the place to myself save for a bored-looking middle-aged barmaid, who asked if I wanted anything. My appetite had returned, so I ended up getting some decent bean soup and a loaf of bread served with garlic cloves and a lot of butter. Good butter.
As the barmaid was bringing me a glass of bitter-tasting wine called Enekesner (I got the name to be certain I never accidentally ordered it again), I asked her when Eelie would be showing up.
“Won’t be in today,” she said.
“Where can I find her?”
She looked me over. She’d done something to darken her eyebrows, and something else to make her lips shiny. I’ve always wondered about stuff like that. But not too much.
“Don’t waste your time,” she said.
“Is she a friend of yours?”
She shrugged. “Not especially. Why?”
I pulled out three silver coins and let them ring on top of the table. “Where can I find her?”
Her eyes widened, and she said, “Upstairs, room at the end of the hall.”
I was glad the barmaid hadn’t been a friend of hers; it would have cost me another coin. I took my time finishing the meal, then went to the back and up the stairs. I had to hit the door twice before I heard a faint voice say, “What is it?”
“My name is Merss,” I said. “I want to talk to you.”
“Go away,” she suggested.
“Open the door,” I suggested back, “or I’ll knock the bloody thing down.”
There was a pause, and the door opened. She was pretty enough, I guess, except for her eyes. She’d been crying.
“Tell me what you know,” I said, continuing with the whole suggestion line.
“What the hell does it matter to you?” She started crying again. I ignored it.
“I’m going to find out who did it, and kill him,” I said.
Her red eyes widened a little. “Why?” she said, barely whispering.
“I’m just in that kind of a mood,” I said. “Tell me what you know.”
She hesitated again, then stood aside, which I took as an invitation to enter her room. I did so, and she shut the door. It was a tiny room, with little enough to show who she was, and that little I paid no attention to. There was the bed and a chair. She didn’t suggest I sit, so I just stood there and waited.
“You talked to him last night,” she said.
“Yeah.”
“He told me about you. He thought you …”
“What?”
“He thought you were funny.” She started sobbing. I leaned against the door and waited. A moment later she said, “I’m sorry.”
“I’m told a witch killed him.”
“He had the witch-mark.”
“What is the witch-mark?”
Her eyes flicked to Loiosh and Rocza, then back to me; her forehead was creased. “Different lands, different customs, different ways of doing things,” I told her. “I’ve heard of a witch’s mark, something that indicates a person is a witch. I don’t think you’re using the term that way, and, anyway, I don’t believe in them. Fill me in. What is a witch-mark?”
“When they found him, his lips were red.”
“Um,” I said. “Why is that called a witch-mark?”
“You really don’t know?”
Patience, Vlad. “I really don’t know.”
“A witch will send an imp down your throat to your heart. The imp leaves red footprints on the lips.”
There were some problems with that—the first being that you can’t really get to the heart from the throat (you pick up a bit of anatomy when you kill people for a living), the second being that I don’t believe in imps.
To be sure, there is a way to kill someone using the Art that will leave red lips; it involves a simple transformation, replacing the contents of his lungs with the smoke from your brazier. But—
Okay, now wasn’t the time. “All right,” I said. “Where was he found?”
She looked at me for a long moment, then looked at her bed, then back at me.
“Oh,” I said.
“He was going to marry me,” she said. “He told me so.”
I nodded, choosing not to ask when he had told her and how many times for fear she might take it the right way. Okay, so I’m a bastard; but there are limits. “I’m sorry,” I told her. “I’ll leave you alone now.”
“You’ll find out who did it?” she said, and there was something a little scary in her eyes.
“Yes, I will. I’ll also find out why.”
“And you’ll kill him?”
“Yes,” I said. “I will.”
“Good,” she said. “Will you make it slow?”
“I’ll make it certain.”
She nodded.
Okay, maybe I shouldn’t have told her that; I certainly would never have admitted that I was going to kill someone to anyone, ever, back in the Empire. And maybe I was a bit too contemptuous of what this kingdom used for law, and should have been more worried. But I wanted to give her that much, and, in the event, of all the things that turned around and bit me, that wasn’t one; so I guess I got away with it, if you like.
I left her and went back down to the main room, and from there back into the stench. It hit me hard that time, I remember; almost like a blow. My stomach turned and I actually gagged there, in the street; the reeking foulness of the whole town was suddenly, just for a moment, too much for me. I made my way back to the Pointy Hat; I can remember my eyes felt glazed and it was all I could do to put one foot in front of another until I’d passed the threshold.
I made it to my table, and, yeah, they had the same subtle incense here they did at the other place, only I couldn’t see where it came from. It helped, though. I’d never been fond of incense before; it was another tool of the Art, not something one used just to brighten up one’s day. I know that many witches—including my grandfather—live so that there is no clear distinction between practicing the Art and simply living; subtle spells and charms are part of his life. Not me; for me there had always been a sharp line: Here I was doing a spell, here I was done with it. But now, maybe that was changing. I could imagine getting very fond of incense. I could just imagine the look on Cawti’s face when I told her I was—
Yeah, shake it off, Vlad.
The thought of brandy repulsed me, and I didn’t need coffee, so I did something unusual for me: I had the host draw me a summer ale. It was warmer than I’d have liked, but not too bitter. I nodded my approval to Inchay, who gave me a rare smile. I guess he was proud of his ale.
I sat and drank it slowly while my head stopped turning, and gradually I was able to focus on the problem in front of me. I got up and paced a bit, earning me a look from the host; then I sat down again. It hit me that one thing that was so odd was that there was so much violence going on, and I was pretty sure I was somehow at the center of it, but I wasn’t doing any of it, and none of it was directed at me. I wasn’t used to that.
Well, but let’s think about that, Vlad. If they aren’t trying to kill you, there’s a reason. The most likely reason is that they know that if they try, you’re liable to put a nice pretty shine on a whole lot of them. Which immediately calls up the question: How do they know that? It isn’t like I was walking around looking dangerous, or anything. Was the mere fact that I openly carried a blade sufficient to tell them? It didn’t seem likely. So either they’re good enough to spot me for what I am, or else they have some reason to suspect I’m someone they shouldn’t touch.
Or they know who I am.
To be sure, the Guild knew my name, as did whatever witch or witches had pulled it from my mind. But how much more had they gotten? Enough to know to get a message to the Jhereg? And, if so, wo
uld they want to? Would they know how?
It was possible. It was possible there was an assassin heading this way, right now, as fast as teleportation and feet could carry him. But why? If they were going to do that, it would be for the money. If they did manage to get hold of the right people in the Jhereg, they wouldn’t be told to lay off me; they’d be told they could get a lot of money for delivering my head.
Morganti.
The Jhereg would want it done their way. So, if I assume there is some means of communication between some group here and the Jhereg—dubious, but possible—they could have been told to keep me in town, but not to kill me, and that would account for at least some of what was going on.
Maybe, but it certainly seemed like a stretch. Especially considering that they wouldn’t have let me know that my name wasn’t a secret; nor would anyone working for them. At least, not if they had any sense.
All in all, it was more likely there was something entirely different going on: something that had to do with the complex politics of a strange Guild, a Count who owned a factory—excuse me, a “mill”—and whatever forces there were that I didn’t know about. If so, then whatever was going on, it made them believe I was someone they couldn’t touch directly.
“What do you think, chum?”
“I think you’re right, Boss. Someone wants you not to find out something, and they don’t dare come after you directly.”
“Suggestions?”
“You mean, other than leaving?”
“Yeah, other than that.”
“No’:
I considered the plan I’d come up with, all of—uh, two days ago? The people I’d want to get information from were dead, or had dropped out of sight, or had managed to forestall me one way or another. But I had learned a few things, hadn’t I?
Yes.
I’d learned that there were all sorts of talk of witchcraft, and maybe it had been used to kill someone, it had certainly been used to burn a house down, and it was unlike the Art I knew, and there were two sides, one of which involved my family, and they were dead, and the other side—
