by Steven Brust
“Okay, Loiosh.”
“Boss—”
“See you in a while.”
Loiosh and Rocza left my shoulders and flew away.
I followed the Demon into the place. We stepped into a long hallway. The first door on the right was to an antechamber with an oversized fireplace and a door. Past the door was the room we were to meet in. If you’re paying attention, you’ve noticed that, with windows facing the ocean-sea, the antechamber should have been on the left. Sorry, can’t help you with that.
The Demon opened the door and went into the antechamber, while his bodyguards took positions against the wall opposite the fireplace. If there were as many bodyguards coming as I expected, or even half as many, it was going to get awfully crowded in there.
The Demon cleared his throat.
“Right,” I said. I flipped the cloak aside and moved my arm out of the way, hating it. But if that’s what it took, that’s what it took.
One of the bodyguards pulled out what looked like a piece of silver cord, and approached me. He licked his lips. I suspect he wasn’t enjoying this much more than I was. He glanced at the Demon, and I could see him brace himself. I could also see him reminding himself of how much extra he was getting for this.
He wrapped the cord around Lady Teldra’s hilt and around my belt, and made a tight knot. Then he made a gesture, and backed away quickly. He stank of fear, which I admit gave me a certain satisfaction.
I didn’t feel anything, except that, maybe, there was a vague sense of something missing, as if I were in a room in which the light was just the tiniest bit dimmer than it had been a moment before. Only it wasn’t sight, it was, well, something else.
“One hour,” said the Demon. “As agreed.”
“As agreed,” I agreed.
I followed the Demon into the room itself.
“Anyone else here yet?” asked the Demon over his shoulder.
“I don’t think so, m’lord. But I wasn’t waiting that long.”
That earned me a quick glance. I looked back at him, and he barely shrugged.
The room we were in was the one I’d picked out—the only one possible. There was a long, lacquered table, set with several more chairs than we’d need. One thing I hadn’t been able to determine in advance was where I’d be sitting, but I’d decided it shouldn’t matter too much. Or, at any rate, I hoped it wouldn’t.
The Demon indicated that I should sit at the head of the table, and he put himself by my right hand. I wondered if it were a courtesy, a gesture of respect, or if he just wanted to be able to reach my right hand quickly. Maybe some of all of those. But it put me with my back to the window, and it couldn’t get much better than that. If things kept going like this, I might actually survive the day. I removed the euphonium case from my shoulder, set it next to me, and sat.
Poletra came in next, nodded to the Demon, looked at me, then gestured with his head to his bodyguards, who were standing outside the doorway. Poletra sat down almost across from the Demon, on my left, but with a chair between us. He looked around. He had this long, skinny neck, so when he looked around, he reminded me a little of a lizard. I tried not to let the thought form so Loiosh wouldn’t be insulted.
“Nice place,” said Poletra, looking around.
I said, “Are we getting the whole Council here?”
“No,” said the Demon. “Just enough of us to make a decision.”
“How many is that?”
“Six. Three members of the Council, and of course we have each hired our own sorcerer. Not, you understand, that we don’t trust each other.”
I chuckled a little because it was expected. “And these three can speak for the Organization? You’ll forgive my being a little nervous on the subject, but it is the whole point of the exercise.”
“Is it?” he inquired. “I had thought the point was to get me money, and that part was just a convenient bonus.”
“Sorry to disenchant you. Figuratively, I mean.”
A woman came in, alone, nodded to Poletra, and bowed respectfully to the Demon, who rose and returned the salute. Three sorcerers, he had said. He’d neglected to mention that at least one was from the Left Hand. But if I’d been paying attention, I’d have assumed it. The Jhereg—that is, the Right Hand—had precious few of them.
This particular sorceress looked at me and nodded as well, politely. Having a Dragaeran, not to mention someone in the Left Hand of the Jhereg, act polite toward me makes me suspicious, in spite of my too-trusting nature. But I nodded back anyway.
“This,” said the Demon, “is my lady Radfall, sorceress.”
I decided that saying, “Never heard of you” would be a bad idea, so I contented myself with one of those gestures between nodding and bowing your head that I’d practiced in front of a mirror back when I was young and forcing myself to learn to be diplomatic instead of being, you know, me. She returned the gesture exactly; maybe she had learned to not be her.
She said, “This room is enchanted.”
The Demon looked at me, eyebrows raised. I kept my face neutral, and he turned back to her. “What sort of enchantment?”
“It’s subtle. It’s part of the room. Anyone in this room is less inclined to act, more inclined to cooperate. There’s a sort of lethargy.”
“Can you get rid of it?”
She frowned, then closed her eyes. “Done,” she said.
“Nice try, Taltos,” said the Demon.
I shrugged.
The next to arrive was someone else I didn’t recognize; a compact guy in Jhereg colors who reminded me a lot of Shoen, even to the slicked-backed hair. He wore several rings, and at least three chains about his neck holding things that vanished under his jerkin. He stopped just inside the door and his eyes narrowed—at Radfall.
“Well,” he said, before any introductions could be made.
Radfall, who had sat facing the door a couple of seats away from Poletra, stood up and glared back at him. “Illitra,” she said, like the name was a curse.
“What,” he asked, “are you doing here?”
The Demon coughed. “I hadn’t realized you two were acquainted.”
Illitra answered him without taking his eyes off Radfall. “We’ve met,” he said.
“Yes,” said Radfall. “Murdered any children, lately?”
“No,” said Illitra. “Why? Did you have some suggestions?”
Radfall sniffed disdainfully, something it seems everyone in the Left Hand gets training in.
“Tell me,” said Illitra. “Do you still—”
“That will do,” said the Demon quietly.
Illitra shrugged, something it seems everyone in the Right Hand gets training in.
“This is Lord Taltos,” said the Demon.
Illitra twitched a little, I suppose at the “lord.” It made me want to shove something big and dull into a small orifice, but I did my best to hide it. He did his best to hide his warm and affectionate feelings toward me, and he was good at it.
Three Jhereg walked in about then, and they may as well have had “muscle for hire” written on their foreheads. They looked around, one glanced back and nodded ostentatiously, and a Jhereg I didn’t know, wearing clothes of an expensive cut, came in and took a seat.
He smiled to the Demon, and either he actually liked him, or the guy was a good actor. The Demon introduced him as Farthia, and he was kind enough to bestow a quick glance on me. I felt all honored and shit. He had to be one of the sorcerers, because he couldn’t be on the Council, though I’m starred if I can tell you how I knew that. That meant the bodyguards weren’t actually with him, but with the next guy to show up. They walked back out. I waited.
The other two sorcerers continued glaring at each other, but Illitra added a sneer, so I thought he had the edge. I didn’t know which sorcerer worked for whom, but I didn’t need to know. The point is, this really wasn’t a trick. It was going to have to work. I was going to have to do what I claimed. A shame I hadn’t been able
to actually, you know, test it or anything.
“How many more are we waiting for?” I asked.
“One,” said the Demon.
He arrived just about then. Jhereg tend to be as punctual to a business meeting as a Dzurlord is to a duel. This was someone else I’d never seen before. He was one of those older, quieter Jhereg who made you think that he lived a sedate life in a little barony where all the Teckla were always cheerful and the fishing was good. So far as I know, those places don’t exist, but he looked like he belonged there. The Demon introduced him as Diyann, and he nodded gravely to me. You couldn’t imagine him ever being unpleasant to anyone.
Jhereg like that scare the shit out of me.
He sat down next to the Demon. No one’s bodyguards were in the room. My heart thumped as it hit me yet again.
It had been so long. And now I was close. So close. All this had to do was work, which I was fairly certain it would. I looked at the others in the room. How would it come, and from which direction? Had I made the opening to my heart as I thought, or had I made the worst—and last—miscalculation of my life? Still, no point in worrying about that; hadn’t been for a few days now. I had committed myself with the visit to the Demon. Now it was just a matter of playing out the scene.
Oh, and not fucking up.
The Demon was looking at me. I caught his eye. “Nervous?” he said.
“Why would I be nervous?”
He let a smile almost appear. I tried to decide whether I was glad no one had brought wine, or sorry. It would go down well, but I didn’t think I’d be able to drink it without my hand visibly shaking.
This wasn’t like waiting for the perfect moment to strike. This wasn’t like anything I’d done before.
“A lot of that going around, Boss.”
I didn’t reply, but having him speak to me right then, even from outside, was just what I needed. I felt my shoulders dropping, my back relaxing.
The Demon turned to the rest of the table.
“Here’s the deal,” he said without preamble or greeting. “First, to restate, as of right now, until we’re done here, no one kills or injures Lord Taltos. Are we all clear on that?”
Several very high-powered Jhereg said they were clear on that, and I felt myself relaxing maybe just a little more.
The Demon nodded and said, “All right. We give him an hour to prove his idea works, and works consistently, and is practical enough for us to make a lot of money on. If it is, the contract on him is off, he gets to keep his soul and his skin, and, if he keeps his bread buttered from here out, no one comes after him. Are we all clear on that?”
There were nods.
“And you can all answer for your people?”
There were more nods.
“No,” he said. “Sorry, but I need you to state your agreement.”
They each allowed as to how they would abide by the terms as he’d stated. Then he turned to me. “And together, we speak for the Council. Good enough, Lord Taltos?”
“Yes,” came out of my suddenly dry throat.
“Then you may begin.”
I stood up. “All of you have someone prepared to send you a message?”
There were nods from the the three bosses. The sorcerers—two of them, at least—managed to pull their dislike from each other and redirect it my way. “Presumably,” I said, “you took precautions to make sure I couldn’t hear what was said by any mundane means. It should also help that, except for my lord the Demon, I didn’t know who was going to be here. You sorcerers will be monitoring the spells used, and thus be able to describe and duplicate the technique.”
I stopped and sized them up. I had everyone’s attention, even the sorcerers’. Diyann had no expression, but you could see the flicker of greed in his and everyone else’s eyes.
“Any questions before I start?”
“Yeah,” said the sorcerer called Farthia. “When you do this, how far into the boss’s head do you get?”
“I don’t get into his head at all,” I said. “Or rather, just the very, very surface, enough to become aware that he’s receiving psychic contact. But even if he were to concentrate really hard on the name of his first mistress, I couldn’t tell you what it was unless he actually sent it to someone. Assuming he remembered.”
There were a couple of obligatory chuckles, then he said, “What if you’re lying?”
“You’re going to get the technique, so you’ll know yourself. If I’m lying about that, the deal is off.”
He grunted and nodded.
“Anything else?”
There wasn’t anything else. Except, of course, still another of those thumps my heart had been giving since I started in on this whole thing.
I pulled out the wand and set it on the table. Then I picked up the euphonium case, opened it, took out the instrument. I kind of wanted to go through an elaborate ritual of tuning it, just for effect, but I didn’t even know how to pretend to do that, so I skipped it. No one made any remarks about having a concert, though I’m sure a few of them wanted to; that’s how we work.
I took the egg out and set it next to the euphonium. “These things should not be necessary,” I said, “for those of you with stronger brains than I have, but you know us weak-minded Easterners.” I kept talking before anyone could say anything. “The point is, the egg will increase my mental strength enough for me to cast the spell. This device,” I indicated the wand, “will turn the psychic energy into a form I can use for the spell, and this—” I nodded to the euphonium, “has been enchanted with the necessary spell itself. I’m sure you sorcerers will get the gist of it once I start going, otherwise I’m not sure why you’re here. But my object is to show you that you can accomplish the same effect without these tools. Or, rather, for you to detect it on your own.”
Oh, just to be clear: That was all true, except about the wand, which was there in case someone cast a sleep spell at me, which was one of the more likely ways things could go down.
“The idea is, each of you—that is, you three gentlemen, not the sorcerers—is to receive a message. You don’t know what it will consist of. I don’t know who you arranged to have send it to you. Once we’ve done that, each of you will receive a second message from someone else. Finally, each of you will send a message to someone. By this time, your sorcerers should be able to assure you that they can duplicate it.”
The one called Farthia said, “How did you come across this?”
“I know a Hawk,” I said. “He told a story about hiding from the Orb. It occurred to me that, if you can use psychic power to hide from the Orb, and if you can use the power of the Orb to enhance psychic ability, then … um.
“Okay, let me put it this way. Some communicate with psychic ability, most use sorcery. But I wondered if very subtle psychic control couldn’t be used to detect the sorcerous channels.”
There was some stirring, and I could see the sorcerers were becoming intrigued.
Farthia said, “But then, you require a lot of natural psychic ability and training.”
“Unless you have aids,” I said, pointing to the devices in front of me. “Only I’m betting you can duplicate the effect using sorcery. In other words, sorcery duplicating the effect of psychics duplicating the effect of sorcery. That’s what you’re here to observe.”
No question, I had their attention; I could see the wheels spinning in their sorcerous little heads.
“Any more questions before I begin?”
When no one said anything, I nodded. “All right. One at a time, please. Who’s going first?”
The Demon shrugged. “I may as well.”
“Remember, tell him to wait for ten seconds or so before he sends the message. I need a little time to get the spell working.” Always assuming it works.
He nodded.
I removed the amulet from around my neck, put it into its adorable little teakwood case, and I could tell what time it was again.
So, yeah, there I sat in a room full my en
emies, plus a sorceress of the Left Hand, and I had just removed the thing that had done the most to keep me alive for the last several years. I felt fine, thanks. Why do you ask?
I picked up the wand, brought it to life, and set it down again, and no one had killed me yet. I felt it swirl around in my head; strange, but not unpleasant. My toes and fingers were tingling. I was suddenly very alert and focused.
I picked up the hawk’s egg, crushed it.
Daymar once “observed” me performing a witchcraft spell, realized it was just psychic energy I was playing with, thought he’d “help” by giving me some extra energy, and he about burned out my brain. It was also like that first rush I’d gotten this morning, realizing this was the day, only it was all in my head; I felt powerful, like I could knock things over just by thinking about it. And I could, too. I felt bigger, tougher, like I could kill with bolts of lightning out of my eyes, and, hey, for all I know I could have done that, too.
Also, I got runny stuff on my palm and wondered if the thing would work if I’d hard-boiled the egg first. Probably not.
I had an instant of almost panic realizing that this effect wouldn’t last, and here I’d been sitting around thinking aimless thoughts, and the guy was going to deliver the message, shit, I’d probably already missed it—
No. My time sense came back. It had been maybe a second since I crushed the egg. All was well—in a scary, head full of power, surrounded by enemies, hoping I’d outguessed or outplanned everyone because if not I was dead, kind of way. But I’m sure you’ve been there, too.
I picked up the euphonium, my hand still smeared in egg goo, and, without preamble, blew into it. I started moving my fingers, too, and then I wasn’t controlling my fingers at all, or my breath, and music started happening. It was surprising—for an instant, I almost panicked again, and the whole spell nearly slipped. I hadn’t been able to practice this part, and of course, it’s the thing you can’t practice that screws you up, no matter how much other preparation you’ve done.
But I got through it. I kept playing; or, rather, the instrument kept playing, using my mouth and my gooey fingers, leaving my mind free. And the only way I can think to describe it is that I focused my thoughts as if they were external and sent them out through the instrument. There’s no better way to put it than that, and if you’ve done something like it you know what I mean, and if you haven’t, well, try it. I knew the what of what I wanted to do; the instrument turned it into how and my power-soaked brain supplied the energy. You’re doing it, and watching yourself do it, and then it’s like you let your mind wander, only you direct where you want it to wander to. I guess it isn’t wandering but it feels like it’s flowing out of the instrument, floating, and watchingguidingwaiting and the notes of the music turn purple and the spell is going into each finger and out like it’s all in your hands and—
