Can I get there by candlelight?
Aye, and back again.
If your feet are nimble and light,
You’ll get there by candlelight.
I NEEDED HELP. But not from Nahadoth or Yeine; I dared not chance their tempers. Not until I knew more.
Who could I trust among my siblings? Zhakkarn, of course, but she was never subtle and would be no help in uncovering a conspiracy. The rest—hells. Most of them I had not spoken to in two thousand years. Before that I had tried to kill some of them. Bridges burned, ashes scattered, ground strewn with salt.
And there was the small problem of my inability to return to the gods’ realm in my current state. That was less of a problem than it seemed, because fortunately the city beneath Sky was teeming with my youngest siblings, those for whom the novelty of the mortal realm had not yet worn off. If I could convince one of them to help me… But which one?
I turned from the window, frustrated, to pace. The walls of Sky had begun to glow again, and I hated them, for they were more proof of my impotence; once upon a time, they would have dimmed, just a bit, in my presence. I was no Nahadoth, but there was more than a little of his darkness in me. Now, as if to mock me, the walls stayed bright, diffusing every shadow—
—shadow.
I stopped. There was one of my siblings, just maybe, who would help me. Not because she liked me; quite the opposite. But secrets were her nature, and that was something we shared. It was always easier to relate to those of my siblings with whom I had something in common. If I appealed to that, would she listen? Or would she kill me?
“No reward without risk,” I murmured to myself, and headed for the apartment door.
I took the lift down to the penultimate level of the underpalace. The corridors here were as quiet as always—and dim, compared to the brighter glow of all the other levels. Yes, this was the place.
For nostalgia’s sake, I touched each door as I passed it, remembering. Here were my sisters’ rooms: Zhakkarn’s with cannon shot embedded in the floor and the walls hung with shields; her hammock of blood-soaked slings and whips. (Very comfortable, I knew from experience, though a little scratchy.) Dear traitor Kurue’s, with pearls and coins scattered over nearly every surface, and books stolen from the library stacked atop the rest. The coins would be tarnishing now.
I avoided my own quarters, for fear of how they would make me feel. How long before I ended up living there again? I steered my thoughts off this path with a heavy hand.
This left the fourth chamber, at the center of the level. The one that had been Nahadoth’s.
It was pitch-black within, but I could still see a little in the dark even without cat’s eyes. The chamber was completely empty. No furnishings, no decorations, no hint that the room had ever been used. Yet every inch of its structure screamed defiance of our onetime jailors: the permanently lightless walls. The ceiling, which dipped toward the center of the room; the floor rose in the same spot, as if some terrible force had sucked the very stone toward itself. The sharp corners, which no other room in Sky had. If I stared hard enough into the dark, I could almost see Nahadoth’s silhouette etched against it and hear his soft, deep voice. Have you come for another story? Greedy child.
It had been cruel of me to push him away. I would pray an apology to him after this.
Reaching into my shirt, I pulled up the necklace of my own woven hair. Tugging En off the cord, I willed it to hover in the space between the floor and ceiling extrusions. To my relief, this worked; En stayed in the air and began turning at once, happily. This reminded it of the orrery, though it was lonely without planets.
“Sorry,” I said, reaching out to stroke its smooth surface with a fingertip. “I’ll give you more planets someday. In the meantime, will you give me light?”
In answer, En flared bright yellow-white for me, a gleeful candle. Suddenly Nahadoth’s chamber became smaller, stark with shadows. My own loomed behind me, a big-headed apparition that seemed to taunt me with the shape of the child I should have been. I ignored it and focused on the task at hand.
“Lady of Secrets,” I said, extending a hand; my shadow did the same. Shaping my fingers just so, I made the profile of a face on the wall and spoke with it. “Shadow in the dark. Nemmer Jru Im, my sister; do you hear me?”
There was a pause. Then, though I did not move, my hand shadow cocked its head.
“Well, this is unexpected,” it said in a woman’s voice. “Big brother Sieh. It’s been some time.”
I added my other hand, working the shadow into the shape of a donkey’s head. I’ve been an ass. “I hear interesting things about you, Nemmer. Will you speak with me?”
“I answered, didn’t I?” The first shadow shifted, impossibly manifesting its own arms and hands, the latter of which were set on its hips. “Though I’ll admit that’s because I’ve heard some very interesting things about you, too. I’m dying to know if they’re true.”
Damn. I might have known. “I’ll tell you every juicy detail, but I want something in return.”
“Do you, now?” I tensed at the wariness in her tone. That she did not trust me was irrelevant; she trusted no one. She did not like me, though, which was another matter entirely. “I’m not certain I’m interested in making any bargains with you, Trickster.”
I nodded; no more than I had expected. “I mean no harm to you, Nemmer. Cross my heart and hope to die.” I heard the bitterness in my own voice and angled my fingers into the shape of an old man’s head. “You did not turn on us in the War. I bear no grudge toward you.”
“That I do not believe,” she said, folding her arms. “Everyone knows you hate the ones who stood by doing nothing as much as the ones who fought for Itempas.”
“Hate is a strong word—”
Her silhouette tossed its head in the universal gesture of rolled eyes. “Resent us, then. Yearn to kill us. Is that more accurate?”
I stopped and dropped my hands with a sigh. The talking shadows remained. “You know my nature, Sister. What do you want from me—maturity?” I wanted to laugh, but I was too soul-weary. “Fine, I’ll say it: I hate you and I wouldn’t have contacted you if I had a choice, and we both know it. Now, will you speak with me, or shall we just tell each other to go to the infinite hells and leave it at that?”
She was silent for a moment. I had time enough to worry: who could I contact if she refused to help me? The other choices were worse. What if—
“All right,” she said at last, and the knot that had been tightening in my belly loosened. “I need time to set things up. Come here, a week from today. Noon.” The location made itself present in my consciousness, as if I had always known it. A house somewhere in the city below Sky. South Root. “Come alone.”
I folded my arms. “Will you be alone?”
“Oh, of course.”
I made the shape of a cat’s head with my hands: ears back, teeth bared. She laughed.
“I don’t care if you believe me. You asked for this meeting, not I. Be there in a week, or not at all.” With that, her shadow leaned down and blew hard. With a surprised flare, En went dark and dropped to the floor. Then Nemmer was gone.
In the dark, I retrieved En, who was quite put out. I murmured soothing words and tucked it back into my shirt, all the while thinking.
If Nemmer knew what had happened to me—and it was her nature to know such things; not even the Three could keep her out of their business, though she wasn’t foolish enough to flaunt that—then when I arrived in a week, I might find her and a group of my least-favorite siblings, some of whom had been waiting for a chance to repay me for the Gods’ War for two thousand years.
But Nemmer had never been one to play the games of our family. I didn’t know why she’d sat out the war. Had she been torn, like so many of our siblings, between our fathers? Had she been one of those working to save the mortal realm, which had nearly been destroyed by our battling? I sighed in frustration, realizing that this was the sort of thing I should have occupied
myself with as eldest, not our parents’ sordid dramas. If I had bothered to reconcile with my siblings, perhaps tried to understand their reasons for betraying Nahadoth—
“If I had done that, I would not be who I am.” I sighed into the dark.
Which, ultimately, was why I would risk trusting Nemmer. She, too, was only what her nature made her. She kept her own counsel, gathering secrets and doling out knowledge where she deemed best and making alliances only as it suited her—briefly, if at all. If nothing else, that meant she was not my enemy. Whether she became my friend would be up to me.
On returning to Deka’s room, I was surprised to find that I had visitors again: Morad, the ample-haired palace steward, and another servant, who was busy making the bed and tidying up. Both bowed to me at once, as they would to any Arameri highblood. Then the servant promptly resumed his cleaning duties while Morad looked me up and down with an expression of unconcealed distaste.
Frowning at her scrutiny, I looked at myself—and then, belatedly, realized why the servants had all stared at me on my way to the underpalace. I still wore the clothing I had conjured for myself two days before. It had been nondescript then, but it was filthy now, after all my scrabbling through dusty corridors and Tree-choked dead spaces. And… I sniffed one of my armpits and wrinkled my nose, appalled that I had not noticed. I had not bathed since my return to this world, and apparently my adolescent body had a greater capacity for generating reek than I had done as a child.
“Oh,” I said, smiling sheepishly at Morad. She sighed, though I thought I saw a hint of amusement on her face.
“I’ll run you a bath,” she said, and paused, looking particularly at my head. “And summon a stylist. And the tailor. And a manicurist.”
I touched my stringy, gritty hair with a weak laugh. “I suppose I deserve that.”
“As you like, my lord.” Morad touched the servant, who had almost finished the bed, and murmured something. He nodded and exited the apartment at once. To my surprise, Morad then rolled up her sleeves and finished tucking the sheets. When that was done, she went into the bathroom; a moment later, I heard water run.
Curious, I followed her into the room and watched while she sat on the tub’s edge, testing the water with her fingers. It was even more noticeable with her back turned and all that hair of hers visible in full riot. It was clear that she was not fully Amn; her hair had the kind of tight, small coils that wealthy Amn spent hours and fortunes to achieve, and it was as black as my father’s soul. Her skin was pale enough, but the marks of other were in her features, plain to anyone who looked. It was also plain that she was not ashamed of her mixed blood; she sat as straight and graceful as a queen. She could not have been raised in Sky or any Amn territory; they would have beaten her spirit down with cruel words long before now.
“Maroneh?” I guessed. “You must’ve gotten the hair from them, at least. The rest… Teman, maybe? Uthre, a bit of Ken?”
Morad turned to me, lifting one elegant eyebrow. “Two of my grandparents were part Maroneh, yes. One was Teman, another Min, and there are rumors that my father was actually a half-Tok who pretended to be Senmite to get into the Hunthou Legions. My mother was Amn.”
More proof of the Arameri’s desperation. In the old days, they would barely have acknowledged a woman with such jumbled bloodlines, let alone make her Steward. “Then how…”
She smiled wryly, as if she got such rude questions all the time. “I grew up in southern Senm. When I came of age, I petitioned to come here on the strength of my fourth grandparent—an Arameri highblood.” At my grimace, she nodded. It was an old story. “Grandmama Atri never knew my grandfather’s name. He was passing through town on a journey. Her family had no powerful friends, and she was a pretty girl.” She shrugged, though her smile had faded.
“So you decided to come find Grandpapa the rapist and say hello?”
“He died years ago.” She checked the water once more and stopped the taps. “It was Grandmama’s idea that I come here, actually. There’s not much work in that part of Senm, and if nothing else, her suffering could bring me a better life.” She rose and went to stand pointedly beside the washing area’s bench, picking up the flask that held shampoo.
I got up and undressed, pleased that my nudity didn’t seem to bother her. When I sat down, before I could warn her, she lifted the cord that held En from around my neck and set it on a counter. I was relieved that En tolerated this without protest. It must have been tired after its earlier exertion. Plus, it had always had odd taste in mortals.
“You didn’t have to come here for a better life,” I said, yawning as she wet my hair and began washing it. Sending the message to Nemmer had left me tired, too, and Morad’s fingers were skillful and soothing. “There must be a thousand other places in the world where you could’ve made a living and where you wouldn’t have had to deal with this family’s madness.”
“There were no other places that paid as much,” she said.
I swung around to stare at her. “They pay you?”
She nodded, amused at my reaction, and gently pushed my head back into place so that she could resume work. “Yes. Old Lord T’vril’s doing, actually. As a quarterblood, I can retire in five more years with enough money to take care of my whole family for the rest of my life. I’d say that’s worth dabbling in madness, wouldn’t you?”
I frowned, trying to understand. “They are your family,” I said. “The ones you left behind, in the south. The Arameri are just employers to you?”
Her hands paused. “Well. I’ve been here fifteen years at this point; it’s home now. Some aspects of life in Sky aren’t so terrible, Lord Sieh. I suspect you know that. And… well, there are people I love here, too.”
I knew then. She resumed work in silence, pouring warm water over me and then lathering again, and when she leaned past me to pick up the flask of shampoo, I got a good mouthful of her scent. Daystone and paper and patience, the scents of efficient bureaucracy, and one thing more. A complex scent, layered, familiar, with each element supporting and enriching the other. Dreams. Pragmatism. Discretion. Love.
Remath.
It was my nature to use the keys to a mortal’s soul whenever they fell into my hands. If I had still been myself, the child or the cat, I would have found some way to torment Morad with my knowledge. I might even have made a song of it and sung it everywhere until even her friends found themselves humming the tune. The refrain would have been see wow, you silly cow, how dare you lose your heart.
But though I would always be the child, and the child was a bully, I could not bring myself to do this to her. I was going soft, I supposed, or growing up. So I kept silent.
Presently Morad finished with my hair, whereupon she handed me a soapy sponge and stepped back, plainly unwilling to wash the rest of my body. She had wrapped my hair in a damp towel that was tied like a beehive atop my head, which made me giggle when I finished and stood and caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror. Then my eyes drifted down. I saw the rest of me and fell silent.
It was the same body I had shaped for myself countless times, sometimes deliberately, sometimes in helpless response to moments of weakness. Short for “my age”; I would grow another two or three inches but would never be tall by Amn standards. Thinner than I usually made myself, perhaps from years of not eating while I gradually became mortal within Nahadoth. Long-limbed. Beneath my brown skin, there were bones poking out at every juncture, like blemishes. The muscles that lined them were attenuated and not very strong.
I leaned closer to the mirror, peering at the lines of my face critically. Not very attractive, either, though I knew that would improve. Too disproportionate for now. Too tired-eyed. Shahar was much prettier. And yet she had kissed me, hadn’t she? I traced the outline of my lips with a finger, remembering the feel of her mouth. What had she thought of mine, on hers?
Morad cleared her throat.
Did Shahar ever think of—
“The water will get cold,�
�� Morad said gently. I blinked, blushing, and was abruptly glad I hadn’t made fun of her. I got into the tub, and Morad exited the bathroom to go speak with the tailor, who’d just arrived and announced himself.
When I emerged in a fluffy robe—I looked ridiculous—the tailor measured me, murmuring to himself that I would need looser clothing to conceal my thinness. Then came the manicurist, and the shoemaker, and one or two others whom Morad had somehow summoned, though I hadn’t seen her use magic. By the time it was done, I was exhausted—which Morad thankfully noticed. She dismissed all the craft servants and turned to head for the door herself.
Belatedly it occurred to me that she’d been unbelievably helpful. Who knew how many duties she had as steward, and how many of those had she neglected to see to my comfort? “Thank you,” I blurted as she opened the door.
She paused and looked back at me in surprise, then smiled in such a genuine, generous way that I suddenly knew what Remath saw in her.
Then she was gone. I sat down to eat the meal the servants had left. Afterward, I sprawled naked across Deka’s bed, for once looking forward to sleep so that I could perhaps dream of love and
forget
I stood upon a plain like a vast glass mirror. Mirrors again. I had seen them in Nahadoth’s realm, too. Perhaps there was meaning in this? I would ponder it some other time.
Above me arced the vault of the heavens: an endlessly turning cylinder of clouds and sky, vast and limitless and yet somehow enclosed. Clouds drifted across it from left to right, although the light—from no source I could ascertain—shifted in the opposite direction, waxing light and waning dark in a slow and steady gradient.
The gods’ realm, or a dream manifestation of it. It was an approximation, of course. All my mortal mind could comprehend.
Before me, rising from the plain, a palace lay impossibly on its side. It was silver and black, built in no recognizable mortal architectural style and yet suggesting all of them, a thing of lines and shadow without dimension or definition. An impression, not reality. Below, instead of a reflection, its opposite shone in the mirror: white and gold, more realistic but less imaginative, the same yet different. There was meaning in this, too, but it was obvious: the black palace ascendant, the white palace nothing but an image. The silvery plain reflecting, balancing, and separating both. I sighed, annoyed. Had I already become as tiresomely literal as most mortals? How humiliating.
The Inheritance Trilogy Page 79
