House of Shadows

by Rachel Neumeier

  Of course Benne had come before with Taudde out to this shore. Taudde had come down to the edge of the sea half a dozen times, covert and solitary, compelled by the rhythm of the waves against the rocks and the slow receding music of the outgoing tide. When he’d come here with Benne, he’d thought it was safe enough. He’d believed any man from an inland country might reasonably be expected to find the sea compelling. Now… now Taudde bent to fetch a packet of papers and a good-quality quill pen out from their packet in the carriage. The quill was magecrafted, inelegantly but with some attention to detail; one might use it to sketch for an hour without the ink needing renewal. It was not the sort of item bardic sorcery could make, and Taudde had already purchased a good many such quills to take home with him when he finally quitted this city.

  He tossed the papers to the rocks at Benne’s feet and followed this with the quill pen. The wind tried to snatch the quill away and send it spinning out over the sea, but Taudde checked that errant gust with a low whistle. The quill fell straight and struck the papers point down, with an audible little shick. It stayed there, its sharpened tip embedded in the packet like a miniature dagger.

  Benne watched the quill fall, then lifted his gaze.

  Taudde took out his small wooden flute and turned it over in his fingers. He did not look at the instrument he held, but only at the other man. When he spoke, his voice was not loud but pitched to carry over the sounds of sea and wind. “I wondered how it was Lord Miennes came to discover that I am from Kalches. Then I wondered if perhaps Ankennes had discovered it. Then at last I realized I should wonder how it was that you discovered it.”

  Benne straightened his shoulders and stared back at Taudde in, of course, silence. Yet neither did he shake his head or otherwise try to deny the accusation. It occurred to Taudde that Benne, voiceless, was almost as helpless in the face of disaster as the horse would have been: No more than an animal could a mute offer excuses or plead for mercy. His broad, coarse face had set in the blank expression of a man preparing to endure whatever a harsh fate might mete out.

  “How did you discover me?” Taudde asked him.

  There was an almost imperceptible pause. Then Benne went to one knee and bent to retrieve the packet of paper. He pulled the quill free and took out a single leaf of paper, supporting it on his other knee to write. Even under these straitened circumstances, the man wrote a quick neat hand. Finishing, he held the paper out toward Taudde.

  Taudde took it and read, My lord, you were not subtle enough. I saw a Kalchesene sorcerer once, and heard him speak. I heard that quality in your voice, lord, and sometimes I heard you play. I watched you listening to the sea.

  Taudde looked again at the other man, lifting an eyebrow. He crumpled the paper absently in his hand and tossed it into the wash and ebb of the wave that broke on the rocks. Quickly waterlogged, the bit of paper sank into the water and followed the retreating waves out to sea. Taudde let his eyes follow the path of the waves for a moment, then turned back to Benne. “I knew perfectly well a mute need not be deaf. And yet I see that sometimes I forgot this. I am sure many others have made the same mistake. Miennes owned the house I have been renting, yes? And placed you there to spy on those who might rent it?”

  Benne gave a curt nod, and waited.

  “Yes,” Taudde repeated. He studied the other man. “Was it Miennes, then, who cut your tongue?”

  Benne hesitated, then nodded again. He extracted a second leaf of paper from the packet and wrote quickly, then offered the paper to Taudde. It read, Lord Miennes desired a servant before whom men would speak freely. He bought me from the stone yards and had me taught to read and write. When I had nothing, Lord Miennes gave me everything. Then he told me why he had purchased me. He offered me a choice: to have the cut made in my tongue or to return to the stone yards.

  “A hard choice.” And a cruel one. Taudde absently tossed this paper after the other and wondered how many big, simple-looking men had been offered the choice Benne described before Miennes had found one who chose as he desired. And whether any of the ones who had chosen to return whole to the stone yards had actually survived their choice. And further, considering the hidden cleverness in the man before him, whether Benne, too, might have guessed that his only real choice most likely lay between mutilated life as Miennes’s servant and death. He asked, “And Nala?”

  Benne gave an emphatic shake of his head.

  “No?” If Benne had been able to speak, Taudde might have listened for truth or deceit in the tones of his voice. Miennes had made a better spy than he had probably realized with that mutilating knife. Even so, Taudde believed the man was telling him the truth. He asked curiously, “What is she to you?”

  Not by so much as a flicker of the eyes did Benne reveal the calculations that passed through his mind as he wrote his response: What answer did Taudde expect? What would be the best answer for Nala, or for Benne himself? But the subtle shift of the big man’s breathing suggested to Taudde that those calculations were there.

  He took the paper Benne held out to him and read, Nala is just as she seems: a woman hired to keep the house in order. Lord Miennes has had woman spies, but Nala never even knew that the house was his. She has been a friend to me. I beg my lord will not harm her. I swear she does not know the truth about me. Nor the truth about you.

  “Well, I think that is probably true,” Taudde allowed, looking up. He watched a little of the tension leave the man before him. In fact, he thought Benne had not tried to deceive him, not at any moment since Taudde had made his accusation, which spoke well of his courage. Or at least his sense.

  “What would you do now that Miennes is dead,” Taudde asked him, “if I opened my hand at this moment?” Then he answered his own question: “You would go immediately to Mage Ankennes, or to the Laodd—that might even be more likely. You could inform some lord there of the bardic sorcerer who had the effrontery to come into Lirionne. Into Lonne itself, no less. You would surely be well-rewarded for that information. You would gain the favor of a powerful man—most likely a place in his household—”

  A forceful jerk of the head denied this scenario. Benne wrote quickly and offered the paper to Taudde with a sharp gesture. The note read, I swear I would not. I know what place any great lord would give me: He would make me again into a spy. I would sooner find a place with a scribe in the Paliante. Or down by the docks, where the ships come in from the islands. I understand the speech of Erhlianne, of Samenne, of the outer islands, I write those languages, I could find a place with a reputable scribe. I beg my lord will permit me to seek such a place. I swear I will not reveal you to anyone.

  On consideration, it did indeed seem possible that Benne would prefer the role of scribe to spy. It even seemed likely. Taudde thought about what the big man’s life had been since his tongue had been cut: Able to write but forbidden to reveal this skill, he was twice separated from the normal discourse of men. By Lord Miennes’s order. Surely he could not have loved his master. Could he? Taudde said slowly, “A man under threat will make any claim. From what you tell me, you served Miennes for years. Would you wish me to believe you would not desire vengeance for his death?”

  Benne’s wide mouth crooked a little at this. He shook his head and made a deliberate gesture of negation, of denial. Taking another leaf of paper from the packet, he wrote briefly. The words, when Taudde took the note, were very clear: To Lord Miennes, I was a tool to be fashioned as he wished. His death frees me. I beg my lord will free me also. I swear I will not trouble you again.

  Taudde crumpled this paper, too, and dropped it into the surf after the others. Then, absently, he ran the smooth length of his flute through his hands, fingering its stops and frets. He said slowly, “Bardic sorcery is not without its limitations. But the limitations of sorcery are not the same as those of magecraft. You say you wish to find a place with a scribe? I offer you better: You may accompany me to Kalches, if you wish. Where we shall see whether sorcery will stretch so far as to re
store your voice.”

  Benne had been looking at the little flute. Now the man lifted his gaze to Taudde’s face and stared at him, motionless.

  “What I ask in return,” Taudde told him, “is that you place service to me above any other loyalty you may owe elsewhere, until we depart Lirionne. I cannot guarantee I will be able to restore your voice. But I swear to you, if you pledge me what I ask, I will try.”

  It took Benne a long moment to extract a paper from the packet, and when he did at last, his hand was shaking so that he tore it. When he wrote, he tore the paper again with the point of the quill pen.

  The note read simply, For that chance, I will do anything.

  Taudde shook his head immediately. “In Kalches, we hold that it’s perilous to make so broad a promise to anyone, and ill done to accept it. Make a narrower pledge, man. I ask only for your service and loyalty while I am in Lirionne. Can you promise that, above any other loyalty you may owe elsewhere?”

  Benne gave Taudde a long, unreadable look. Then he took another paper out, this time more carefully. He wrote for a moment, hesitated, then added a few more words. When he offered this paper to Taudde, his expression was once more restrained, his mouth set and steady, his eyes unrevealing. But his hand still trembled, just perceptibly.

  I owe no loyalty to anyone in Lonne. As Lord Miennes has died, I owe no service anywhere. I wish nothing but to accept what you offer, my lord. If you can restore my speech, my loyalty is yours, and I am glad to offer it. But I would ask, if my lord will permit me, what is your purpose in Lonne?

  Taudde read this and nodded. This was much better, implying as it did a limit to the pledge Benne was willing to make. He said, truthfully, because it would be an ill thing to bind falsehood into an oath of loyalty and fidelity, “I am neither a spy nor a saboteur nor an assassin—I have no leave to be here at all, from my own people. I came to Lonne to strive to understand the sea, nothing more. Kalches has no coast, and I… there is a deep magic in the sea, especially perceptible near Lonne, that I desire to understand.” Though desire seemed a weak term to describe the heart-deep compulsion that had driven him to this coast. But he knew no words to describe the goad that his dreams of sea magic had become. “Now that my nationality has become known, I intend to leave Lirionne as soon as I may. But Mage Ankennes blocks me. Would you then be willing to stand out of the way as I move against Ankennes?”

  Benne’s face hardened. This, he did not need to think about: He nodded sharply at once.

  “You dislike the mage?”

  Another nod, as decisive as the first.

  “Why?”

  But this seemed difficult to explain. Benne started to write, paused, crumpled up the paper and began again, but with no better result.

  “Never mind.” Satisfied that the other man would not warn or assist Ankennes, even if he knew of Taudde’s move and found the chance, Taudde dismissed the question. “That will do.”

  Benne made a gesture of acceptance and followed it with a deep bow: the bow of a man offering fealty, his palms flat on the rocks and his face touching the damp stone.

  “Well,” said Taudde, moved even though he had expected the man to accept his proposal. “I will be glad of your service. As it happens, you may be of use to me at once. There is a woman, a servant in Cloisonné House. She has, I believe, evidence that links me to Miennes’s death. I believe she has taken it to the Laodd—she may have done so as early as this past dawn. Perhaps she might go to Prince Tepres, perhaps to someone else. You will understand that I wish to intercept her before she can make this evidence known to anyone there. Can you assist me in this, Benne?” Laid out like that, it scarcely seemed likely that anyone could help.

  But the big man looked thoughtful. He wrote quickly.

  Taudde read, This woman is not a keiso, but House staff? I know where in the Laodd she will wait. Taudde finished reading and looked up, cautiously hopeful. “This seems promising.”

  Benne nodded, and got to his feet. He nodded toward the Laodd and looked at Taudde, clearly meaning That way.

  If there was anywhere Taudde less wished to find himself than the Dragon’s fortress, he could not immediately think of it. He made himself nod in return and lift a hand for Benne to precede him.

  CHAPTER 12

  Nemienne, returning to the Lane of Shadows from Cloisonné House rather later than she had hoped to, laid her hand on the door of Mage Ankennes’s house and then touched the head of the cat statue by the door. Of course, the door didn’t open. After several minutes, Nemienne gritted her teeth and rapped hard on the oak panels in the center of the door.

  A moment later the lock clicked, and Ankennes swung the door open. His eyebrows rose as he looked down at her. Nemienne tried to look as though she was perfectly at ease, but didn’t think she managed it very well.

  “I’ve had apprentices now and again in the past,” the mage observed at last, his tone mild. “Each had unique strengths and odd weaknesses. But I don’t recall any of them having precisely the idiosyncrasies you are displaying, Nemienne. Come in. Have you had breakfast? No? Well, then, perhaps while you do, you can tell me where you have been this time.”

  Nemienne meekly followed Ankennes through the stubborn door, trying to decide just how displeased he might be with his current apprentice’s, well, idiosyncrasies. There were no new doors or windows in the hall, this time. Most of the current row of windows looked out into morning light high in the mountains, but the nearest showed a sharp-edged night that glittered with stars. The beech door and the door with the carved animals were both shut fast, but the black door was standing a little ajar. Mage Ankennes gave it a look and pulled it shut as he passed it, with a swift glance at Nemienne. Nemienne flushed under that glance.

  The mage made her rice porridge for breakfast, taking fresh bread out of the cupboard and butter out of the ice pantry while they waited for the rice to cook. Nemienne sliced the bread and spread it with butter. Since Enkea was asleep on the chair nearest the stove, Nemienne sat down on the stove’s hearth to eat the bread. The heat of the stove beat pleasantly over her, driving away the memory of cold. Nemienne bit into her bread and tried to decide how to put into words the thin piping and heavy darkness and great carved dragon.

  “Did you go through the black door?” the mage asked her. He had sat down himself on the bench by the long table, where he could keep an eye on the porridge. His tone was not unkind, but his slate-gray eyes were chilly.

  “No!” said Nemienne. The look in his eyes frightened her. She was relieved she could deny it. “I…” She paused, trying to make sense of the night’s events, conscious of how strange any explanation must seem to anyone who had not been there. Her family, despite the best will in the world, would not have really been able to understand the… the feel of the heavy darkness and the dragon’s cavern. But Ankennes was a mage, she reminded herself. He would understand. And yet, although this ought to have been true, she could not overcome a visceral reluctance to explain what had happened.

  But that was silly. It was stupid. What, so far, had Mage Ankennes failed to understand? When had he ever been anything other than kind and patient? She said, trying for a firm tone but sounding hesitant even to herself, “I woke up in the dark—well, that is, I thought I was dreaming, but after a while I knew I was awake. There was music—at least, I’m sure there was, but it was very faint. I couldn’t really hear it—I don’t think it was really meant for me—but I found my sister Karah following the music. She stopped when I caught her hand, and then the music stopped, too. It was after that that I knew I was awake. I thought—I knew—we were deep under Kerre Maraddras, but I don’t know how I knew. Enkea was there, and a kitten someone gave Karah. They led us…” Her voice trailed off. She found herself somehow reluctant to describe the cavern with the black pool and the great white dragon carved into its farthest wall.

  “Music drew you into the dark?” murmured the mage. He got up briefly to stir the porridge, then sat back down and lo
oked thoughtfully at her. His eyes were no longer cold, but they held a strange, predatory glint. He seemed to have found this account perfectly plausible, for some reason. He asked, “What kind of music?”

  “Pipes,” answered Nemienne. “I don’t know—someone showed me a set of twin pipes Karah had been given, but they were ruined. But it might have been those I heard. I think it was.”

  “Interesting,” said the mage, but though Nemienne waited hopefully, he did not explain anything of his thoughts. He merely waved a hand at her: Go on.

  “Well…” Nemienne tried to organize memories that now seemed jumbled and uncertain. “There was the sound of dripping water. Of water falling into a pool. You know, the sound that’s always there in the dark…”

  “Yes. And?”

  “Well, Enkea led us to a place, a cavern, really big. There was a pool there, and water dripping into it, and… there was this carving…”

  “The Dragon of Lonne.” Mage Ankennes leaned back in his chair and regarded Nemienne as though she had just this moment magically appeared in his kitchen, next to his iron stove, eating his bread. As though he had never really seen her before and wasn’t entirely certain he was pleased by the sight. “You found the dragon’s chamber.”

  A shiver went down Nemienne’s spine, but she could not tell whether this was because of the memories of the cavern under Kerre Maraddras or because of the mage’s cool tone. She asked cautiously, “Do you know what… what any of that means, any of the things that happened last night?”

  The mage lifted an eyebrow and served them both porridge without answering. The rice was perfectly cooked, but Nemienne, finding herself with little appetite, only stirred hers around in the bowl.

  “You saw no one else under the mountain?” Ankennes asked.

  “No,” Nemienne answered, and then paused. “There might have been somebody else. Right at the beginning. He wasn’t there later. I’m not… I’m not certain he was there at all.”