House of Shadows

by Rachel Neumeier

  “All right—yes—good,” stammered Nemienne, and retreated, since she could see Mage Ankennes wanted her out of the way. That unexpected permission to go see your sisters—she would be happy to, of course, but it was also clearly a polite way to say Go away and don’t bother me for a while. She wondered what he could possibly mean to do while she was gone, but couldn’t think of any way to ask. And, anyway, she longed to see Karah again and make sure she was all right. She went out to find the coins and a conveyance.

  There was no conveyance handy to the Lane of Shadows, so Nemienne walked on foot toward the more traveled areas of the city. She didn’t mind. It was cold, but she wanted time to think—time to herself, out in the open air.

  The image of the Dragon of Lonne kept coming before her mind’s eye, though she didn’t want to think about it. Or at least, not about Mage Ankennes destroying it.

  Nemienne badly wanted to tell someone else about the Dragon of Lonne, if not about Mage Ankennes’s plans for it. She felt that if she did, she might find a way to understand it better herself. “Leilis,” Nemienne whispered. She didn’t know why, but she felt that Leilis would understand the dragon—maybe better than Nemienne did herself.

  Not that that would be difficult.

  Cloisonné House was awake and beginning to be lively when Nemienne arrived in late afternoon. But it was sufficiently early that the flower world still belonged almost entirely to itself. A girl came to the door in answer to Nemienne’s tentative rap, but her faint air of surprise said plainly that it was early for outsiders to arrive.

  But the surprise on the girl’s face cleared at once when Nemienne gave her name. “You’re Moonflower’s sister, of course,” she said confidently. “My name’s Birre. You’re welcome, of course. Moonflower is busy dressing for the evening—she’s going to attend a small engagement. Rue will be with her, don’t worry about that.”

  “That’s fine,” Nemienne said, wondering what she ought to have worried about. “Actually,” she added, since the opportunity presented itself, “I was hoping I might see Leilis? If she’s free?”

  “Oh,” Birre said earnestly, “I’m so sorry. Leilis isn’t in Cloisonné House this evening. She went out early and I know she hasn’t yet returned because Mother was only just asking for her. We really can’t imagine what might have taken her away so long.” She looked a little worried, but then added with more cheer, “But then, Leilis always has good reasons for everything she does, and I’m sure she’ll be back soon. But it is too bad, with first that foreign lord and then you both looking for her. She’ll be sorry she missed you both, I’m sure.”

  “Oh,” Nemienne said faintly, and then rallied and asked, with some trepidation, “What, um… the foreign lord? You don’t mean… not the same foreign lord who gave Prince Tepres a set of twin pipes? That the prince later gave Karah? That lord?”

  “Why, yes.” The girl looked wistful. “The prince is in love with your sister, everyone in the House says so, and anyway it’s obvious. I saw him when I was carrying platters during his private engagement with your sister—he’s so splendid—and that foreign lord, so gracious, do you know he gave out a gratuity for all the servants? It’s a shame Leilis was already gone when he came by today. She ought to have been the one to accept it on our behalf, really—”

  “Yes, I’m sure,” Nemienne said almost at random. “You mean the foreign lord was here today looking for Leilis? But she was already gone then?”

  Birre gave her a mystified look. “Why, yes.”

  “Um.” Nemienne hesitated. Leilis’s absence seemed important, but she was not really sure why. She asked after a moment, “Well, then, do you know when Karah will be free? In just a little while, you said? I think I really need to talk to her. Could I wait in her room? Or where would be convenient?”

  Karah, of course, shared Rue’s room—Nemienne had forgotten. But Rue politely excused herself and left the sisters in privacy, only reminding Karah that she’d expect her to be ready for the engagement in half an hour.

  “And I mustn’t be late, Nemienne, though of course it’s wonderful to see you,” Karah told her sister warmly.

  Karah looked wonderful herself. She was wearing blue robes embroidered with dusky rose and white, and a strand of beads wound through her hair: black glass and hematite, white and black pearls, with three lapis beads neatly arranged where they would show to best advantage. She had her silver kitten on her knee. The kitten, amazingly, was not batting at the beads. With her hair up, Karah looked all grown up and every bit a keiso. Nemienne, despite the urgency driving her, paused for a moment in astonishment. She had somehow never thought of her sister as really a keiso, and Karah’s glamour startled her.

  But it wasn’t just the glamour. Robes and beads aside, Karah just seemed to glow, somehow. A private smile curved her lips; her gaze was warm and happy and a little unfocused. If Prince Tepres was in love with Karah, the sentiment was obviously returned. Nemienne had no doubt about that, now. If the prince and Karah… well, that should have been exciting and wonderful, but in fact it added a new worry to the pile that seemed to be accumulating.

  “What’s wrong?” Karah asked, a trace of worry entering her eyes. Even distracted, she couldn’t help but notice when somebody else was anxious or upset.

  “Oh.” Nemienne hesitated, and then asked about the pipes instead of the prince.

  “Oh, I don’t have them anymore,” Karah said, sounding a little surprised. “Leilis showed them to me—it’s so strange what happened to them, and really too bad, after Prince Tepres”—her voice softened a little on his name—“was so kind to give them to me!” She stroked her kitten possessively, smiling down at this other gift from the prince.

  “I suppose Lily did something to them,” Karah added. Her tone here went a little doubtful. She added quickly, as though trying to justify such an unpleasant supposition, “Lily is jealous, Rue says. But Leilis said she’d find out for me if a similar set could be made, so the prince won’t be disappointed. Leilis is very kind, really, though she tries to hide it,” Karah added, happy again once she could think of Leilis’s kindnesses rather than Lily’s jealousy. “But why ever did you want them, Nemienne?”

  “Mage Ankennes wants to look at them. He said he can learn things about them even though they’ve been ruined.”

  “Yes,” Karah said artlessly, “that makes sense. I remember: Your Mage Ankennes was so impressed by the pipes when Lord Chontas first gave them to Prince Tepres and Lord Miennes. Of course, we all were.”

  Nemienne was startled. At first she did not understand what Karah had said to startle her. Then she did, and she was at once dismayed as well as shocked. Mage Ankennes had been at that banquet? Yes, she remembered now he’d said he was going to a banquet at Cloisonné House. He’d seen the foreign lord give Prince Tepres those pipes. And he’d seen the other set given away, too.

  Could he have failed to realize right then the instruments were enspelled?

  But Nemienne knew, even as she wondered this, that Mage Ankennes hadn’t missed that ensorcellment at all. Horrible pieces fell into place with appalling smoothness.

  “Sympathy between similar objects,” she whispered. Unfortunately the necessary sacrifice appears to have failed. That was what the mage had said. “The Dragon of Lonne—the Dragon of Lirionne,” she said aloud. “Sympathy between similar objects.”

  “What?” asked Karah.

  “It’s a principle. Iasodde explains it in his codex. Oh, sea and sky. I wrote an essay on this…”

  “Did you?” Karah was plainly mystified.

  Nemienne shook her head. “This can’t be right. I must be mistaken.” But she knew she wasn’t. For the first time, she really understood Iasodde’s principle. She felt cold right down to her toes… She whispered, knowing it was true, had to be true, “Mage Ankennes wants to kill Prince Tepres in order to, to destroy the dragon. The sympathy between similar objects. He can destroy the dragon if he murders the prince. He said it was unfortun
ate it wasn’t the prince who… who died. That was the sacrifice he meant.”

  “Wait—what?” Karah stared at her, horrified and frightened. “What are you saying, Nemienne?”

  Outside, the descending sun must have begun its plunge into the western sea: The light had shifted from the gold of late afternoon toward the shadowy violets and sapphires of dusk. Nemienne felt like similar shadows were stretching out in her heart. “I think,” she whispered. “I think—”

  But before she could complete the thought, the whole of Cloisonné House, maybe the whole city, abruptly went thump, as though caught in an earthquake. It felt like the whole House jerked sharply to one side and then the other before returning to rest.

  Nemienne cried out, a thin sound that seemed to vanish in suddenly thick air. Karah gasped. Other exclamations, the crash as somebody dropped a tray, and a burst of startled laughter came from elsewhere in the House and from outside on the streets. The kitten, its little tail lashing in alarm, leaped off Karah’s knee, crouched on the floor, glared around at the room, and hissed.

  And yet, Nemienne realized, in fact neither Cloisonné House itself nor the city had actually been shaken by any physical tremor. None of the little bottles or mirrors or combs on Rue’s table or in the cabinets had even trembled. There had not been a real earthquake at all.

  Nemienne had an uncomfortable conviction that she knew, at least in broad terms, what had actually given Lonne that twisting not-quite-real sideways shove.

  CHAPTER 13

  The Laodd was imposing enough from the candlelight district. When one actually stood before it, with its powerful walls rearing above and the afternoon sun blazing in its thousand windows and close at hand the roaring Nijiadde Falls drowning speech and sense as it thundered down the cliffs into its lake… “imposing” was not an adequate term. Leilis had almost changed her mind at that point, almost gone back to Cloisonné House. But pride, or stubbornness, or simply the habit of making careful decisions and then holding to them, had stiffened her resolve. Thus she had not turned away, but instead approached the guards.

  Now she waited, alone, in a great echoing chamber with walls as thick as those of a tomb and no amenities to soften its stark chilliness. In its own way, this room was as intimidating as the Laodd’s outer ramparts. It was meant to be, she knew: the intimidation as much a calculated effect as Cloisonné House’s warm welcome. Common people were supposed to wait in this room, and while they waited, they were supposed to think again about why they had come here. If their reasons for approaching the court were trivial, they were expected to slink out quietly and go home. The guards at the Laodd gates wouldn’t question them. For most people, leaving the Laodd was much easier than entering.

  Leilis could leave. Indeed, she hadn’t had to come here at all. She could have gone to Mother right away, let Narienneh be the one to approach the court. Narienneh knew everyone. She could have approached the right person, someone powerful who would know what to do about a Kalchesene sorcerer who’d had the temerity to enter Lonne. But, no. Leilis had told herself she’d meant to keep her House clear of any entanglements, but now she suspected it had merely been pride that had prompted her to venture the cliff road herself. Misplaced pride. Whom did she know?

  She hadn’t really been thinking clearly, she acknowledged now. Or at least, she hadn’t let herself recognize everything she’d been thinking. Because even more than leaving everything to Mother, she’d been tempted simply to take no action whatever. Because she knew—she knew—the foreign lord must be a sorcerer. A Kalchesene sorcerer. Why else would he have tried to murder the Dragon’s heir? Why else would he have tried to do so with enspelled pipes?

  But, even knowing so much, she hadn’t been able to stop herself from wondering what else a Kalchesene sorcerer might be able to do that Lonne mages couldn’t. Might a sorcerer, for example, be able to remove strange curses? Hadn’t the foreigner even implied as much? And seemed willing to do it?

  And, after all, Prince Tepres hadn’t actually been harmed by whatever magic had been in those pipes. In a way, that made it almost as though the foreigner had never given them to the prince, didn’t it?

  She couldn’t quite persuade herself of this, although she wanted to. Besides, if she told no one about these pipes and then the Kalchesene finished what he’d come to Lonne to do—if the prince or anyone else died at his hands—it would be her fault. That was an obvious conclusion, and wishing it had never occurred to her didn’t make it vanish from her mind.

  Leilis hadn’t, in the event, been able to persuade herself to anything so immoral as complete inaction. But she hadn’t gone to Narienneh, either. She’d come to the Laodd herself, in a sort of compromise between inaction and efficiency.

  She’d first intended to approach the prince himself, but that had clearly been foolish. Then she had thought of Jeres Geliadde. Surely he would be interested in what she had to say. But the dour bodyguard frightened her. So then she had thought of the prince’s left-hand friend, Koriadde. Surely Koriadde, himself keiso born, would listen to a woman from the flower world.

  So she had come to the Laodd and asked to see Koriadde. And now she stayed, and waited, and would not give up and go home. She stood instead by the room’s one window and looked out at the late sun turning the spume from Nijiadde Falls to glittering diamond, and though she wanted to run across the room to the door and then down the echoing hall and out of the Laodd and back to the candlelight district, she didn’t.

  She turned restlessly and paced around the perimeter of the room. She had done this twice, now. Each circuit took a long time, if one walked slowly, for the room was quite large. She told herself that when she reached the window again, if someone hadn’t yet come to escort her to Koriadde, she would leave the Laodd, but she could tell that this wasn’t a firm decision because as soon as she told herself this, her steps slowed even further. Maybe if she delayed long enough, she would never reach the window. Or maybe Koriadde—

  But it wasn’t the prince’s friend who interrupted her slow circuit of the room.

  Lord Chontas Taudde ser Omientes looked like he’d been hurrying, and the big man with him was clearly a hired thug. They could only be here looking for her—and the door through which they had entered was also the only way Leilis could leave. She froze, momentarily panicked. When she’d thought of bracing the sorcerer, it hadn’t been here, like this, with the pipes in her pocket and no way to defend herself.

  Lord Chontas looked relieved, as well he might be, finding her here—clearly she hadn’t had time yet to speak to anyone—undoubtedly he meant to ensure that she wouldn’t speak to anyone ever again—she said quickly, “I’ll scream. Guards will come if I scream, you know! They’ll come right away—stop there!”—as the foreign lord seemed inclined to approach her.

  To her surprise, Lord Chontas did stop, one hand a little extended toward her. He said, his tone an odd mix of caution and certainty, “Leilis. You won’t scream.” And then, with a jerk of his head for the other man, “Benne.”

  The large man retreated back through the door—to watch for the threatened guards, Leilis understood. She said sharply, “He had better not try to fight Laodd guardsmen. They’re all King’s Own, you know. They’d kill him.”

  “He won’t,” answered the foreign lord. “He won’t have to, because you aren’t going to scream. Leilis, I don’t wish to harm you. I don’t intend to harm you.”

  “I’m sure you don’t.” Leilis couldn’t quite manage to keep the scorn out of her tone. “You just want your pipes back. Here, then—” She took the ruined pipes out of a pocket and showed them to the foreigner. Then she pretended to throw them across the room, but really she threw a comb that she’d palmed when she got out the pipes. The comb clattered across the floor, and as the foreigner turned to follow its path, Leilis darted past him and toward the door.

  She almost reached it. But the foreigner spun back, took two long strides, and caught her by the wrist. The curse flared to life.
Leilis, better accustomed to the silent clash of dissonant magework, wrenched herself free from the foreigner’s suddenly lax grip and jumped for the door again, and this time she made it.

  But the foreigner’s servant was there, looming just outside the doorway, his broad, stupid features more alert than Leilis had expected. Certainly he was quicker than she’d guessed: His arm came up to block the hall. He could effectively block it all by himself; he was that big. Leilis, frustrated, slid to a halt.

  “Don’t scream!” Lord Chontas said behind her.

  The foreigner spoke with a kind of quick force that stopped her even as she drew breath. Sorcery? Leilis wondered, and suspected it was, of a sort. Besides, unfortunately, no guardsmen were in sight. Leilis turned back to face Lord Chontas instead.

  The foreigner met her eyes. “You’ve guessed already that I’m Kalchesene. A bardic sorcerer. Of course you have. Surely it has occurred to you that I might remove the mageworking that is interfering with the smooth extension of your, your… own immanent self.”

  Leilis said nothing. If Lord Chontas wanted to offer a bribe rather than a threat, she was more than willing to let him.

  “It had occurred to you. And yet you are here. Well.” The Kalchesene looked like he wanted to shout at her, but he didn’t. He said quite reasonably, “Leilis, I will try to, um. Resolve your problem. If you permit me. All I ask is that you have enough hope to let me try.” He waited.

  Leilis said drily, “And all you’d ask in return is these pipes.”

  “Well, yes. Is that so much to ask?”

  “I saw those twin pipes when you gave them to Prince Tepres, and I saw them when he gave them in turn to Karah. And I saw them this morning, all cracked and ruined, and I think I’m not the only one who ought to see them. So you tell me: how are you not a threat to me and to everyone else in Lonne, Lord Chontas, if that is your name?”