The white gryphon

by Mercedes Lackey

  Still, that may not be a problem for long, after this evening. In a way, the fourth murder had come as something of a blessing. It was rather difficult for even the most sensitive to be dreadfully upset about the death of that harridan, Lady Fanshane. She had moved into the life of Lady Sherisse years ago, turning the poor thing into a man-hating recluse, and she was cordially detested by most of the wiser folk in Shalaman's Court. And once Lady Sherisse had drunk herself into an early grave, Lady Fanshane had been circling the court like a vulture, looking for another victim to fatten on.

  Still, she had been murdered, and murder was a crime most foul (and never mind that in the laws of return, Lady Fanshane could be considered guilty of the murder of her former paramour), and evidence was mounting that it was Amberdrake who was guilty of that crime, and perhaps the previous three murders as well. Once there was enough evidence, Amberdrake would be out of the way, and Winterhart would be free to accept the honor that the Emperor had offered her.

  He might be innocent, muttered a third part of his mind, a part he seldom heard from. This might be some strange conspiracy, and Amberdrake the victim of it as much as those who were slain.

  No. That was utter nonsense. If—if—Amberdrake were truly innocent, why had he not asked for the services of the Truthsayer immediately? If his conscience was clear, the Truthsayer would know; as the King's guest, he was entitled to the offices of the highest Truthsayer in the land, Leyuet, who was also the leader of the Spears of the Law. If Leyuet declared him innocent, not even Palisar would challenge that declaration.

  So, obviously, he had something to fear from a Truthsayer's examination.

  But what if these people know nothing of Truthsayers? niggled that annoying little voice. What if he does not know he has the right to such an examination? It is magic, after all, and all the outlanders have been cautioned against the use of magic. Why, what if they do not even have such a thing as Truthsayers among them? How can he ask for something he is not aware exists?

  Oh, that was nonsense! Of course these people must have Truthsayers! How could any society exist without the means to tell truth from falsehood? That was insane! Besides, wouldn't Silver Veil have said something if there were no such things as Truthsayers among the cultures of the north?

  No, Amberdrake, if not directly guilty, knew something of the murders, enough to make him fear the touch of Leyuet's mind on his. That would make him guilty of conspiracy to murder, which was just as great a crime as murder itself.

  It would be only a matter of time now. Either the evidence would become irrefutable, Amberdrake would slip up and be caught, or he would finally break down and confess.

  And then Winterhart would be free—and once she was free, she would be his. Then he would be lonely no more.

  Hadanelith flung open the windows of the darkened chamber, and the night breeze blew the gauzy curtains about, giving them the uncanny semblance of grasping, ectoplasmic hands.

  This would be the first time he had dispatched two victims within a day of each other—but the Haighlei were expecting the same pattern as the last time, and they had all let their guards down in the wake of the last murder.

  Fools; they patterned their lives like pieces on a game-board, and expected everyone else to do the same!

  Even this rather ineffectual old biddy; she had followed the same pattern every night for as long as he and Kanshin had watched her. It had been child's play to insinuate himself up the wall and into her chamber after she dismissed all of her servants for the night. She hated the sounds of other people breathing in their sleep (or worse, snoring), or so Kanshin said, and she would not abide another human being or animal in her chambers after she retired for the night. She would ring a bell to summon her servants once she awoke, but from the moment she took to her bed to the moment she left it, she was alone. And not even a murderer on the loose would induce her to change that pattern.

  Fool.

  Hadanelith had pinned Lady Linnay to her bed, stuffed the end of his latest special carving down her throat to prevent even the slightest sound out of her—

  That was a bit unsatisfactory. I would have liked to have heard her beg.

  Then he had dragged her over to the window, his skin pressed against her bedclothes, at precisely the spot she might have stood if she'd heard something large—say, the size of a gryphon—land on her balcony. Then he pretended to let her go.

  Predictably—Pah, these fools are so tediously predictable!—she had turned to run, and he had struck her down from behind with his new sculpture, a club carved into the exact likeness of a gryphon's foreleg.

  He opened the window now, so that the overwhelming body of evidence would be that it was open before she died. Then he stood over her unconscious body, and raised his club again.

  As he brought it down in a punishing blow, regretting the necessity of doing this in the dark, he felt just a little bored. These Haighlei as a whole were just not interesting prey—the Kaled'a'in may have been sanctimonious, sickeningly sweet prigs, but at least they did something once in a while. The Haighlei just lined up like good little sheep for his knife. They didn't even alter their habits when it was obvious who and what kinds of folk his targets were!

  Well, they aren't really important, he consoled himself with a grim smile, bringing the club down on the body with all of his strength. They aren't my real prey, anyway. They're only tools. Their deaths are not the end, only the means. They're only the stepping stones to my real goal, the ladder to reach my revenge.

  Although—actually, this was turning out to be a little more interesting than he had thought it would. I've never actually beaten anyone to death before. Hmm. Fascinating. I didn't realize how much punishment a body could take and still breathe! He knew it could be done, of course; provided nothing like the spleen or the skull was injured, a great deal of injury could be inflicted in theory before the body was so broken that it literally bled to death from bruising. But he'd never actually witnessed such a thing.

  In fact, he thought, beginning to feel some of that manic strength coming into his arm that only the best kills brought out in him, this is rather fun!

  He wanted to giggle, but he kept his mirth well-contained as energy poured into him and the club felt as if it weighed no more than a straw. It rose and fell of its own accord, and he brought it down, over and over, harder and harder, the thudding of wood into flesh pounding in his ears like the thumping of his own heartbeat pounding with excitement and—

  The club splintered. He heard the crack of the wood over the dull sound of the blow.

  He stopped in mid-swing, immediately. He was too well-trained, and much too clever, to risk a final strike and leave behind even a single shred of evidence that it had not been the claw of a gryphon that had done the deed. Instead, he stood over the now-motionless body, breathing heavily, while he surveyed his handiwork as best he could by moonlight.

  Quite impressive. He'd left the head intact except for the initial blow that had rendered her unconscious. For the rest—there was nothing to show that she had not been bludgeoned to death by the fisted claw of a gryphon. There were the cuts and tears in the skin that even a claw closed tightly could and would leave, and the telltale signs of the essentially bony nature of the "hand" that had beaten her. Virtually every bone in her torso had been smashed, however, and the stiff and structured Haighlei would assume that no human could do that.

  Which will leave the obvious, of course. Skandranon.

  Lady Linnay had been one of Lady Fanshane's few friends, and had been one of the loudest in her insistence that Amberdrake was guilty and must be made to pay then and there. And as such, she became an obvious target for Kaled'a'in elimination.

  Hadanelith grinned as he moved carefully away from the body. Somewhere nearby, Noyoki was capturing all of the potent energy released by this death, and channeling it into whatever project he had in mind. Kanshin waited above, with a rope-ladder, ready to spirit him off the balcony and across two roofto
ps. Noyoki would meet them both there, and use a bit more of that channeled energy to lift them down to the ground, noiselessly, and efficiently, putting them all in a garden cul-de-sac where Kanshin had concealed the servants' livery they had worn earlier to move through the Palace grounds.

  Of course, no one who was not a Palace servant would ever even think of wearing Palace livery—nor would the Spears of the Law consider that possibility. It was simply Not Done. Here, all crimes worked by ritual and custom!

  Hadanelith backed up onto the balcony, glad for the first time of his pale skin, which blended into the stonework very nicely. Of course, Kanshin would have contrived to look like a shadow, but still—

  Still, even he hasn't got the audacity to do work like this in the nude. Even if this murder was discovered before they got off the Palace grounds, watchers would search in vain for bloodstained clothing. There wouldn't be any. And one quick wash with the bucket of water that Kanshin had up there with the ladder would remove any trace of evidence from Hadanelith's person.

  I will never forget their faces when I told them how I planned to avoid getting blood on my clothing. And of course, for all but one of these old hags, the sight of a naked man in their rooms was shocking enough to stun them all by itself. They didn't even think to scream until I'd made screaming impossible.

  The only time he had worn anything had been this very afternoon, when he'd worn just a bit of Amberdrake's stolen finery. He'd let his target struggle just enough to tear the clothing from his back in an artistic fashion.

  That time he'd brought his change of livery with him, of course. And he'd cleaned himself up in the pool in the prey's own little garden. Had anyone noticed a sign of blood there?

  Probably not. But if they did, they'd assume it was Amberdrake cleaning up after himself.

  That was the essence of making all of this work; attending to detail. With no bloody clothing to dispose of, that left one detail already taken care of. With no blood about, there was nothing for a mage to trace.

  He would have to remind Noyoki to cleanse this club very thoroughly, though.

  The rope-ladder dropped down from above, and Hadanelith grabbed it, clenching the end of the club between his teeth so that he could use both hands in climbing.

  The night breeze felt very good, slipping along his skin like a caress. Was this how a gryphon felt when it flew? Was this how a gryphon felt when it made a good kill, and launched itself up into the vast dark vault of the night sky?

  I should have been born a gryphon! he thought, laughing to himself, as he let his energy carry him up the ladder effortlessly. But no, not a gryphon. Tonight—I was better than a gryphon! Tonight—I was the ultimate predator, the killer of gryphons! Yes. Oh, yes. Tonight, I was makaar!

  Seven

  Leyuet was a sorely puzzled man, and his worries dogged his footsteps as he passed through the cool, dimly-lit hallways of the Palace. The rest of the Entertainment had been canceled, of course. That left most of the courtiers at loose ends, with nothing to do but gossip until their normal time to retire. And gossip they certainly would—but Leyuet felt certain that most of them would not come within a bowshot of the truth of tonight's drama.

  Even though all the evidence pointed to the foreigner Amberdrake as the author of the latest murder, he himself would never have believed it to be so, after he witnessed the foreigner's reaction. Amberdrake had been as shocked as anyone in the room at the revelation of a fourth murder, and his reaction on being accused was to freeze, like a terrified bird. He had not been plotting means to escape the room, he had not come forth immediately with plausible alibis—he had frozen, struck dumb, as any innocent man would.

  And seeing his bewilderment and terror, Leyuet would bet his professional reputation that, if he had been asked to perform a Truthsaying on the man, the results would mirror his intuition.

  Furthermore, it occurred to him on reflection that the person who spirited himself into four rooms without detection, committed butchery without detection, and spirited himself out again without detection, would not have been stupid enough to leave so many clues behind as to his identity.

  Still, though, the first three murders had been made without leaving a signature, as was customary among professional assassins. The foreigners' ways were not those of the Haighlei, though, so perhaps the murderer did not know what should be done. Even in assassinations, customs were to be observed—but only if the assassin knew the customs.

  The foreigners don't know the customs of assassination any better than they know how to address a social convention in Court, if that is the case. That is circumstantial evidence, but evidence nonetheless, that a foreigner committed the murders.

  He would have said as much to the Emperor in private, if the Gryphon King had not interrupted with his theatrical posturings and outrageous statements. By the time Skandranon was finished and Shalaman had been forced to order both of them free on their own recognizance, there was no point in saying anything, at least not until things calmed down a trifle.

  Leyuet had intended to speak to the Emperor in private even before the murder was discovered, but he never got the chance. The Gryphon King had been spending a great deal of time today in the air, although Leyuet had not seen Skandranon anywhere near where the fourth murder had taken place—and anyway, there had been no way to get into the murder room from outside the building. But why was he flying about, spying? There was no reason for him to do so. This observation was of a piece with everything else about this series of murders—strange things were occurring all over the Palace, yet none of them fit with the murders or even with each other.

  Strange things—such as the Emperor absenting himself from the Entertainment, and only reappearing after the Ho Play was well underway. I could not find him. Silver Veil and Palisar could not find him. Where was he? What was he doing? This play was about his own grandfather; what could have kept him from watching it?

  There were others absent this evening, but the Emperor was conspicuous in his absence. He only appeared after several people had been asking for him.

  But there were other questions, more troubling than that, which plagued Leyuet this night—and they were about the murders.

  I am the Chief Truthsayer of this Kingdom, and at the moment I would be willing to swear that Amberdrake is as innocent of murder as I. What is more, I would be willing to swear that Shalaman thinks so, too. So why did he not call upon me to exercise my office and settle the accusation immediately?

  When it first appeared that the Gryphon King was a suspect, Leyuet had shrunk from the notion of touching such a strange creature's soul for a full and formal Truthsaying, and Shalaman had not asked it of him. There really had been no need, since the first murder had occurred when Skandranon—and his mate, which accounted for the only two gryphons besides their flightless children—was under the eyes of hundreds of spectators, and the next two when he was under guard. The suspicion was really only in the minds of those who hated and feared the foreigners in the first place, and was eventually dismissed without Leyuet's intervention, as the Truthsayer had hoped.

  I could understand and appreciate the Emperor's reluctance to ask me to examine the mind of the Gryphon King—after all, I was reluctant myself and he surely saw that. Skandranon is not human, and I might not be able to read his soul, or trying to do so might cause me damage or distress. But Amberdrake is as human as I, and there should be no question of my being able to read him. Even if the foreigners are unaware that calling a Truthsayer is their right, the Emperor certainly knows! So why did he not call upon me? I was waiting!

  Shalaman seldom forgot anything; with Leyuet standing there and Amberdrake accused of a terrible crime, surely he could not have "forgotten" to ask Leyuet to exercise his chief office! So why had Shalaman done nothing? Innocence or guilt could have been settled in a single evening!

  And while under Shalaman's gaze—and command—it would have been improper of me to volunteer. Protocol must be observed.
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br />   Leyuet turned a corner and realized that he had quite missed the corridor he wanted; his feet had taken him in the direction of the Guest Quarters—and Silver Veil's suite—without him intending anything of the sort. He knew that Silver Veil was with Amberdrake now, possibly advising him, so there was no point in going on.

  My heart knows what I need—but he has need of advice more than I. Surely I can unravel this by myself, if I can only see all the clues.

  He turned, and was about to retrace his steps, when he saw that he was no longer alone in the corridor.

  Stumbling blindly toward him, a look of stunned bewilderment on her face, was the foreign woman Winterhart. Leyuet would have attributed her expression to the terrible accusation laid against her mate, if not for two things. One, was that he knew that she had not been in the room when the accusation was laid.

  And where was she if she was not there?

  And two, an observation that left him stunned—she wore the Royal Betrothal Necklace of amber lilies and golden lion heads about her neck, and she carried in one hand the wreath of ten Lion Lilies, signifying the King's intention to wed her.

  Her eyes saw nothing, and he pressed himself back up against the smooth wooden paneling of the wall, hoping the dim light would disguise his identity. With luck, she would take him for a servant.

  She walked numbly past him, clearly lost in her own thoughts and paying no attention whatsoever to him, as he stared at her with his mouth slightly agape. His own thoughts swirled with confusion for a moment.

  And suddenly, the reason for the King's inaction became blindingly, painfully clear.

  Shalaman wanted Winterhart,

  But Winterhart was bound to Amberdrake, by whatever simplistic rites these barbarians used as marriage. There was a child, in fact, a girl-child called Windsong, or so Silver Veil had told him.

  Now, if Winterhart chose not to be bound by such things, then she would not be considered wedded, not by the laws of this land. Even among the Haighlei, most women would be so overwhelmed by the King's offer that even a legal marriage would be—dealt with.