The Queen of Lies

by Michael J. Bode

  Maddox grinned back at Esme. “Hey, kid, I think places like this provide you with silverware.”

  She feigned a pout and put her knife away. “I would never cut food with Lucky.”

  “When I use to come here,” Gran said, “I sat over there, and they had a fireplace place next to a long table where you could make any kind of salad.”

  “Wow, Gran,” Riley said. “You really got around in your old days.”

  “I was so sad when this place burned down,” she said wistfully.

  Maddox turned to Riley. “So what the fuck is up? With all this shit? Why are we sitting by ourselves in the most prestigious restaurant in Rivern? What the hells is going on with the revenants and the drugs and the disciples and the mansions and your clothes and the fucking diamond tiaras and fucking all of it?” He took a deep breath.

  “Had to be done, though. They were catching on,” Gran whispered to no one in particular.

  Maddox held up a finger to the old woman. “I’ll get with you in a minute.”

  Riley slid his arm around Maddox’s shoulder. “We got us a legitimate operation, licensed and everything. The city needs all hands on deck making dragonfire since they legalized it, and Mr. Cordovis has taken us under his protection. He owns this place, and I told him I wanted your birthday to be special, so he were like ‘Here, have it,’ so we can celebrate as a family. You’re one of us now.”

  “Wait…Cordovis? That man puts more people in the river than the Thrycean flu.”

  “We got us an agreement, and he knows better than to come for any one of us. Besides what you got to be scared of, eh?” Riley punched his arm. “The old man don’t do nobody who don’t need to be done in the first place. He’s the one who offed that twat Torin Silverbrook on the riverboat.”

  “Torin’s…dead?” Maddox felt nothing when he said it, but it was a tangible nothingness. A placeholder for emotions happening far beneath the surface.

  “I’d have done him meself, the fucking asshole.” Riley spat on the antique Turisian rug beneath them. “But yeah, he died same day your old magus kicked the bucket. Cordovis wanted to keep him from marrying that Storm princess, but it were all a misunderstanding about a peace treaty or some such.”

  Esme snapped her fingers at one of the waitstaff. “Excuse me. Can you give our friend some wine, perhaps a fortified cippriatto from Barstea? Nothing from 543—that was a terrible vintage. Not that he would know, but it is his birthday.”

  Theril looked at Esme. “How’s a street rat like you know to order wine like a lady and such?”

  She set her elbow on the table. “I was a high-class prostitute till I hit puberty.”

  “That shit’s not funny,” Maddox said coolly.

  Esme laughed innocently. “We all deal with tragedy in our own little fucked-up ways. I like to make jokes and…be alive all the time. It’s not for everybody.”

  One of the waitstaff appeared with a bottle of dark liquid and a glass balanced on a silver tray. She was dark skinned enough to pass for Bamoran, but she probably was Turisian if she was serving Rivern nobility. A single trickle of sweat ran down the side of her face as she gently lowered the tray to the table. Her eyes looked straight ahead, terrified.

  At the last moment, her hand slipped, and the glass tumbled off the tray along with the bottle.

  Maddox caught both midair before they hit the table, but the wine splashed out on his rank old tunic. Liquid was next to impossible to handle by seal, but he saved a sip in the glass. “I’ll pour,” he said, willing the bottle to refill the glass.

  “I should have poured,” Crateus whispered to the wolf next to him.

  The waitress had gone pale. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry…”

  Riley touched her arm gently. “Hey, it’s all good. You didn’t get any on me coat and people make mistakes, and you can’t get mad for things people can’t help. Now run along and see where we’re coming on that thing.” He winked at her. The second his hand came off her arm, she marched to the kitchen. The other servers stood perfectly still, barely disguising their terror. .

  “What are these people scared of, Riley?” Maddox demanded. The glass slid into his hand, and he took a swallow. It was like drinking liquid walnuts and cinnamon, like someone had distilled his grandmother’s house into a cloyingly sweet beverage.

  “What’s anyone scared of, Maddy? Fear is the enemy of us all.”

  “Fucking shit.” Maddox rubbed his temples.

  “Houses,” Esme said. “We wait for people to die in their sleep. Then, after the body is cleared out and the remaining family members flee, we go in and loot whatever valuables we can move on the street. We use that money to buy reagents for dragonfire and other drugs. We take bodies from the river and turn them into revenants so they can cook the shit. We’ve made a fucking killing, and now we’re the toughest crew on the streets. People who piss us off have a habit of turning up dead.”

  Riley shrugged. “City’s falling apart anyway. The whole fucking place. It’s free money.”

  Maddox scooted back from the table. “I can’t be a part of this.”

  “Sit the fuck down!” Esme grabbed his arm and pointed her dagger at him. She smiled sweetly. “Riley went through a lot of trouble to give you this party, and all of us have better shit to be doing, so have a seat, drink your bottle, and eat some cake with your family.”

  Maddox flung his wrist slightly, and Lucky the dagger flew out of Esme’s hand and thunked into the ceiling. After the fact he noticed it was actually embedded into a mural, which was probably priceless. Still he wasn’t about to be coerced by a teenage girl. “Don’t ever point that fucking thing at me again, or I’ll stick it in your face, got it?”

  She licked her lips.

  “She’s fucking nuts!” Maddox turned to Riley.

  He shrugged. “It’s hard for her to share my affections, but I love you both. Still Esme’s my girl, and that means I have to do the right thing here.” Riley stood and faced Maddox. The waitstaff had vanished. The others at the table were watching intently, except for Gran.

  “Riley,” Maddox said evenly, “I just want to walk out of here and never, ever see another one of you sorry fucks again.”

  Riley scowled for a second but went back to his usual obsequious contrition. “You’re just overwhelmed. This is a lot to take on, and you’re saying stuff you don’t mean. That’s just your way, like pointin’ daggers is Esme’s way. You’ve got the gentlest heart of anyone I know, Maddy, and you’re not cut out for this sort of life. This weren’t just a birthday party—it were a going-away as well.”

  Riley fished something out of his pocket. It was a long metal key on a festively colored silk ribbon with a little card on it that read “Maadaux” in horribly scripted Archean. Riley held it in the air between them then gently let it go. It hovered there for a few moments before Maddox took it.

  Riley’s eyes were moist. “It’s yours. It’s your own alchemy shop so’s you can continue your studies in peace. Anything you ever need, you just ask. The boys’ll be by to check on you daily, and if you want to get in touch, let me know. The city belongs to us now, and you was a part of that.”

  “Thank you, Riley. That’s very kind,” Maddox said robotically.

  “Don’t thank me. It were your dad’s shop and all.” Riley patted his arm. “The cantankerous old fuck finally passed in his sleep, if you catch my drift. It were just a simple matter to give the mages a blood sample and prove relation. Got the title moved to your name a day or two after he died, but I wanted it to be a surprise. Fucking good riddance to the old fuck, I say.”

  “Yeah, sure, Riley. Whatever you say.”

  Maddox pocketed the key. There was nothing left to feel—no regret, no satisfaction. Months of the bullshit he’d been willfully turning a blind eye toward had come crashing down on him in the space of a few minutes. He had faced down Achelon in his own godly exile and not flinched once. But now the gnawing feeling of emptiness consumed him. And there was
no escape from it.

  “How’s ’bout we swing by tomorrow, around breakfast?” Theril said. “You be up by then or…uh…napping?”

  “Such a waste, all those people…” Gran sighed.

  Riley grabbed Maddox and kissed his cheek. “Just because we’re under different roofs don’t mean we’re not still close. I love you like a brother. You’re welcome.”

  “I need to go home.”

  “I need drugs,” Otix said in broken Thrycean.

  TWENTY-FIVE

  Reunion

  JESSA

  THE SYSTEM OF government in the Protectorate of the Free Cities is a bit confusing for one acquainted with a traditional system of peerage.

  There is no king, but there are nobility who are addressed according to local custom. However, it would be wrong to assume that a count holds any real responsibilities. There are, for instance, a profusion of beggar princes in Bamor who inherit their title because the son of a prince is always a prince, and there is no king to name an heir apparent.

  This isn’t to say the titles are always honorifics. Old families with wealth and resources are well represented in the democratically elected Assembly. Wealth, as it does in every nation, secures influence even if it doesn’t translate to a seat on the Assembly.

  The Assembly writes laws, collects taxes, and allocates funds for its local municipality according to the vote of its majority. However, a plethora of independent chartered organizations work within the official sanction of laws according to the guidelines given by the Assembly. This includes at minimum the Patrean military, the Lyceum, trade guilds, and the Orthodoxy.

  To give an example of how confusing this can be, the city of Rivern’s security is enforced by four separate groups, with different functions. The Patreans and Invocari coordinate to enforce the law and defend the city. The Orthodoxy and the Lyceum work, often at odds, to manage rogue magical elements.

  —SUANG XIAU, COMPARATIVE GOVERNMENTS

  THE STREETS WERE eerily quiet in the light of day. The latest round of harrowings was said to be the most yet, and people whispered that even daylight couldn’t protect them from the visitations. Screaming faces with black holes for eyes had been painted on the doors of some of the houses Jessa passed. Someone was marking the sites where people had died. One home had five faces painted on the door.

  The Upstream Locks District was a neighborhood of modest homes, built with adjoining walls so that they huddled together on the narrow, vacant streets. Behind the cheerfully painted facades, dark curtains hung across the windows like burial shrouds.

  Jessa found number fifteen easily. She wore a long cloak to conceal her identity, but it was unnecessary. The street was abandoned. Carefully she knocked three times, as Cameron’s mysterious letter had instructed. The door swung open ominously, and Jessa stepped into the cool, dark interior of the house.

  Cameron’s place was small and narrow. A set of stairs greeted her at the foyer, and a living area sat off to the side. The walls were minimally adorned with a couple of swords and a scattering of small, unremarkable landscape paintings. “Hello?”

  “Hello, Jessa.” Cameron emerged through a doorway, bare chested and tipsy from drink. He was tying his trousers. She clearly saw the outline of his erection. He gave her a cold look and put his finger to his mouth before she could say anything. Something about the way he did it made her pause.

  Jessa felt a visceral stab of anger when she saw the thin hands of another woman reach out of the darkness and run themselves across his chest. Then a face peered around the side. “Jessarayne! It has been absolutely ages!”

  It took a moment for the pieces to fall together. The woman was older but incredibly striking. Lustrous hair like coils of metallic silver spilled over her shoulders and breasts. She wore a bright-blue leather bustier and a chain-mail skirt studded with sapphires. Her eyes were lined with black kohl that curved into wicked points at the corners. Her irises matched the silver in her hair.

  Jessa gasped. “Aunt Sireen?”

  Sireen squealed in excitement and nearly tossed Cameron to the floor as she ran to Jessa, her arms extended in a warm embrace. For a shorter woman, Sireen’s embrace was surprisingly strong. Jessa remained motionless as she allowed her aunt to lift her into the air, twirl her, and set her down.

  “Let me get a look at you!” Sireen said breathlessly, running her eyes over every inch of her niece. She smiled warmly as she ran her hand through Jessa’s pale golden hair. “You’re so magnificent. And as tall as your mother. I remember when I could hold you in my arms. Oh, I just wanted to eat you up.” She giggled. “Not literally.”

  “It’s probably for the best. I imagine children would be fatty,” Jessa said.

  Sireen let out a musical peal of laughter. “Cameron, you bottom-feeder. You didn’t tell me she had such wit!” She glanced back at Cameron and slapped his arm.

  Jessa’s eyes met Cameron’s, and he shook his head gravely with a look that said, I haven’t told her anything.

  Sireen grabbed Jessa’s hand and yanked her down to a sofa. “You must have so many questions for me. And we have much catching up to do. But first I want to hear all about your adventures in Rivern. How are the suitors? Are they handsome at least?”

  “Torin was cute,” Jessa said matter-of-factly, “before someone, possibly my own mother, murdered him.”

  “That’s terrible”—Sireen pouted innocently—“but your mother had nothing to do with it. She can be petty and vindictive, with the emphasis on ‘petty,’ but Cameron tells me it was local politics.”

  “Cordovis,” Cameron said. “He’s a smuggler who, among other things, was responsible for shipping weapons and supplies from Rothburn’s allies into Amhaven. He also served as a proxy for the Patreans, supplying him with troops.”

  Jessa glared at him, but he didn’t react. Were you going to mention this to me at some point? she wondered.

  “Cameron has been faithful to the Dominance for years.” Sireen explained. “He’s proven extremely resourceful in getting us information we need.”

  “Of course, you’re a spy.” Jessa buried her head in her hands. “The Stormlords really pull all the strings, huh? Why would an assemblyman take interest in me if not to report my every movement back to the empire? What with my mother indisposed with her apparently baseless arrest. How could I have been so foolish?”

  “Now look, Jessa—” Cameron started.

  “You disgust me,” she said angrily. Without thinking she added, “And to think I was considering carrying your child.”

  Sireen started to laugh then quickly covered her mouth. She motioned for a pause in the conversation while she mastered herself and finally said, “You have fine taste in men, Jessa. He fucks like an animal and is as devoted to the empire as any of the empress’s consorts. He would lay down his life for you. Your instincts were right to trust him.”

  Cameron added, “The Dominance isn’t as bad as your mother makes it out to be. You’ve seen the Backwash—the beggars, the whores, the undesirables. Is that really the kind of justice you expect from a government supposedly run by the people? I spent half my life arguing common sense to an Assembly that can’t even wipe its own ass without holding a referendum on what to wipe it with. Their empress is strict, but she gets things done. People don’t go hungry; they don’t get tossed aside. Anyone who wants a job has work.”

  “I suppose slavery is a profession,” Jessa said sarcastically.

  “Mandatory term-limited labor contracts don’t constitute slavery.” Sireen chuckled congenially. “In any event, political discussions are so dreadfully boring. So tell me—am I a great-aunt or what?”

  Jessa tossed her blond hair back and cast a withering glance at Cameron. “For the time being. And provided I can ever escape the machinations of my family.”

  Sireen smiled sadly. “Your mother is a troubled woman. It couldn’t have been easy growing up with her as the only example of our kind. I begged her on endless occasions to let
you come stay with me in the summers at Mazitar Beach. The pink sand is the most beautiful in the entire archipelago, and at night the sea glows like a starry sky. But she was always so afraid I would turn you against her.”

  Jessa deadpanned, “Would you not?”

  “To be perfectly honest”—Sireen shrugged nonchalantly—“I think your mother did a fine job of that on her own. I just wish she hadn’t soured you on the rest of your family with her instability.”

  Jessa smiled. “So you prefer to manipulate through kindness rather than bravado. Is that the gist of your strategy?”

  Sireen put her arm around Jessa. “I believe being a good person and getting what you want aren’t mutually exclusive. Yes, I’m forced to play the games of court because it’s expected, but my targets are always deserving of their comeuppance.”

  “So who are you here to kill, dearest aunt?” Jessa asked as she slid away. “And what’s my role in this endeavor?”

  “You’ll help us reclaim this city. Rivern will bend to the Red Army, and the Dominance will gain a foothold on the continent of Genatrova. The empire will expand to cover half of Creation.” Sireen said.

  “And should I decide, for whatever reason, that I have no interest in doing so?”

  Sireen tipped her head back. “Nasara and I are your family, Jessa. Though you don’t know me, the connection of our blood is a stronger bond than you realize. Cameron is the father of your child, and he fights for a society he can be proud of. Even your mother, flawed as she is, needs your help.”

  “You left out the part where you threaten my life if I don’t agree to what you next propose,” Jessa said.

  “I would never,” Sireen gasped. “No, but you can’t escape who you are. The people of Rivern will turn on you before any reprisal by the Coral Throne. You can swear everything before their Veritas Seal, and they’ll still mistrust you as an outsider. The empress needs only whisper from across the ocean to implicate you, if your enemies in the Assembly don’t do it first.”