She stood to one side and indicated that Jester was to precede her. Jester considered unsheathing one of his daggers, but decided against it; it took a surprising amount of effort. There were sixteen different ways that the servants could kill him, each of them less incriminating. He entered the narrow, short hall and stepped aside as she closed the door at her back.
The halls were not well lit; they did not—as the far side of the gallery did—boast windows and daylight. Magestones did not grace ceilings; lamps did. The uneven flickering of the light made it clear that they were entirely natural. In many ways, these halls reminded Jester of the alleys in the hundred holdings, except for the lack of sky. The floors were stone, although in some sections of the servants’ quarters, proper wood had been laid. Footsteps echoed; no rugs absorbed noise. Even breath sounded strangely enlarged.
He waited in silence as the Master of the Household Staff once again took the lead she’d momentarily surrendered, no doubt to make sure her victim wouldn’t turn tail and run. He was surprised at her use of the back halls; she was at the very head of the Household Staff, and had quarters for her use in the main house.
Unless, he thought, as he followed, it was not to her quarters that she now led.
“It has long been my contention,” she said, in her stiff, chilly voice, “that the entire West Wing has been coddled to the point of near imbecility. Arguments in favor of the West Wing have been made, and while I believe you are collectively about to prove my point, it is not an argument I now have an interest in winning. There are far too many members of your wing embroiled in all levels of House Terafin.”
Jester stopped walking. So, after a brief glance back, did the Master of the Household Staff. “Who was she working for?”
One iron brow rose. “Perhaps,” she said, “you are capable of actually learning.” She didn’t speak with any notable approval. “You will not, of course, ask that question of any—any—of the servants. I am aware that there has been a lowering of general standards where the residents of the West Wing have been concerned; in the absence of The Terafin, those standards could be raised.”
Jester smiled and shrugged. “It’s not a bet I’d take.”
This caused predictable narrowing of eyes. “Vareena was a very junior servant, and she was assigned to tasks appropriate to her seniority; she has been with the Household Staff for a little over a year. She had no prior history of service to one of The Ten; she had, however, been apprenticed to the staff of one of the more significant merchant houses. A background check—which is, of course, always conducted—did not raise any flags, and Vereena showed an admirable commitment to her duties.
“She was not brought to my attention by a member of the House. You will understand that, in the climate as it existed a year past, we were far more reserved in our external hiring practices.”
“You expected—”
“Difficulty, yes. The Household Staff does not embroil itself in the affairs of the House Council; the House itself must continue to run, and run smoothly, regardless of the politics in the front halls.”
Jester thought of the page who had stumbled—artfully and deliberately—in just such a way that she might deliver a message to the only man present who would be inclined to catch her before she fell. He said nothing.
The Master of the Household Staff noted this, but did not add to what was by no stretch of the definition a conversation.
“Vereena did not live in the manse itself.”
Jester was silent for a couple of yards. “She was too junior.”
“Indeed. She was expected at work at six in the morning six days a week. She was expected at noon on the seventh. She has, to my knowledge, never been late.”
“Not something I could say of myself.”
“No. But you answer to a different master.” And the Master of the Household Staff, her voice implied, had standards. Jester had no difficulty remembering why he avoided her—or why most of the servants did.
“Yes, sporadically,” he replied. He had recovered enough that he could once again offer her the lazy, nonchalant smile for which she had so little use. It bounced off her expression and fell beneath her notice.
They continued down halls that were conspicuously empty. Jester didn’t have Carver’s familiarity with the back halls, but he frowned. They had taken the first right, which put them somewhere in the vicinity of the small ballroom; he could see two doors that aligned roughly with the neatly linened side tables from which lighter fare was served. He did not expect that they would emerge from either of those doors, given the hour and the fact that the room was not in official use.
Nor did he expect that they would emerge in the rooms that lay beyond it; they were rooms that were also meant for the use of servants when the small hall was used for entertainments. But she continued past that room, and past another junction that would have led to a different exit in a more well-traveled gallery.
“Why aren’t you angry?” he asked. He hadn’t meant to ask anything serious, and would have clawed back the words if it were possible. She didn’t appear to hear them, on the other hand; he couldn’t decide if she was attempting to be merciful or dismissive.
She surprised him. “I am obviously discomposed,” she eventually replied, “or I would not be speaking with you. My staff is well enough trained not to notice the breach of etiquette.” She continued to walk. He followed, curious in spite of himself. She considered Vareena’s injuries—injuries that he had not himself seen—a matter of politics, and at that, politics that did not or should not involve the Household Staff.
But she was not averse to removing impediments to the safety of that staff in other circumstances. These were therefore not the right circumstances. He let go of some of his fury as he considered what the wrong circumstances might actually be. For all her stiff, cold condescension, she was not a woman who respected power except in matters of etiquette; the formal separation demanded by rank was a duty she expected both sides of the equation to support.
For that reason, she had never been well loved by the residents of the West Wing. In the august presence of the Master of the Household Staff, servants who were otherwise friendly—or even friends—became stiff, formal, and almost invisible. The den was certain that, were it up to the Master of the Household Staff, there would be no interaction of note that did not involve servants’ duties.
Or the den had been certain of it. Jester, in this narrow, cold hall, felt some of that certainty crumble beneath his feet as he walked. It had been assumed—by all—that The Terafin had been responsible for the choice of servants that graced the West Wing; for Merry and Viv and their small band of friends and rivals. It had not occurred to him to wonder how The Terafin had ascertained that the men and women chosen would, in fact, be flexible enough to aid the den in the little ways that had become, over time, so important.
He wondered now. Echoes of the earliest of the rumors that had reached the den—mostly through Carver—came back to him, following the rhythm of their footsteps. The small garden plot the Master of the Household Staff kept. Her rumored use of its contents.
Jokes abounded about servant deaths—but most of them involved fear. Of this woman. None involved poison. She was terrifying. But Jester doubted that she had ever been moved to murder a member of her own staff; that would, no doubt, be too merciful.
The guests and members of the House did not interfere with the senior servants. For one, those servants were not in easy reach; they were surrounded by the various detritus of their responsibilities as supervisors and instructors. Some guests and some members of the House had attempted to interfere with the junior serving staff—it was considered inevitable. Merry and her friends had ways of avoiding those difficulties; they were a hazard of the job.
Jester accepted it; he expected it. Firm in his loathing of the rich and the powerful, it had never occurred to him to question its
truth.
Too much, he thought, had never occurred to him.
Some of the junior servants, he was certain, had fallen prey to House Council members. But they had been too ashamed to speak up. They had brought no complaint to the Master of the Household Staff; they feared the loss of necessary employment because they blamed themselves.
And yet, rumors of the actions taken against members of the House persisted. And Jester believed them.
How, then, to reconcile the fear of the servants with the truth of those rumors?
He thought of Vareena, and had his answer. Some offenses could not be hidden. Vareena would be dead were it not for the intervention of the healerie. And it was an intervention of which the Master of the Household Staff did not approve.
Jester was not certain how far they had walked by the time the Master of the Household Staff came to the end of the hall—and it was an ending, not a junction. She opened the door—which was, in all ways, an ordinary door; it was not built to be relatively invisible. It was also locked, and the lock required two keys.
If someone was to enter the back halls, they weren’t doing it from this door. But given the number of entrances and exits, Jester wasn’t certain why it was relevant. He half-expected the door to open into a dungeon, replete with shackles and implements of torture.
It opened, instead, into a sunny, light-filled room. He blinked, his eyes adjusting. As they did, he cataloged what he saw: windows—large windows—occupied the wall to the left of the door’s frame; they were, at the moment, covered by lace curtains that hung from rods just above the window’s frame. They were not the magnificent bay and bow windows that afforded a view of the grounds to the House Council’s various members—but they were fully glass, and at least one opened to allow breezes to cause the curtains to sway. On the wall opposite the door was another door, and to either side of it, cabinets, most of which appeared to house dishes or glass.
And opposite the windows were shelves. The Master of the Household Staff appeared to be a voracious reader. Glancing at the titles, he grimaced; if she read, she was not particularly interested in lurid adventure stories. Of course not.
She was interested in etiquette, in history, and in The Ten families; she was, it appeared, interested in the merchant houses and in the heraldry that the pretentious boasted. He remembered, as his eyes scanned spines, the early years of the den, when Teller and Jay had undertaken Rath’s equally pretentious lessons; he could hear Jay’s invective so clearly he grinned.
But he could hear, as well, Teller’s curiosity, his avid interest, his almost tangible yearning. He was certain that Jay would have quit in disgust if she hadn’t been aware of it as well.
He had not thought of Rath in years. Ironic, that this room—otherwise the antithesis of any rooms Rath called home—should bring him back so sharply.
Someone cleared her throat, and Jester’s grin deepened. He was certain that he was now at the heart of the dragon’s den: it connected the two facets of her life.
“By all reports, ATerafin, you have a day of leisure ahead of you. I, however, do not; given the actions of the healerie, my day has become infinitely less pleasant. Do you understand that Daine’s life is now at risk?”
“Because the rest of the House will know he’s healer-born.”
Her curt, sharp exhalation implied either disgust or impatience. Or both. In that moment, she reminded him of Haval, the man he had been avoiding. “I’m already getting this at home,” he said, his back toward her. “I’m not sure I need it anywhere else.” He turned; the one thing that was notably lacking in any of the glass cabinets was liquor.
Drinking in the presence of the Master of the Household Staff might be amusing. Or suicidal. “Or because, in healing someone that close to death, he now knows as much about her life as she does.”
“You understand.”
He didn’t. But he was beginning to, and it made him uneasier than even the bizarre and isolated walk with the Master of the Household Staff.
“You assume that I do not approve of either you or your friends in the West Wing.”
“I did.”
“I see.”
“Who was Vareena working for?”
Jester felt the temperature drop as the breeze shifted. He turned to face the dragon, his hands clasped loosely behind his back. Her expression offered as much warmth as it usually did.
“You chose the servants.”
“I choose all of the servants, yes. I understand the duty of a host to guests. I understand service. I understand, further, that this House does not stand without the service of the men and women who bear its name—in any walk of life. I am, of course, ATerafin. Do I appear young, to you?”
This was, among the older women of his acquaintance, often a signal. Jester could not imagine that the Master of the Household Staff wanted either comfort or stroking. “No. If it helps, I don’t believe you’ve ever appeared young—even when you were.”
“Whom would you expect this opinion to help?”
“Clearly not me.” He grinned.
She didn’t. She was far more brittle in her annoyance than Haval; there was no humor in it.
“Does my age imply anything to you?”
Only the good die young. His grin deepened, although he kept the words on the right side of his mouth. “You were alive during the House War that saw Amarais Handernesse ATerafin seated.”
“Indeed.”
“You weren’t—”
“I did not occupy my current position at the start of the war.”
“You were given your position afterward.”
“Yes.”
Jester frowned. The tone of her voice was off, somehow; he tried to recall what he’d heard of the last internal conflict for control of Terafin—but nothing came to mind when he thought of the servants. “You didn’t support the previous Terafin in her bid for the seat.”
“No.”
“You didn’t support any of the contenders.”
“No.”
“Did the previous Master of the Household Staff?”
The silence, and the obvious reluctance that framed it, was longer. “Yes. Before you ask, he did not throw his support behind the woman who did, in the end, take the seat.”
Jester continued to think—and he resented the effort; he wanted a drink. Or three. The Master of the Household Staff approved of Iain; Jester would have bet money that should Iain evince interest in the seat, she would back him.
But he was no longer certain he would win. Amarais had valued the Master of the Household Staff; Jay both resented and respected her. Neither of the two would have presented an ultimatum, overture, or threat, to gain her support—and her support could be invaluable.
He had, he thought, learned much about her various attitudes toward the House Council, most of it conveyed by small shifts in her facial expression. Aside from Iain, he could not think of one of whom she approved; she was at quiet war with Barston, and had been for a decade.
“You’ve never involved yourself in the politics of the House.”
“I have never involved myself in politics,” she replied, in a tone of voice that made politics a step below any other form of illegality. “The Household Staff is necessary for the smooth functioning of the House; it will be necessary no matter who sits in the seat.”
Jester’s glance shifted toward the window; there was only so much of the Master of the Household Staff’s stiff, condescending gaze he could take. He almost pinched himself; the day had not started particularly well, and it had traveled in directions he would never have predicted.
He missed Carver.
He missed Carver, and he was almost certain Carver, like Lefty, Duster, Fisher, and Lander, would never be seen again. The lack of certainty was a sharp, painful gift. Hope always was. What would Carver do? This entire discussion, bizarr
e and unpredictable as it was, would have been Carver’s responsibility.
“How do you prevent your staff from becoming involved in House politics?”
“How does The Terafin prevent her House Council from becoming involved in external politics?”
She didn’t. “Why are you speaking to me about this at all?”
“Because The Terafin is not present. She does not occupy her seat. You assume I do not approve of her; you are not entirely in the wrong. She does not understand service—not as it pertains to, and arises from, the Household Staff. She does not fully comprehend the extent to which familiarity breeds contempt.
“But she has survived this deficiency—or rather, my staff has—because of the extraordinary way in which she ascended the seat. I do not question her absence,” she added, although it was clear she was doing exactly that. “And I admit a certain gratitude at the way she averted the deaths that must come with any martial struggle.
“I wish you, of course, to speak with the healer. You have a vested interest in the fate of Terafin, ATerafin. And you have connections the Household Staff does not. I will not,” she continued, “support your faction should the specter of war rear its head. But I will not support any other faction, either. I will ensure that the House continues to function.”
Jester, silent, slid hands into his pockets. “You terrify the servants.”
“Do I?”
Jester nodded. “In the same way The Terafin did.”
One iron brow twitched. “I believe you are confusing respect with fear.”
He shrugged. “How will you explain Vareena’s injuries?”
“I will explain nothing; there will be no need.”
“You terrify them,” Jester said, repeating the phrase as he considered it, “but they trust you. They do not trust your mercy or your flexibility.”
“With good reason.”
Yes. She offered neither. “But they know what to expect from you. They understand that you have free reign among the Household Staff. You are the first—and last—resort. But they understand that the Household Staff is yours. No one who bears the House Name interferes in any obvious or detectable way with the servants.” The exception, of course, were the cooks, but Jester felt no need to point this out; she was no doubt aware of it.
Oracle: The House War: Book Six Page 34
