Battle: The House War: Book Five

by Michelle West

  The words echoed in the large room. She bit her lip and turned away from Haval, and away, as well, from what she was certain she would see in Ellerson’s face.

  “I will take that under advisement,” Haval finally replied, teacup full and once again in his hands. “The others?”

  “They’re far more powerful than I am. They’ve always been more powerful than any single member of my den. If Celleriant wished it, he could kill us all. He could arm and armor us first, and then kill us all, without breaking a sweat. I’m not convinced that he couldn’t kill most of the Chosen in the same way.” She swallowed. “Meralonne is the same. And Haval? They both love to fight. They love it.”

  “To fight, or to kill?”

  “To fight and not die, if I had to guess. It’s the only time I see either of them look joyful.”

  “So you are willing to trust them—”

  “I don’t. I don’t trust them the same way. My den, me—we want the same things. We have the same goals. There are things none of us would ever do to further those goals. Avandar, Celleriant, Meralonne—with them I have to watch what I say, watch what I do, watch how my words might be twisted if it serves their purpose. They have goals and those goals aren’t mine; my goals are convenient for their purposes now, that’s all. The cats are the same and not the same. They also love to fight.

  “But the others, my den—they’re like me, but without the sight. If someone attempts to slide a dagger through my back, my body moves. I don’t even have time to think. They don’t have that. When Haerrad had Teller injured—” she lost words. Found them again, but it was hard. She wanted Haval to understand.

  She was afraid he already did. “I wanted to kill him. I want to kill him now. I was certain he’d be dead before The Terafin was buried. It was the one silver lining to a House War. I want them to be safe—”

  He watched, impassive now. “Do you feel that you are safe, Jewel?”

  “I can’t easily be killed.”

  “That was not the question I asked. Do you feel that you are safe?”

  Did she? “I feel that I’m safer than they are.”

  He raised a brow. Raised a cup.

  “. . . No.”

  “Better. You’ve said that you can’t—easily—be killed. I will accept that at face value; I believe it is true. Why, then, do you feel unsafe?”

  She let the tension drain out of her shoulders, arms, and fists. What did she know about Haval? Nothing. Nothing except that there was so much to know. “What is Hannerle, to you?”

  Both of his brows rose in what Jewel hoped was genuine surprise. He then smiled, his eyes crinkling. “That, Jewel, is a palpable hit. Very good. I will not trifle to answer the question you have asked in a trivial way. She is the entirety of the reason I live—and work—in the Common. The choices I’ve made in my life to date revolve around the fact that she is part of it. She is almost the whole of it. What I am willing to do to preserve her life is almost without bound. But not entirely; there are some things she would never forgive.”

  “You could hide them. You’re good at that.”

  “I am. But I am older than you, as is Hannerle, and I understand the ways in which lies of any significance trouble a marriage. They grow roots, the way trees do, and they break foundations in ways that are unforeseen by even the wisest. I lay no claim to wisdom,” he added. “Will you tell me that your den is like my wife?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Then I will tell you that you have made all the wrong choices in your life if you mean that statement to be true.”

  “No.”

  “No? You are The Terafin. You might have chosen to remain a member of the House Council with all the lesser significance and weight that implies. It is still considerable.”

  “You know why I couldn’t do that.”

  “Indeed. And so do they. They did not argue against it, Jewel, and in your absence they protected what they could. They want what you want—and not less. They will give what you give—possibly more. I could not live with Hannerle had I not surrendered claim to the greater responsibility.”

  “But you’re here now.”

  “Indeed. I am. She is not pleased. I think she would be entirely unforgiving had my work here not involved you, and for that I am grateful. She is not suspicious of your activities in the same way she was suspicious of mine—and with reason. She sees to the heart of the matter. I am willing to do what my current life requires, no more, no less. But what I am willing to do to preserve it, you would not do.”

  “Haval—”

  “I do not practice the full range of my options because some of those would destroy the life Hannerle and I have built just as certainly; in all ways, the choices I make are hampered by my desire to live Hannerle’s life. But absent that? There is much I would be willing to do that you could never countenance. Not to save Teller or Finch. Not to save yourself.

  “But I tell you this to point out that our situations are not the same. The den knows what you know; they are willing to see you do what you feel you must. They will not leave you because they disagree with your choices. They do not hold Duster’s death against you; nor do they fear to follow because of it. So: do not speak to me of love, even if you will not name it.”

  “You’re here because you’re certain Hannerle would have died had you stayed at home.”

  He nodded.

  “I shouldn’t have taken advantage of that.”

  “Jewel, please. I have already pointed out all the ways in which your attempt to do so was a failure. Do not force me to repeat them; it is almost entirely beside the point, and I wish you to remain on point.”

  “I don’t feel safe,” she told him, forcing her hands to remain at her sides, “because Duster died. Lefty died. Lander died.” She turned toward the fireplace, and then turned back. “And before them? My mother, my Oma. My father. Rath. It’s exactly the same. You’re afraid of losing Hannerle. You’re here. I’m afraid of losing anyone else I can love. I don’t want to be left alone in a silent house ever again.”

  * * *

  After a long pause, during which Ellerson refilled Haval’s cup, Haval said, “If all of your arguments in Council involved matters of the earnest heart, my dear, your rule would be unassailable.”

  “Is that a compliment?”

  “It is, of a sort. You have forced me to acknowledge a sympathy, an empathy, I would have sworn could not exist. Shall I now tell you why you are wrong?”

  “If I say no?”

  “We shall sit here in increasingly uncomfortable silence.”

  She did laugh, then. She laughed, and she returned, at last, to the seat she had vacated.

  “You need them.”

  “You need—”

  “I need Hannerle in my store. I need her in my life. But my life, with the single exception of this endeavor, is hers. I have accepted the confines and the cage because if I could not, she would not now be mine. You need your den in the same way I need Hannerle. If I were afraid that every prick of a needle would send her to sleep—or death, as devised—if I was afraid that any bolt of cloth she might touch would be poisoned, any customer might be an assassin, I could not have my store. Or my life. I would deny her—and myself—her competence.”

  “In your case, none of those things are likely.”

  “Yes. Because in my case, the making of clothing for the idle rich—or the busy rich, do not make that face—is not political. It is not a matter of power; it is, at base, an appeal to those who have the power I lack. I curry favor.

  “In your case, you are a power. And, Terafin, it is my belief that you must be more of one before this is out. Not within the confines of your House—although that is utterly necessary—but beyond its boundaries. You must be as near to absolute as it is possible for you to become. And without your den, you have deprived yourself of the only people you trust at a time when you cannot afford to falter on any front. You cannot defend yourself against the Kings, the magi, the Exalted, the
demonic—and still oversee every other element of the House. Nor can you afford to appoint people you trust less at such a delicate moment in your rule.”

  “I don’t want—”

  “No, of course you don’t. But, Jewel, I have considered—carefully—what I will do if Hannerle does not survive. I have seen what my life will become. Have you done likewise?”

  “. . . No.”

  “You must. Unless you intend to end your rule if your den dies, you must consider the alternatives with care. You must even cultivate them. You are no longer Jewel Markess, the youthful and earnest orphan who followed Ararath Handernesse to my store. Your life is not your own. You are The Terafin, now. You have taken the responsibility for House Terafin within the Empire. You cannot cease to function because one, or another, of the members of your House falls; that luxury is lost.

  “But you did not cease to function when Duster died. Regret? Yes, of course you regret it. On some days, you regret it bitterly. But that, as they often say, must be your problem. It cannot be the House’s. Trust your den. I believe they are worthy of that singularly unwise decision. You need them,” he said again. He set his cup aside. “And I must attend my affairs and my life, now. I have been absent from her side.”

  He walked toward the door, but before Ellerson opened it, turned again. Jewel had not moved to see him out. “There are, at the moment, some discrepancies in the House accounts. Those discrepancies can be traced indirectly to the office of the right-kin.”

  Jewel froze in place. “How large a discrepancy, and is it in his favor?”

  “A very large one, alas. No, it is not in his favor. I do not believe he is aware of the full state of his accounts, but it is almost exactly the sum of money one would expect to spend on very short notice if one hired a fully-trained assassin.”

  She exhaled. “Come back, Haval. Tell me what you know.”

  Chapter Four

  ELLERSON QUIETLY BROUGHT Jewel tea, allowed her to drink half of it, and suggested—firmly—that she might consider changing her attire. Since she knew the events in the Common would bring a stream of visitors that she could not put off for lack of an appointment—and since her day’s schedule had been cleared for the purposes of a day-long inspection of troops in the heart of the hundred—she took his advice.

  She regretted it slightly when it came to the matter of her hair, because apparently ash, small stones, splinters, and dirt did not magically take care of themselves. But the mark on her arm had, as she’d told Haval, ceased to bleed. It did remind her, as she rose to dress, that Avandar was absent. She hoped he was sleeping, although Avandar’s sleep—like her own—was not guaranteed to be restful.

  “Ellerson.”

  “Terafin.”

  “I will be in The Terafin’s—in my—office. I’d like to speak with Teller and Finch the moment they arrive home.”

  * * *

  When Ellerson had finished making her look presentable, she walked through the Chosen stationed outside of the room. They followed at a very discreet distance; only in the West Wing—her personal quarters—did they do so. But these quarters also housed the den, Adam, Ariel, and two domicis. In this case, it was the domicis’ rooms she approached, or rather, Avandar’s.

  Not for Avandar Gallais the practical rooms that Ellerson occupied; Avandar’s room had no cupboards and no counters, for one. But, like Ellerson’s, they were unadorned. For a man who had not spent his life in poverty and, more germane, had lived a very long time, he had very few obvious possessions, and none of these were sentimental in nature.

  Jewel still had the old, iron box in which the den’s money had been kept in the twenty-fifth holding. She kept Rath’s sword, although that had only come into her hands after The Terafin’s death. She wore the Handernesse ring on a long, golden chain that hung around her neck. She had the House Council ring, of course—the old one, although she no longer wore it. The new one was styled in a much more ostentatious way; she liked it far less.

  It was vastly heavier, its weight an accusation, not an affirmation.

  She knocked on Avandar’s door. There was no answer; she knocked again. After a long pause, she opened the door. It was not his habit to keep this door locked. Hers, yes.

  He was abed. The curtains were drawn, and the magelight that adorned the room had been whispered to near invisibility. She heard his deep and even breathing, hesitated a moment, and then turned in the doorway.

  “Jewel.”

  “I’m sorry. I know it hasn’t been very long—”

  Across the darkened room she swore she could hear the brief clenching of domicis jaws. Avandar rose. “Your meeting with Haval is finished?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did he have any information of import to impart?”

  “Yes. Gabriel’s personal accounts.”

  He shed the robe he habitually wore when sleeping, and began to dress. “They are significant at the moment?”

  “Only in one regard. Haval thinks the money that paid for the assassin—the woman—came from Gabriel’s account.”

  “I see.”

  * * *

  She took four of the Chosen with her when she left the wing. Avandar, clothed, walked to her left. He did not look significantly better for the rest he’d taken; his face was pale, his eyes lined and dark. She made no comment; they only irritated him, and today, there would be irritants in plenty.

  But she worried, and he knew it.

  Jewel, I cannot simply expire from exhaustion.

  The halls stretched out before her. They were no longer adorned with the symbols of mourning that had marked The Terafin’s death; she missed them. I don’t know what’s going to happen in the future.

  Ironic, coming from a seer.

  She nodded slightly, keeping the habitual grimace from her lips. But you can’t fight—not like that. Not that sword, not that shield. Not that.

  There is no other way to fight what we faced today.

  Yes, there is. We did fight it.

  We did not destroy it.

  She almost asked him if he thought he could destroy the demon in other circumstances, but stopped herself from forming the words. He would be aware of the thought itself; he was. He chose not to answer. It didn’t matter. A sudden, certain implacable knowledge, a flash of conviction, came in the place of the words he refused to offer: he could.

  But it would destroy him. It wouldn’t kill him, no. But it would break whatever hope he had of escape. Of death.

  It was so ironic. The one thing she feared—death, even if not her own—was the one thing he wanted. A reminder, if one were necessary, that eternity was not the blessing the powerful and the mortal believed it would be. She had seen parts of a past that stretched as far as the gods—perhaps farther. Avandar was the one person—the only person—that she thought she could cede to death, if there was some path that would lead him there.

  Terafin.

  And she knew, as she walked, that there was. She couldn’t see its shape, its form; she couldn’t see its end—but in that moment, between one step and the next, she knew it existed.

  * * *

  Barston was, in no one’s estimation, a happy man. He was precise, orderly, immovable within his own domain; no detail was too small to escape his notice. He was not young—Jewel privately wondered if he had ever been young, even as a child. But he was also aware of the relative ranks in the House, and he insisted, no matter what the circumstance, that the respect due those ranks be strictly and exactly observed.

  He rose the moment the doors opened and Jewel entered the right-kin’s office.

  Barston was technically the right-kin’s secretary. He was not The Terafin’s, but The Terafin did not require one; all appointments, all matters of concern, that were meant for The Terafin, passed beneath the eyes of the right-kin first. Only those matters the right-kin felt were urgent—or political—enough to demand The Terafin’s attention were then put before The Terafin’s eyes.

  Barston, therefo
re, was responsible for a majority of Jewel’s schedule. He knew it, in all likelihood, better than she herself did. She was not of a mind to change this arrangement, although she knew it was not an arrangement followed in the other Houses among The Ten. She liked having the shield of Barston to huddle behind.

  Avandar did not approve.

  “Rise,” she told the secretary. He did. “I apologize for my unexpected presence. The victory parade in the Common was severely disrupted.”

  Barston didn’t blink. Nor did he ask. He assumed that the reasons for her unexpected and unforeseen presence were impeccable. “You have no appointments scheduled for this afternoon.”

  “No. But Gabriel has not yet returned from the Common; I do not imagine he will be able to extricate himself from the procedural difficulties for at least another hour. I wish to speak with him when he returns—and I wish to speak with him before I speak with any other visitors.”

  “You expect there will be other visitors of import.” It was not a question; Barston was not an idiot.

  She nodded. Hesitated. Barston noted that, too. But questions of a very delicate nature could not be asked of Barston in so open an environment—the office was not empty—if ever. “I expect the appointments that arise out of the afternoon events to be long and complicated. At least one of those will be held over one of the dinner hours; I am unconcerned as to which hour it is.”

  “Which appointment, Terafin?”

  “The Guildmaster of the Order of Knowledge.”

  Barston nodded.

  “Offer her that meeting time, and extend an invitation to join me. I am certain, by that time, we will both require refreshment.”

  “Yes, Terafin. I will inform you if her schedule conflicts with yours in such a way that the meeting cannot occur.”

  “Thank you, Barston.” She turned toward the door, stopped, and turned back, squaring her shoulders. The movement caught the secretary’s attention. “I’m sorry. I know you have work that you hoped to catch up on while most of the House Council was occupied in the victory celebrations. My presence here cannot be helpful in that regard, but I must ask for a few moments of your time.”