The Poison Master

by Liz Williams

  “But we don't have much time.”

  “I know. If the mendicant had not died—but such is life, plans fail. You're right, however—the clock is against us. We need to start out for Hathes as soon as possible.”

  “I still don't see why you can't wait.”

  “That won't be possible,” Ghairen said and there was a raw edge below his words, like a wire in a bird-snare. Instinct told her not to press it further.

  “Very well,” Alivet said, cautiously. “But first, I want to know that you're not lying to me about Inki. How do I know that you've spoken to her? Everyone knows that I have an Enbonded sister. You said you'd researched me—it wouldn't take a lot of investigation to find out about that.”

  “A good point and one that occurred to me. I asked Inki to tell me something that only a twin might know. And I hope you'll forgive me for embarrassing you, but I now know that you punched Nicholas Hakluyt when you were working in the marsh-hopper store, for suggesting that you sleep with him.”

  “Inki told you that?” Alivet said, outraged.

  “She also told me that she dropped your aunt's wedding necklet through a crack in the boards when you were both seven and that you took the blame. Now are you convinced?”

  “More or less,” Alivet said grudgingly. “How do we get to Hathes?”

  “There is,” Ghairen seemed to be debating how much to tell her, “a means to reach a drift-boat. At Eleida Vo.”

  “Eleida Vo? That's the easternmost Palace of Night,” Alivet said in horror.

  “Quite.”

  “We're going back through a Night Palace?” Alivet was plunged back into doubt. Ghairen was a creature of the Lords: they had ransacked Inki's memory and this was some caprice of the Unpriests, a game within a cruel nest of games.

  “There's a device—a portal—in the Night Palace which will take us onto a Hathanassi drift-boat. It's intended for the Lord's craft only, of course, but there is a way by which the coordinates can be altered for a short period. It's the only way to reach other worlds. The Lords take great care to keep you here, Alivet. They do not want your people to explore. The journey will be both difficult and dangerous.”

  “Difficult? To enter a Palace of Night is pure suicide!”

  “It's the only way,” Ghairen said, adding—not without irony—“Trust me.”

  Alivet could not bring herself to reply. Nonetheless, she waited impatiently in the hallway as the Poison Master, his face veiled, conducted some final transaction with the landlady. She could feel the woman's curiosity and wondered what the landlady thought. Did Ghairen often bring young women back and forth to his lodgings? Was he in the habit of sleeping with them? She remembered the young woman in the house opposite, slipping off her shoes in the lamplit room and closing her eyes to think, perhaps, of her brother in the depths of a Night Palace, just as Alivet thought of Inki. Had Ari Ghairen made some bargain with that tired girl? Had he merely bought her drinks and listened with sympathy in eyes that were the color of poison? Or had he made love to her? The thought aroused a curious sensation in Alivet: half alarm, half envy. She thought of Ghairen's long fingers moving over someone's skin, brushing hair back from a face— Alivet reined in her thoughts with a start. Enough of that. There was no way of knowing. Yet if she lost sight of Ghairen she, too, would be lost.

  “You'll like Hathes.” Ghairen spoke at her shoulder, making her jump. “A lovely world, full of wonders. Come on. We'll go out the back way, just in case someone might be watching.”

  “What if the Unpriests find us?” Alivet asked. “You know that they're after me.” The question trembled on her tongue: Did you kill Madimi? She was suddenly very aware of Ghairen's presence at her shoulder, of his moth-soft breath against her neck. She should step away, she told herself, turn and face him, and yet she could not move. Stop being a fool. You've faced Unpriests, bagmen, murderers before now and looked them squarely in the eye. What is so different about this man?

  “Don't worry about the Unpriests. You're with me now.” Ghairen's hand brushed her shoulder. Clearly, he meant to be reassuring, but condescension achieved what fear could not. Alivet swung around.

  “And what about Inki? If we're actually going into the Night Palace, can I see her?”

  “That wouldn't be wise.”

  “But—”

  “We'll discuss it later.”

  The landlady, tucking a wad of money into the pockets of her skirt, led them silently through a large, dank kitchen and out down a flight of steps. The wood was slippery; moss glowed green in the lights from the street. Wet fronds brushed Alivet's face as they made their way down the garden and out through a narrow gate.

  Ghairen, moving swiftly, led Alivet along a maze of alleyways: she smelled rain-soaked earth, ripening marrows, and bitter cabbages. When she and Inki were children, Alivet had often imagined leaving Latent Emanation forever. But in those dreams, she had always been a princess or a pirate, rescued from the impostors who pretended to be her family and sailing up in a silver-winged ship surrounded by her devoted henchmen. The dreams of an eight-year-old did not encompass sidling through back gardens at night, led by a charming unhuman poisoner.

  Alivet trod in a pothole and concluded that the dreams of eight years old were better.

  “How are we getting to the Night Palace?” she hissed at Ghairen, now some strides ahead. He turned back.

  “Well, we're not walking all the way.”

  “That's a relief.”

  “This is just a diversion. I don't think anyone was watching the house, but it never hurts to be sure. Tricky people, your Unpriests. Once we come out onto the main road, we'll take a chaise.”

  “What if the Unpriests have issued a description of me?”

  “Do you think the anubes will hand you in? They did not do so out on the marsh.”

  “How do you know so much about what happened on the marsh? I didn't see you skulking in the rushes.”

  “I keep informed,” Ghairen murmured. “The marsh wife, for example. A most helpful lady. Though the anubes keep their own counsel, you will be interested to hear. I have tried to co-opt them before but—apart from my poor mendicant— with a lamentable lack of success.”

  “I see,” Alivet said sourly. How far did his network of informers extend? she wondered. Had Genever Thant been bought? The Poison Master had clearly been busy during his time in Levanah. Ghairen stepped over an irrigation channel, footsteps splashing in the thick wet moss, and pointed.

  “There's the road that leads to the causeway. I've arranged transport for some of the way, then we'll need to be more covert.”

  Now that her eyes had adjusted to the shadows, Alivet saw that there was a chaise waiting. It was run-down and old, the canopy in tatters. The anube who waited so patiently between its shafts did not look up as they approached, nor did it turn its head as Ghairen extended a hand to help Alivet onto the seat.

  Once they were both inside, the anube loped out into the road, still in silence. Numbly, Alivet watched the streets roll by and soon they were out near the causeway that led to the Night Palace.

  “Not far now,” Ghairen said. He gestured toward a ring of lights. “There's the entrance to the causeway.” But as they neared the middle of the causeway, something swift and black darted overhead. Alivet gripped Ghairen's arm.

  “That's the Unpriests' flier.”

  “I told you not to worry.”

  “Ghairen—”

  “Just trust me, Alivet.”

  She looked back. There was no other traffic on the causeway. They were as visible as a bird on a lake. The flier veered once and turned. The causeway rose high above the marsh: if she sprang from the chaise and jumped, she would be killed.

  “Almost there,” Ghairen said, comfortingly. The vast gates of the causeway entrance rose before them. Ghairen tapped the anube on the shoulder. The chaise slowed to a halt.

  “Now,” Ghairen said, “walk slowly, and keep close to me. Keep your hood over your head and your h
ands in your pockets.”

  Alivet did so. She followed Ghairen to the gate, resisting the temptation to look up. This was the closest she had ever come to a Night Palace. It was Lord technology, far beyond a human scale. Both gates and walls were built of a dense, translucent substance, like columns of dark air. She could see the Palace of Night at the end of the causeway, glimmering as if glimpsed through water. An Unpriest stepped out of the gatehouse and stood before them, tapping a hand sheathed in rippling metal against her thigh.

  “Entrance is forbidden. Where are your documents?”

  “Here.” Ghairen handed over a strip and the Unpriest held it beneath her mechanical eye. Alivet could see the lens dilating in and out as it processed the information.

  “An Imponderable. You're a long way from home, aren't you? What about you?” She gestured to Alivet, who grew cold with the dismay of betrayal. Ghairen had given her nothing, had issued no instructions.

  It was all a cruel and elaborate trap. He was employed by the Unpriests to bring her in. If she turned and ran, the woman would kill her. She stepped back and as she did so her eyes met Ghairen's own. He had cast aside the Imponderable's veil. The night ran around her, blurring in sudden heat. Her skin felt warm as summer and she stumbled. A skein of material was clapped over her face and she breathed something fresh and astringent, dispelling the faintness. Ghairen's hand was around her arm and he pulled her forward. Then they were through the gate, leaving the slumping figure of the Unpriest behind.

  “Quickly, now. The toxin won't last forever.” Ghairen pointed to the banked sides of the causeway. “We'll go along the bank, not the causeway. The Unpriest's forgotten that she ever set eyes on us, but I don't want to stroll down the causeway in plain view.”

  Alivet slithered down the bank after him, the back of her neck prickling with alarm. She could see the bulk of Eleida Vo rising before her now: dark and glittering against the sky. This was where Inki had been taken. The notion of seeing her sister made Alivet grow clammy with apprehension. Wild thoughts raced through her mind: of snatching Inki away, fleeing into the marsh…

  Since Ghairen had spoken to her, it seemed that her mind had not been her own, but subsumed under some alien presence. It occurred to her that perhaps this was his artistry as a master of poisons: the real toxin was his manipulation of the fears in her agitated mind. But it was too late now. The great gate of the causeway lay behind her, and the Night Palace was rising up like a black orchid out of the marsh. Alivet blinked. Ghairen, who had been striding before her, had gone.

  “Ghairen?” Alivet whispered into the empty air. “Where are you?”

  His voice floated up from the ground.

  “Down here.”

  Crouching down, Alivet saw that a yawning hole lay between the clusters of rushes.

  “It's quite safe.”

  Alivet doubted this, but even as she hesitated, the air began to hum as if struck like a bell. The flier was coming back. She could see its lights arcing out before it and the dragonfly bulb of its hull striped with rain. As it swung around, Alivet gathered her skirts around her and dived into the hole. It was a long drop and she landed in a heap. Ghairen pulled her to her feet.

  “Ghairen, there's a flier out there.”

  “Then we must hurry.”

  To Alivet's surprise, the tunnel was high enough to stand upright, and its walls were dry.

  “Where are we?” she asked, as Ghairen turned and began to walk swiftly along the tunnel.

  “This is an anube passage, from the days before the Lords,” Ghairen said over his shoulder. “The mendicant knew of it.”

  Alivet put out a hand to steady herself and encountered smooth, cool stone. They had reached the end of the tunnel. A round chamber arched above her head, made from blocks of interlocking rock. And there was a face looking at her from out of the darkness. Alivet gasped, then realized that the face was not that of a living thing.

  “What's that?”

  The visage was cut into a pillar: a head, unattached to a body, but with four faces. The faces were human: beautiful and wild, with curling mouths. Alivet stepped around the pillar to see the fourth face and found that this one was serene. Its eyes were closed and the lips were curved into a faint, melancholic smile. She could not tell whether it was male or female.

  “This surely wasn't made by the anubes,” she said. “The faces are human—why would they bother?”

  “Who knows?” Ghairen said. Alivet glanced at him. In the light of his torch, Ghairen's face was closed, the red eyes downcast and full of secrets. She was certain that he was lying. “This is the entrance to the Palace of Night,” Ghairen added. “Follow me, as closely as you can. Do not speak and try not to look about you—I know the temptation will be great, and I know that you want to search for your sister. But if we are discovered, you will never see her—or anything— again. I will not condescend by asking if this is clear. I know that you understand me.”

  “Believe me,” Alivet said with feeling, “I've no wish to do anything in a Night Palace which could draw attention to myself.”

  “Good.”

  He raised a hand to the wall. There was a gleam of light, a pattern against the stone. Alivet saw that it came from Ghairen's glove: a diagram of lights that flickered over his palm.

  “What's that?” she whispered. Ghairen did not answer. The stones of the wall began to grow translucent, so that Alivet could see through them to a darkness beyond. Images slid across the transparent stones. She saw the face of an anube bearing a great golden crown, a procession of tiny figures crossing over a place that looked both high and cold, the fourfold face of the statue behind her with the eyes staring and fierce. The images marched through the stone, like dreams through the sleeping mind, and were gone. And the wall was gone with them, melted away and leaving an emptiness upon the air.

  Beckoning, Ghairen stepped through. Alivet, following, found that the air in the space beyond was much colder. Her teeth snapped together and gooseflesh rose on her arms. Ghairen paused to fasten his coat more securely. Alivet rammed her hands into her pockets and walked on. The torchlight picked out a path along the wall. She stood in a winding red corridor, its walls glazed as if with frost. It reminded her of the meat-rack she and Inki had crept into as children, to gaze with wonder at row upon row of icy butchered carcasses, destined for the tables of the aristocracy. The meat-rack had smelled of chilled blood; this place was warm and fragrant, with undernotes of ginger and musk, resinous amber and living flesh. Alivet stopped and stared.

  “Ghairen?”

  “Just follow me.”

  She had always thought of the Night Palaces as being dead places, cold and somber, but the network of corridors through which they walked seemed horribly alive. Alivet felt eyes on her back, as though the walls were watching. The floor pulsed gently beneath her feet and she had the feeling that she had wandered into nightmare, that Ghairen was her dream-guide, her psychopomp, that she would never return.

  Stop this, Alivet told herself. Think of what Inki must have been through.

  It was a dreadful thought.

  After Inki had been taken by the Unpriests, Alivet had spent long hours awake in the cold nights of the fens, imagining what might be happening to her sister. She had even dreamed of it: imagining that it had been she who had been taken, not Inki, that it was she who was walking through dead and ancient halls and serving the whims of the Lords of Night. She had never dreamed that their palaces would be anything like this. And with these thoughts came the old guilt: It should have been me.

  Hate filled Alivet's heart. She fastened her gaze on the elegant figure of Ghairen, striding ahead. She would never have believed it possible an hour ago, but she was glad that he was here with her now. However sly and sidling Ghairen might be, he still seemed to be a part of her world rather than that of the Lords. If she could only see her sister, just once— but she was forced to admit that Ghairen might be right. It would not be wise, to risk all for the sake of a g
limpse of Inki, yet reason and sense were at war with her instincts.

  Eventually, the twists and turns of the corridor led them out into a hallway. It was on a massive scale; the Palace of Night seemed even larger from within than it did from without. Soft, thick rugs covered the floor, but it was impossible to see their pattern in this dimness. The ceiling lay far above Alivet's head, a narrow strip of wan light between the crimson buttresses. She could not tell where the illumination was coming from. It looked like reflected light rather than a direct source.

  Then she cannoned into Ghairen. His hand snapped around her wrist and he drew her back behind an arch of stone. Alivet, remembering her instructions to keep silent, had to bite her tongue. Ghairen nudged her in the ribs. She turned to see a small procession of people coming down the hallway. One of them was a girl. The dark red walls of the hallway receded from Alivet's gaze; the ceiling grew dim and distant. She could hear only the roaring of the blood in her head.

  “Inkirietta.” The syllables crunched like ice. She did not realize that she had spoken aloud until Ghairen's hand clamped over her mouth.

  “Alivet,” he murmured into her ear. “Alivet, listen to me. That is not your sister.” His arm was around her waist, all that was stopping Alivet from bolting out into the hall and seizing the girl by the hand.

  As the procession drew nearer, however, she could see that he was right. It was not Inki. This girl was younger, the age that Inki had been when she was taken, and she had golden hair. Her face was pinched and wizened, and she was hunched over as if in pain. The two boys who accompanied her were older; they wore silk doublets and leather breeches, and their expressions held a cold vacancy. They looked like two stilted puppets, drawn along on a string. The third boy was even younger than the girl and he looked simply afraid. Each of them was carrying a platter, covered by a serving dish.

  Alivet tapped Ghairen's hand, mutely requesting release. She thought of toxins crawling over his skin and worming through her clothes, but there was a warmth beneath the fear. Ghairen's arm remained firmly where it was, and then a Lord stepped through the doors at the far end of the hall.