Lord of Stormweather

by David Gross

  Vox entered and shut the door behind him before taking up his place beside the fireplace. He stood there as still as a statue, his big hands planted firmly on the butt of his great axe.

  Since Tamlin’s escape through the secret passages, the bodyguard had refused to leave him alone in a room. There was no point in arguing with him, for Vox could pretend to be as deaf as he was mute when Tamlin gave him orders he didn’t like.

  Tamlin returned to his desk. He set aside the books he’d been studying and removed the coded list and the letter from his sleeve, along with a copy he’d been annotating. Since the disappearance of the other letters, he didn’t trust any locked drawer to keep the clues safe.

  At first glance, the letter he’d saved from the thief disappointed Tamlin. It was full of insincere thanks for a singularly dull Eventide feast that Thamalon had hosted over a month earlier. Tamlin didn’t remember any of the banal entertainment to which Gorkun Baerent referred, but that was hardly surprising considering that he’d insulated himself against the dreary festivities with a little party of his own well before the guests began to arrive.

  Thinking back on the event with a clear mind, however, Tamlin instantly realized that the anecdotes and remembrances must have been invented. He was sure, for instance, that he would have remembered a dozen halfling women juggling flaming pins over a bridge of ice conjured by a Thayan wizard—no matter how drunk he’d been at the time.

  Obviously the letter was in code, and if Tamlin’s guess was right, the vellum page held the key to breaking it.

  He’d tried holding the page to a mirror, reversing each individual word, reading only the first letter of each word—only the second, and the third letters. He’d tried reading it backward and vertically, but none of those simple variations unlocked the secret of the scrambled words.

  Until that morning’s news that Tazi was angry with him, Tamlin had considered asking his sister for help. She was clever with such things, but he feared she would be more likely to push him out a window than help him crack a mysterious code.

  Tamlin needed a break. A nice stroll might be just the thing to stir his imagination toward a solution to the problems he faced. Unfortunately, the only way to get away from all distractions was to take that walk within the walls of Stormweather Towers.

  The secret passages had been calling to him ever since he’d fetched his father’s master keys. Perhaps it was the return of another childhood phenomenon, like his dreams, but Tamlin felt a strong desire to retreat into those secret avenues. There he could travel without escort, without distraction, without any impediment to his whim. If he wished, he could emerge from behind the kitchen ovens and surprise a scullery maid with a pinch. If he was very quick, he could vanish as quickly as he’d appeared, as if by magic.

  That’s why he liked the secret passages so much, he realized. There he could travel unseen throughout the mansion, emerging when and where he wished and vanishing just as quickly.

  Like a wizard.

  Tamlin looked over at Vox, whose black stare had never left his master since he entered the room.

  “You realize,” Tamlin said, “there’s really no safer place in Selgaunt than within the secret passages of my own home.”

  The barbarian’s gaze did not waver, but his scowl deepened.

  Your father is not the only one missing lately.

  That was true, thought Tamlin. Both Thuribal Baerodreemer and Gorkun Baerent had vanished in the days following the disturbance at Stormweather. In both cases, the nobles had disappeared without a trace, and no amount of divination magic could conjure an explanation from their spirits.

  “I’d bring you along, really. It’s just that irksome ‘secret’ clause.”

  Where are you going? signed Vox.

  “I just wish to walk about the house, unseen. Perhaps I’ll visit the wine cellars.”

  You want a drink?

  “No, no, I assure you. It’s just so cool and dark down there. I like the quiet.”

  Maybe you want to sleep?

  “If I wanted a nap, I wouldn’t be going for a walk.”

  When you were little, and your nanny found you had left your bed, you were sleeping in the cellar. Remember?

  “No. How absurd!” said Tamlin. Despite his objection, he half remembered being lifted from his blanket on the cool stone floor. “Why would I do such a thing?”

  Try as he might, he had no clear memory of such nocturnal visits to the wine cellar. Apart from the obvious appeal of its stores, he didn’t know exactly why he found the dank chambers so soothing, yet he did. Casting his mind back to childhood, he could conjure only a vague recollection of dozing among the casks.

  “Dreaming eye, eh?”

  Vox nodded. It may be.

  “I think you’re on to something, Vox, old boy. A stroll in the cellars is exactly what I need.”

  A visit to the wine cellars held many simple pleasures. One of them was an excuse to carry a real torch. There was no logical reason why Thamalon should forbid the continual flames lamps from the cellar, but Tamlin realized the Old Owl had done it to enhance the atmosphere.

  He had succeeded.

  A black path ran along the bare stone ceiling above the route most commonly used by Thamalon and his guests upon visiting the cellars. As Tamlin and Vox followed the trail, cobwebs fluttered in the corners—for the servants were under strict orders not to dust there.

  The narrow passages between casks the size of carriages gave the place a claustrophobic air. In winter, the wine cellar felt only slightly cooler than in summer. All it needed were a few well-placed skeletons set into the walls, and one might mistake it for a catacomb.

  For one who had enjoyed its stores so freely, Tamlin had seldom visited the wine cellars—at least not since he was a child. He remembered hiding among the casks while Escevar and Tazi searched for him in a game of hide-and-seek. He could also recall at least one occasion on which he’d precociously dared the pretty young daughter of one of the cooks to explore the place with him. He’d hoped to kiss her, but instead he ended up leading the hysterical lass back out of the darkness after she glimpsed a big yellow spider.

  The more he struggled to recall these childhood memories, the more strange it seemed that he’d avoided the place throughout his teens and twenties. Whenever Thamalon had invited visitors on a tour, Tamlin had found a reason to beg off. On those rare occasions on which he wanted a specific vintage from the cellars, he’d never thought twice about sending Escevar or another servant to fetch it rather than entertain his guests with an excursion into the fabled depths of Thamalon’s cellar.

  Whether it attracted or repulsed him, the cellar had spoken to Tamlin all his life, and he had never realized it.

  “Feel anything?” asked Tamlin.

  Vox signaled a negative. His torch sizzled as the flame touched a patch of moisture on the low ceiling.

  “Neither do I,” said Tamlin. Disappointment hung heavy on his words, but he shrugged it off as he spied a familiar feature of the cellars.

  Opposite an iron rack devoted to bottles imported from the farthest reaches of Faerûn was the wall of ancestors, or “the rogues gallery,” as Tamlin liked to call it. From Phaldinor all the way down to Thamalon, the heads of House Uskevren and their immediate families were preserved in fresco.

  Thamalon’s painting was a striking likeness, but Tamlin suspected the others were less accurate. Indeed, they were rendered in the classical style that loved grace more than realism. Most of their contemporary portraits had perished in the fire that consumed the original Stormweather Towers, but on occasion Tamlin had seen a surviving etching or cameo of one of these ancestors. All of them displayed the strong Uskevren brow and nose. Those who lived long enough for their hair to turn snowy reassured Tamlin that he would likely keep his full head of hair even in his dotage—should he live long enough to reach it.

  “Remember this?” Tamlin ran his fingers across the face of Roel Uskevren, his great uncle. Despite diligen
t but careful scrubbing, the faint image of a mustachio curled up from his lip to his cheeks.

  Vox made the simple gesture for “ouch.”

  “Poor Escevar,” said Tamlin. “I felt just awful about the beating he took for that one.”

  He felt worse, signed Vox. He pointed to the motto at the top of each portrait’s border: Too Bold To Hide.

  Vox had made it plain long ago that he found the tradition of a whipping boy both unfair and unmanly. In his opinion, he who made the offense must be brave enough to own up to it. Allowing another to take his place didn’t speak well of the young man whose family motto praised courage and accountability.

  Thankfully, Escevar hadn’t served in his original function for over a decade, and he seemed no worse for the punishment. In fact, his endurance had paid off far sooner than he could have imagined. He was chief among the Uskevren family servants.

  Tamlin ran his fingers along the carved letters. Something about them disturbed his thoughts. It was more than just a guilty conscience over daring Escevar to the vandalism and the hundred other offenses that had earned the servant a hiding. Nor was it his own lingering sense of uselessness since and even before his father’s disappearance. He felt that he was on the verge of some revelation, but he couldn’t put it into words.

  Vox touched his shoulder. What is it?

  “I’m not sure,” said Tamlin. “Something about this place … about these portraits. Don’t you feel a little strange down here?”

  Vox thought about the question before answering, I do now.

  “Sorry, old chum. I didn’t mean to give you the ginchies, but you made me think of something … I’ve got it!”

  Tamlin snatched the vellum page and the Baerent letter from his sleeve. He opened the letter and ran his finger across the words.

  “Yes!” He tapped the word “bold,” then “hide” a few lines farther down. Together, they appeared a total of eight times in Gorkun’s note. Tamlin’s excitement began to fade almost as quickly as it had arrived, for despite the unusual frequency of these words from his family motto, they revealed nothing in themselves.

  Still, they marked the beginning of some pattern.

  Vox touched Tamlin’s arm and again signed, What is it?

  “So far, it’s proof that my father was sending secret messages to the families listed on this page,” said Tamlin. “Once I’ve finished decoding it, I’ll know whether this is a list of our friends or a roster of our foes.”

  CHAPTER 18

  KILLING TIME

  Radu caught the edge of the fountain before he could fall to the ground.

  Chaney looked for a loose stone or an unexpected step in the courtyard, but he saw none on the moon-dappled ground. The only obscuring shadows were those formed by the inky bodies of the other ten ghosts, who shuffled silently in a circle around the fountain. The usually nimble Radu Malveen had merely tripped over his own feet.

  “You don’t look so good,” said Chaney. “Maybe you should go lie down for a while.”

  In the four days since Radu’s cruel demonstration of his ire, Chaney felt his former antagonism returning. He told himself it was because no matter what he said, Radu would do as he pleased. In truth, he just couldn’t stop himself.

  Radu coughed, harsh and wet.

  His expression was unreadable beneath his mask, but his breath steamed above his high collar. When he tugged loose the laces and pulled the collar open, Chaney saw blood on the mask.

  “Nasty cold you have there.”

  Radu sat on the edge of the fountain. Even on that cold Alturiak night, water cascaded gently over the lips of the successively larger basins that rose above the reservoir. The enchantment was limited to the fountain, for the trees in this interior garden were nude with three months of cold Sembian winter. Lady Stellana Toemalar was famously stingy, so Chaney wagered himself that the spells that kept the water flowing were ancient remnants of a previous Toemalar’s fancy. Perhaps in its youth the magic had kept the entire garden alive throughout the bitter season.

  The entire courtyard was barely wider than an alley. While other families kept entire manor houses in Selgaunt to remain closer to their businesses, the tight-fisted Toemalar saw maintaining an additional household as an extravagance. While their holdings outside of Selgaunt were considerable, they maintained only a large tallhouse within the city. In fact, the edifice consisted of seven smaller, adjacent tallhouses forming a horseshoe around the center courtyard.

  Radu unclasped his mask and set it aside. He tugged his glove off with his teeth and wet his bare hand. He flicked cold drops on his shadowed face and carefully wiped the blood from the remains of his upper lip.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” said Chaney. “You’re thinking, ‘Damn and dark, but I wish I’d taken that wizard up on his offer to spirit me into the house.’ ”

  Radu spotted Chaney’s rippling image in the water.

  Chaney grinned at him.

  “Actually, I don’t blame you on that count. Magic hasn’t exactly been the boon of the Malveens, now, has it? Imagine how differently your life might have turned out if not for black sorcery.”

  Radu feigned interest in his toilet. He smoothed back his long, black hair.

  “Seriously, imagine it,” said Chaney. “Think of what might have been had you got rid of Stannis years earlier.”

  The remark jolted Radu into looking up where Chaney’s face should be. Moonlight reflected off the sharp, bright fragments of the bone blade that still jutted from his cheek and brow.

  “You know nothing.”

  “No?” said Chaney. “Still, there’s no harm in speculating. What if you had managed to restore the family wealth? What if you had never invited that mad pack of wolves into your old house? Do you think you would be killing old women for gold now?”

  “Be quiet, or else—”

  “Ah!” said Chaney. “That’s the thing, you see. I’ve been giving your ‘or else’ some thought. No matter what I do or say, you’re still killing the innocent.”

  “Not the innocent,” said Radu. “Not unless you disobey me.”

  “Yes, yes. That worked on me before, but not again. I’m already dead. I’m a dark and empty ghost, by Kelemvor! What use is pity to me? Why should I feel any worse when you murder some useless boy than when you kill the grand dame of the Toemalar? Nothing I do will stop you from killing someone.”

  “Perhaps next time I will choose a target more dear to you. Perhaps a friend.”

  “I would like to see you try that,” said Chaney. “The only friend I care about is the one man we both know can defeat you—just like he did before.”

  “He did not defeat—”

  “ ‘I’ve got one hand,’ ” said Chaney, waving at Radu through the fountain. “ ‘Not to mention this fashionable mask. I meet clients in the sewers because I enjoy the ambience, and if I dare not let anyone know I’m alive, it’s because I enjoy the air of mystery.’ ”

  Radu sat silently. At first, Chaney thought he was seething with anger, then he saw that the man’s body was perfectly relaxed. He looked so still that for a moment Chaney thought he might have died, then he saw the faint plumes of breath appear before the ragged holes that were once his nostrils.

  “Sorry, my old fellow. My point is not simply to mock you—though that has been a great comfort to me—it’s to help you.”

  Radu stared at Chaney’s reflection.

  “I know, I know, I’m too kind. Forgiving. Paragon of mercy and all that. Actually, it’s more a matter of necessity. You see, I think your injury has affected your ability to reason. Do you think part of that knife got down into your brain, perhaps?”

  “What?”

  “You must admit, the choices you’ve made these past months have been questionable to say the least. How do you expect to achieve the things you desire this way?”

  “What do you know of my desires?

  “Stop me when I go wrong. You want your crazy brother Pietro to stay clear of
the Hulorn and all the inter-family plotting among the Old Chauncel. Instead, you would like him to help big brother Laskar with the family business—and preferably not the kind of family business you and the late, unlamented Stannis were conducting. You would much rather they be legitimate, unimpeachable … honorable.”

  Chaney paused to watch Radu’s expression. Unfortunately, he’d lowered his face once more into the shadows.

  “You have done some damned wicked things, Malveen. There’s little doubt you’re bound to crawl through steaming dung in the Barrens of Doom and Despair when you die, but the last thing you want to do is drag the rest of your family down there with you. By the way, I notice you haven’t stopped me yet.”

  Radu didn’t reply. His gaze shifted from Chaney’s reflection to his own. It was only a black shape, but the ragged edges of his right cheek marred his silhouette. When he spoke at last, it was in a clear, soft voice.

  “What do you know about me?”

  “I saw your nasty little dungeon,” said Chaney. “I saw those pathetic wretches you murdered for your pleasure.”

  “They were warriors. Each of them had a chance to defeat me.”

  “After starving for how long under the care of that wretched eel you called a brother?”

  “They were recovering their strength befo—”

  Radu coughed again. As the spasm subsided, he lifted his mask, turned away, and spat something red.

  “Pretty,” observed Chaney.

  Radu wiped his shadow-shrouded mouth with his sleeve. He turned back toward Chaney’s reflection.

  “You think you know something of the city because you slept in the gutters for a few nights,” said Radu. “You have never seen its heart.”

  “Is this where you tell me how cruel Stellana Toemalar once had a girl beaten for bringing her cold tea? Or perhaps that you butchered Thuribal Baerodreemer because he irritated you, but that’s all right because he tortures house pets? Bugger all that. It doesn’t matter who you kill or what kind of people they are. You kill for sport. You kill for coin. The gods built whole worlds of pain for people like you.”