by Doris Egan
Ran was silent, the way he'd been with Eliana, neither confirming nor denying. I started to push against the heavy wooden door.
"Besides," I went on, "even if he weren't, I don't think I'd like to make an enemy of him."
Ran looked at me. I said, "Come on, you know it's true. If it comes down to alienating the Poraths or alienating Stereth Tar'krim—"
"Somebody mention my name?"
Stereth stood in the doorway, smiling in the midday sun.
"It's good to be remembered," he said. "I hope you were saying nice things."
Ran took a step backward that he probably wasn't even aware of, leaving me to say, "Hello, Stereth."
"Hello, Tymon." He called me by my old road name, and now that there was nobody to see, he bent and kissed me on the cheek. Then he glanced past me. "Ran. It was good to see you both yesterday." He reached behind to close the door, but I put a hand on his arm.
"Don't, please. I'd rather get some fresh air. I'm allergic to this place." I used the Ivoran word "aversion."
"Tymon, really? All the silver crepe getting you down?" His voice was not without sympathy. He was scary that way sometimes.
"Cats. I get stuffed up."
"My poor barbarian." He opened the heavy door easily, with one arm. He doesn't look that strong until you get to know him. Sunlight streamed in, with the musty smell of old wood from the porch and a faint perfumey scent from the garden.
I ducked under his arm and stepped outside, taking a long draught of uncontaminated air. Ran followed me out. Then Stereth joined us, shutting the door behind him. "I ought to wait for the house steward anyway. I hate to be rude. We can talk here."
Ran's feelings toward Stereth I can only describe as mixed, but certainly he'd always regarded Stereth's "talks" with unadulterated suspicion. He said quietly, "I suppose you're another one who wants to question us about the investigation."
"What investigation? I came to pay a condolence call."
We looked at him.
He said, "There has been a death, you know."
"Yes." Ran took a deep breath. "Jusik Porath asked us to look into it." Everyone did seem to know that fact anyway.
"Oh? Well, best of luck to you." His tone was uninterested. "Actually, I was wondering if I might speak to Tymon here alone."
There's nobody like Stereth for surprising the hell out of you. I had no idea what to say to that, and left it to Ran. He groped for a response. "I really don't see what—"
"Oh, come on, Sokol, humor me and wait under that coyu tree there. We all know she'll just stroll over to you shortly and repeat everything I've said."
Back in control, Ran said coolly, "Then why ask me to leave?"
"Because I'll feel less inhibited in my conversation. Now, please? For an old companion-of-the-road?"
The trouble with Stereth is that he's like a force of nature. He can say "please" all he wants, but you still have the feeling that if you disagree with him on something like this, a giant hand will reach out of heaven and move you over to the coyu tree anyway.
Still, he did say "please." And asked as a friend. Ran sighed and walked down the path to the tree. When he reached it, he turned and raised his hands as though to say, Well? What more do you want?
Stereth watched him with a look of affectionate familiarity. "He's not happy. He wasn't very happy in the Northwest Sector, either. I swear, Tymon, sometimes I wonder what you see in him."
"He's happy enough when you're not around, Stereth."
He chuckled. "Because you let him have things his own way, no doubt."
"Well, you would know about needing to have things your own way."
"Touche." Stereth spoke of Ran as one would of a troublesome younger brother. "But what I want to talk to you about is doing me a favor."
"Oh?"
"What a noncommittal sound after all we've been through together. What about 'Yes, Stereth, nothing you want can be too great?' "
"What did you have in mind?"
"Do you remember Keleen Van Gelder?"
I was disoriented for a moment, thinking he meant someone who'd been in the outlaw band, though it wasn't an Ivoran name. "I don't think I know the person."
"She's junior ambassador from Tellys. You saw her at the garden party and again on the boat." I frowned. He said, "A blond woman, handsome, in her forties or fifties. A bit taller than the average barbarian. She said she tried to speak to you but couldn't get your attention in the press of the crowd."
I flashed back to the woman with the blonde braid who'd stopped her conversation and stared at me. "Yes, I think I remember. I didn't know she was the Tellys ambassador."
"She wants to talk to you."
Another surprise. "Whatever for?"
"I have no idea. But I'm trying to make some Tellysian friends and I told her I'd get you to visit her."
Couldn't he tell her he'd ask me to visit her? Not and be Stereth, he couldn't. "Why do you want Tellysian friends?"
"I'm a friendly person. What about it, Theodora?"
"And you really don't know what she wants."
"I really don't. I'm just collecting a favor."
I considered it. An idea occurred. I said, "Listen here, companion-of-the-road. It's not customary to exchange favors within the same family, because it's assumed that all family members are working toward the same goals anyway."
"We're not in the same family."
"I'm not talking about you and me. I'll go see the junior ambassador—"
"Thank you."
"You'll owe me a favor. Hold onto it. Should you ever, in the future, be in a position where Ran owes you a favor, I want you to ask him to go visit the medical clinic of his wife's choosing, and take what tests she decrees."
For once I'd thrown Stereth off-stride. He repeated, "Medical clinic." Then he said, "Forgive my pointing this out, but as his wife you seem in a unique position to make this request yourself."
"I'll forgive you," I said. "Now do we have a deal?"
"We do." We clasped hands. Ran, down at the coyu tree, dug one foot in the ground impatiently.
I said, "I'll have to tell him about Van Gelder."
"I thought you would. I only wanted you alone because you'd be more likely to agree."
"No mention of our deal, though," I said warningly.
"No, I didn't think so."
I waved to Ran from the porch and he walked up the path, looking far from pleased.
Chapter 7
When the house steward had led Stereth away, Ran simply said, "If you've taken in enough lungfuls, we'd better get to the west wing."
I'd been so expecting him to launch into a cross-examination that it left me at a momentary loss, as no doubt he'd intended. Besides— "You mean the body? Now?"
"No better time. He'll be burnt by tomorrow."
Ugh. I followed him over the path to the west porch and up the step. The aroma of bitter incense was strong here, to drive away the evil spirits. (If you've never seen Ivoran death customs, I should mention that nobody on the entire planet takes these evil spirits seriously. Well, not entirely, anyway. Nobody omits the incense either. I suppose if you offered a bereaved family member a thousand tabals to dump the incense, they'd take the cash. But I don't think they'd be entirely comfortable about it.)
Silver streamers hung over the doorway. Having already been admitted to the house proper, there was no reason we couldn't step right in, but I hesitated. "Will there be people in there?" I asked.
"Possibly. Beloved family members are supposed to keep watch over the body."
And Coalis was reading a book, Eliana was working through her options, and Grandmother was sedated. "Maybe Jusik will be in there. He might not be thrilled at our monkeying around with the corpse. Especially since he's not sure you didn't kill him, anyway."
"Jusik will be too busy at a time like this," said Ran, and he pushed aside the streamers and opened the door.
The room was empty. I hoped for his sake that Kade's populari
ty in death didn't match that of life but I was begin-
ning to get the impression that it did. Except for Grandmother, of course, but they'd probably only wake her up for the funeral ceremony.
There was no coffin. Instead there was a flat board, like a wooden stretcher, set atop a heavy table. It being Kade Porath, first son of his House, the wood was a dark, carved mahogany, and the shallow silver incense bowls set on the floor at each of the four corners had the look of heirlooms. Kade's body was laid out on the board, wearing a suit of robes in gray, burgundy, and snow white. His head rested on a white satin pillow. Appearances had been maintained, I saw; somebody had been in to touch up his face with cosmetics and brush his hair. There is no embalming on Ivory, except for the occasional emperor. They consider it a repulsive custom, and about what one could expect of barbarians; the one or two people I'd asked about it had made disgusted faces, looked away, and changed the subject.
So much the better for us, anyway; aside from a little rouge and face powder, Kade was much the way he'd been when they fished him out of the canal. Ran went over at once and lifted the body's head, touching his thumbs to the base of Kade's chin. I found that I'd backed up as far as the ceremonial candlesticks lined against the wall.
"Come here, Theodora, give me a hand with this."
"Right." I walked over to the table, working for some normalcy in my stride. Theodora of Pyrene, I had no idea you were so squeamish.
—What did you expect? How many dead people have I seen? And I never had to touch any of them.
—You're seriously disappointing me. This is disgraceful. You're just not living up to my image of you.
—Time you found out the truth, then.
I get schizoid sometimes in moments of stress. Bear with it, you'll probably see it happen again.
I ignored the sense of repulsion and put my hands where Ran indicated, turning Kade's head to one side while Ran rubbed Kade's earlobe between his fingers, as though testing a lettuce leaf.
"The doorways of the senses," said Ran softly. "This is where traces of tampering can usually be found."
I grunted. Something about the situation made conversa-
tion difficult for me. And what did he mean by "usually?" Were there forensic sorcerers on this planet who made a career of this sort of thing? There are definitely gaps in my education, but I'm never aware of what they are till I trip over them.
He ran his little finger over Kade's lips. The finger came away red.
I said, "Does that mean anything?"
"Lip rouge," he said.
He pulled the corners of Kade's eyes back and peered into each one.
"So," he said, "What did Stereth want?"
"What?"
"What did the Minister for Provincial Affairs want with you, tymon?"
"Oh. He wanted me to meet somebody. Keleen Van Gelder, the junior ambassador from Tellys."
Ran's glance flicked to my face, then returned to the corpse at hand. "Let the head down, sweetheart. Now pull up the sleeve of the outerrobe. Why does he want you to see the ambassador?"
"I'm not sure. He wants the Tellysians to like him, and Van Gelder asked to meet me. He said he'd arrange it as a courtesy."
"No, hold it all the way back. I want to see the complete arm. What about Van Gelder? Why does he want to meet you?"
"She. Keleen's a female name. And Stereth says he doesn't know."
The glance flicked upward again. "Do you believe him?"
I shrugged. "Who knows? He sounds sincere. And I can't see any harm in a simple meeting."
"You mean you already agreed?"
"Well, yes."
Ran sighed. "I knew he wanted me to stand under that tree for some reason."
I was relieved. Ran thought he'd found the secret at the heart of the conversation, which meant he wouldn't keep pressing.
He said, "Was that the whole matter?"
"Pretty much."
"Pretty much?"
"Yes, that was whole matter. You get a little touchy around Stereth, you know."
"Sorry." He held Kade's right hand with one hand of his own, and pulled Kade's thumb with the other. I know a tinaje massage-healing type move that's exactly the same, but Kade was in no shape to appreciate it. I shifted my grip on the corpse, let a handkerchief drop out of my sleeve, caught it with the same hand, blew my nose, returned the handkerchief, and grabbed Kade again.
I said, "Are we going to have to cut him open?"
"Possibly. A little bit. We may need to take some samples."
Suddenly he threw down the hand. "Ow!"
"What, what's the matter?"
"Kanz!" He reached out slowly toward the hand, and very tentatively touched the massive ring on Kade's third finger. "Yow!" He drew back again as though he'd taken an electric shock. He stepped backward from the corpse and met my eyes. "It's the ring."
"What about the ring?"
"It's cursed."
I blinked. That was interesting. I'd traveled up and down the coast for weeks once carrying a cursed deck of cards and I'd never gotten any electric shocks from it. I reached toward the ring.
"Don't touch it." Suddenly Ran's fingers were circling my wrist.
"Come on, what am I going to do; vanish in a puff of smoke? Go swimming in the fountain outside?"
His face was stubborn. "We make no assumptions till I've had a chance to study it."
He was serious. I put my hand down. Instead I bent over the table and examined the ring visually: A large blue stone set in silver, etched with vine leaves around the setting. There were more designs etched in the band, but I couldn't see them properly because Kade's fingers were in the way. Probably there were characters inside, too; it looked like some kind of family-crest sort of thing. I'd have to pull the ring off to really tell. But apparently that was a no-no.
"If we can't touch it, how do we get it off?"
He said, "Did you bring extra handkerchiefs?"
"In this House of Hell? Of course." I went through the pouch on my belt, pulled out a clean one and gave it to him.
He grasped the ring with the handkerchief and pulled it off Kade's finger. Then he let the ring's weight settle in the center of the cloth like the contents of a small jewelry bag and tied a knot with the corners. He hefted the small package: "There. Most likely it only affects the one who wears it, but no harm in being careful." He smiled. "This is unexpected good fortune. The curse is still operational; we can trace it back to the sorcerer who placed it. Someone's been careless."
I said, slowly, "Too careless?"
He was silent for a moment. "One would think that a murder-curse would be constructed to discharge itself and dissipate, not stay tied to an object like any normal spell. That's how I would do it. But who can say what's 'too careless,' with all the incompetence that's loose in the world?" He added, "When I say that's how I'd do it, I mean of course if I performed the assassination as some public spectacle, which I would never do." Ran's personal curse, his sense of professional pride, required him to point this out any number of times in the course of the investigation.
I realized I was still holding Kade's arm. I laid it down. "Do we still have to cut him up?"
"What? Oh. No, we've got what we need." He slipped the tiny bundle into his pocket. "Let's see if the house steward can identify Kade's ring."
"Ran, for heaven's sake, we can't just leave."
"Why not?" He seemed genuinely puzzled.
I waved toward the table. It looked as though some nec-rophiliac had been having a go at the body. "The family, Ran. Do you want them to walk in on this?"
"Oh." He came over and helped me tidy Kade's robes.
I said, "Damn, you smeared the lip paint when you were touching his face."
"I don't know what I can do about that at this point." He wiped some of the smear with a corner of his sleeve. The lip paint was half on and half off, giving Kade a vamp-iric look. Appropriate to his profession, perhaps, but nothing his family would appreciate.
<
br /> "Wait a sec." I opened my pouch, pulled out the tiny brush and pot Kylla'd given me and started applying rouge to his lips.
"What in the name of all the gods are you doing?"
"I'm being polite, damn it." Kylla'd chosen the shade carefully for my barbarian coloring; it didn't go with Kade, but he'd have to live with it. So to speak. "There." I looked at the tiny pot and brush before tucking them away. "I never want to use these again."
Ran sighed. "Your constant acquisition of new skills amazes me. May we go search out the steward now?"
I glanced over the table, the body, the incense holders, the candlesticks. Everything seemed appropriate. I blew my nose a final time. "Of course."
On being summoned, the steward met us at the front door again, not fazed in the least by our reappearance. Ran untied the knot in his handkerchief and displayed the ring. "Is this familiar to you?"
The steward studied it for a second, then said, "No."
It took us both aback. Ran said, "It was on Kade's body."
"Ah. I was told he'd been found wearing a ring. The servants who took care of the matter said that his fingers were somewhat bloated at the time; we thought it best to leave the ring where it was." He paused an impeccable pause that said Is there some problem?
Ran said, "But you've never seen it before."
"Not to my knowledge, gracious sir."
"If this belonged to Kade, would you necessarily know?"
"If he were in the habit of wearing it, I would. I'm also familiar with the contents of his jewelry box upstairs, and this was never in it."
That was a little unsettling. Did the servants at Cormal-lon know what was in my jewelry box?
The steward went on, "I can't answer for whether he might not have kept it elsewhere, or only just bought it." Ran was retying the knot in the handkerchief, and the steward said, "Excuse me, gracious sir, but are you planning to take the ring away with you?"
"Actually, I was."
The steward coughed. "I'm afraid I'll have to ask for a receipt, sir."
"Oh. Of course." And then we all stood around for a few minutes while paper was obtained and the steward wrote out a description: "One ring, blue cadite, silver setting, etched with vine leaves on the outer band and the words 'Daring and Prudent' on the inner.' "
