“Uhhh. I can’t wait?”
I took a last look at the poor creature I’d just killed, then turned away.
Well done, Vlad. You lived. You’ve also almost certainly pissed off a few people as soon as they find the big white naked, ugly dead guy. I wasn’t sure there was anyone left in the place I had any reason to be afraid of, but I couldn’t be completely sure there wasn’t either.
I went back and stood in front of the mirrors. I had dried blood on the side of my face, and it looked like I was developing a black eye.
“Boss, you’re beautiful.”
“Shut up.”
I checked to see if my hands were shaking. Is it strange that I needed to look? Anyway, they weren’t shaking much. I was convinced these mirrors were the answer, or at least a big part of it. That when I’d struck one with Lady Teldra I’d been transported to Verra’s Halls, and that the beast had come after me, seemed like good evidence that I was right.
“Boss? Any ideas?”
“No. You?”
“Yeah. Let’s just kill everyone we meet and see if that does anything.”
“Not the dancer. I liked her.”
“You’re getting soft.”
I looked over at the body. Did I need to hide it? I wasn’t sure how I could, but did I need to? No, I guess of all the ways things could go down, being arrested for that particular murder was the least likely.
And no one was here anyway—
The door I’d just closed opened. I pressed myself against a wall and let a dagger drop into my hand, and I waited.
And stick me with flags and call me a fair if three servants, each holding a tray of food, didn’t come walking out, cool as you please, as if emerging from a room full of mirrors were the most natural way in the world to serve dinner. They didn’t turn around, they didn’t appear to see the dead lump of monster not twenty feet away from them; they just went down the spiral stair, not marching, but walking at the same pace; there was almost an air of ritual about it. I moved so I could keep watching as they went out the door of the ballroom.
“Boss? What—?”
“I have no idea. Don’t even ask.”
“But you remember those three—”
“I remember.”
I went back down the stairway and out the door, catching sight of them as they turned a corner. I stayed a good distance back and followed the long twisty path. Two of the servants stopped in the kitchen; the third continued on. As I passed the kitchen I heard voices: the servants, then, taking their meal. I reached the passage to the first corridor I’d come to and stuck my head around as the servant went into the room where Zhayin had been.
So, that’s why the kitchen was empty: the food was brought in from the other place. From the past. They cooked food in the past and brought it to the present. Sure, why not? Why had I never done that? Everyone should do that.
“Loiosh, have I gone completely down the well?”
“Maybe.”
“Thanks.”
I tried to put the stuff Verra had told me out of my head, because it wasn’t helping me with this.
It was tempting to just go rushing in and have a talk with Zhayin, demand some answers. But I wasn’t sure he’d give them to me, and then I’d probably get mad and kill him, and besides, it’s rude to interrupt someone’s dinner.
I went back to the little room just before the ballroom and shut the door behind me. Finally, I was doing something I was good at, had done before, and was confident I could do with quiet competence: waiting. It was most of an hour, but then I heard the footsteps, the same slow, deliberate pace.
I waited until they were past me, then stuck my head out, and, yes, all three were there, bringing the dirty dishes and leftovers back to the past, to clean the dishes and give the leftovers to the kethna or the other servants. Once they were past me, I waited for another minute, then followed them from a good distance. I was just coming up the stairs when they coolly disappeared once more into the mirror room. They still hadn’t realized there was a body there.
I hesitated after they’d passed; there were a couple of ways to play this from here, but I knew what I wanted to do. There had been something nagging at me for a while, and, even if it wasn’t part of the big picture, I wanted to get it settled.
I gave myself some time to come up with reasons not to—almost a whole second—then I went back and around and poked my head back into the room where I’d gotten my meal the day before. There was a rope hanging there, vanishing into a hole in the ceiling. I pulled it.
In under a minute, Harro appeared and bowed. “My lord,” he said. “How may I serve you?”
“Just a little conversation, if you wouldn’t mind.”
“Not in the least.”
“Would you like to sit?”
“I should prefer to stand, if I may, my lord.”
“That’s fine.”
I sat down and stretched out my legs.
“What did you wish to discuss, my lord?”
“Hevlika.”
I was watching closely; there was definitely a tightening around his jaw as he attempted not to react.
“What did you wish to know, sir?”
Remember when I was talking about how you need to use different means to get different people talking? Well, sometimes you need different means to get the same person talking, if it’s on different subjects. Let’s take Harro, for example: an Issola, a butler; he was all about duty. He’d rather die than violate his duty, which made it a question of turning it around, so that one aspect of his duty required him to violate another. When it was a personal matter, and didn’t violate his duty, that was entirely different, requiring an alternate form of negotiation.
I drew the dagger from my right side. It was big, as knives go, really more fighting knife than dagger, what with the wide blade curving wickedly down to the point for the last four inches—it’s the sort of knife that makes one think of long gashes in the torso with entrails falling out of them. Most of us don’t care for images like that applied to our person.
I held it loosely in my hand, thumb and forefinger at the crossguard, letting it bounce up and down like a snake looking for where to strike.
“Tell me about you and Hevlika.”
His eyes were wide, and on the knife, which was where I wanted them. I waited for a little while as his mouth, which seemed to have lost all connection to the rest of him, did a credible imitation of a fish.
“Maybe you’d like to sit down?” I said.
He sat on the bed and continued looking at the knife. At last he managed, “How did you know?”
I shook my head. “You’re confused about who is asking questions and who is answering them. I”—I pointed the knife at my chest—“am asking. You”—I pointed the knife at him—“are answering. Start answering now.”
“I…”
“Yes. You. Good. Good start. You and Hevlika. What’s the connection?”
“I’ll … I’ll call for help.”
“I don’t think I believe you, Harro. I don’t think you’re capable of generating a sound much louder than a whimper. But if you want, sure. I’m not sure who you’re expecting to rescue you, though. That monster that used to be Zhayin’s son is lying up on the balcony above the ballroom, getting cold and waiting for the excitement of its body getting rigid. As for Discaru, I believe I managed to send him back to whatever strange, unreal place spawned him, although I could be wrong. But if you want to try anyway, go ahead. I’ll only cut you twice for each scream, and only one of those will be on your pretty face.”
He stared at me.
I tapped the flat of the blade against my palm and gave him a few seconds to consider his options. He looked at the door and I chuckled. “No, I don’t think that’s a good idea.” He turned his attention back to the knife.
“We were.…”
“Yes. You were?”
“I’m in love with her.”
“Yeah? How’d that work out for you?”
“She hates me.”
“Where’d you meet?”
“I had occasion to accompany my lord to the dance, and I saw her.”
“Uh-huh. You saw her. Onstage.”
He nodded.
“And then, what? You decided she was destined to be your true love?”
“I—you make it sound pitiful.”
“No, pitiful is how you arranged for Gormin to be expelled from the House, just to get him out of the way.”
“Out of the way? I had no idea they were involved!”
As he said that, he took his eyes from the knife and looked at my face. I believed him.
“So, it was just to get his job? You made up the part about them being involved, had no idea it was true, and used it so you could get his job to be close to her? Really?”
He looked down again, at the floor now, not the knife. I took it as a yes.
“How long have you known that you’re a complete moron?”
“About two hundred years.”
“Here’s what I don’t get—no, here’s one of about a thousand things I don’t get. How is it that, back then, after you’d managed to get Gormin’s job by being a slimy worm with no more decency than your basic suckerfish, Hevlika never saw you? I mean, never even knew you were there?”
“How did you—”
I smacked the flat of the blade against my hand. He swallowed and changed his mind. “That was at Lord Zhayin’s orders, my lord.”
“But how?”
“It wasn’t difficult. I stayed away from the theater, and from her chambers. She never mingled. Back then, she either saw Lord Zhayin, or she’d visit the village.”
“That’s it?”
“Yes, my lord.”
“How long did that go on?”
“It wasn’t long, my lord. Only until the manor could be occupied, which was less than a hundred years ago. Most of the time has been spent working on the sorcery, you know, not the construction. Once the household—that is, Lord Zhayin, and Lord Discaru, and Gormin, and Odelpho, had taken up occupancy here, he no longer minded. That’s when Hevlika and I actually met.”
I nodded. “Good. Down to nine hundred and ninety nine.”
“My lord?”
I shook my head. “Then answer me this: Why?”
“Why what, my lord?”
“Why didn’t Zhayin want the two of you to meet?”
“I don’t know, my lord.”
“Um. Humor me. Take a guess. I won’t hold it against you if you’re wrong. I’m holding so much against you now there’s no more room anyway.”
He spread his hands.
“Why?” I repeated.
He looked thoughtful. “I don’t know, but, well, he was very secretive about everything in those days. He was always careful who spoke to whom, and we suspect that Discaru would sometimes cast listening spells on us. Perhaps it was part of that?”
“Huh,” I said. “And he isn’t like that anymore?”
“It’s different now,” he said.
“Go on.”
“Now he just tries to limit the intercourse between here and the old castle. The servants who bring the food are all deaf, and those of us here are forbidden to journey back there. I wouldn’t know how to, but I know it’s done, because of the food.”
“So, that’s why there are no guards here. He doesn’t want to bring them from the past. But then, why not hire some from here and now? And cooks as well?”
“I don’t know, my lord. Maybe he will. It’s only just been finished.”
“All right,” I said. “I think I’ve gotten as much from you as I can.”
“What are you going to do with me, my lord?”
I shrugged. “I should probably kill you, you know. Just to put you out of your misery.”
He made no response whatsoever.
“Are you inclined to live, Harro?”
“My lord?” He swallowed. “Yes, my lord.”
“Good. Because I’m not going anywhere. Well, I mean, I am, I’m leaving this place as soon as I figure out how. But I’ll still be in the area. And if, by chance, someone starts taking legal action to become reinstated in his House, and if in the process you’re questioned, you’ll cooperate, and you won’t lie. Because if you lie, you die. Is there an understanding between us?”
“Yes, my lord.”
“Good. Okay, tell me something else, then. Why did you stay? To be near her, because you liked the work, or just inertia?”
“All of those, I think,” he told the floor between his feet.
The floor didn’t seem impressed.
I looked at him; he avoided looking at me. “Never mind,” I said. “I think you’ve managed to make yourself more miserable than anything I could do. Go be miserable. Don’t say anything, just get out of here, and do whatever it is you do. If I want anything, I’ll ring.”
He didn’t even say “Yes, my lord,” which might give you an idea of what kind of shape he was in.
The door closed behind him. I hoped this would all be over soon; I was hungry.
16
ON THE NIGHT OF THE SURLY MOOD
I gave Harro time to get clear, then left the room and made my way back to the ballroom, then up to the balcony, and to the door to the theater. I stood in front of it, took a breath, and opened it.
And I was sitting down.
That transition was one of the hardest to get used to. I wasn’t in the same seat as before, but almost; maybe one forward and two to the side or something. That, by itself, would mean a great deal to someone who wasn’t me.
There was no sign of Hevlika, so I settled in to wait. I’m not sure why I was so convinced that sooner or later she would show up, but I was, and in maybe a bit less than half an hour, she did; just walking onto the stage. She noticed me at once, because she always noticed her audience. She’d said so.
She jumped down from the stage, walked up, and sat down in the chair next to me. As per protocol, she stared straight ahead.
“You really don’t recognize me?” I said.
“Of course I do. You were here yesterday.”
“I mean from before.”
“I don’t understand.”
“We met before, at a house called the Seven Jewels.”
She frowned for a minute, then turned and looked at me. “That was you?”
I nodded.
She scrutinized my face with no sign of recognition—maybe we really do all look the same. Then she glanced at my left hand, and said, “Yes, I remember.”
I nodded.
“How is it possible?”
“It’s complicated.”
“But Easterners—”
She broke off.
“Yeah,” I said. “We don’t generally live that long. I cheated.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I don’t either, entirely. But that conversation we had a few hundred years ago? That was a few hours ago for me.”
“The manor.”
“Yeah.”
“Who are you?”
“Vladimir Taltos, Count of Szurke by the grace of Her Majesty, former Jhereg, current traveler, nehixta, and connoisseur of fine food and drink.”
“I don’t recognize that one word. Is it Serioli?”
“No, one of the languages of the cat-centaurs. I was called that once. She translated it to ‘one who cuts himself twice on the same knife.’”
“It doesn’t sound like a compliment.”
“I got the feeling it was mostly used of children who won’t learn to stay out of things they should leave alone. Somewhere I’m sure there is a desecrator who could explain the full cultural significance and get it entirely wrong.”
“I don’t recall much of our last conversation. Just that you asked a lot of questions.”
“And I warned you not to trust Harro.”
She frowned. “Yes, I sort of remember that. I know I don’t trust him.”
“He’s the one who got Gormin exp
elled from the House of the Issola.”
She turned and looked at me again, and this time didn’t look away. “Why would he do that?”
“He’s in love with you.”
The look on her face was mostly disgust, with an overlay of disbelief. I turned my head so I was facing the stage and waited while it sank in.
“Why are you telling me this?”
“To be honest, I’m not entirely sure. It seemed like something you should know. Besides, I sort of liked Gormin before he drugged me and tried to interrogate me.”
“I can’t believe he’d do that.”
“He was acting under orders.”
“When did this happen?”
“A few hundred years ago. Or earlier today, depending on how you look at it.”
“Gormin,” she said. “He…”
“Is it hard, living under the same roof as him?”
She cleared her throat and turned back to the stage. “That’s a little personal.”
“We got more personal than that, back before.”
“Did we? I don’t remember. And I can’t think why I would.”
“Neither can I. It didn’t seem very Issola-like.”
“Perhaps that was close to”—she looked for the words to get around saying what she didn’t want to say—“to when things happened with Gormin. I wasn’t myself, then. What is it?”
“Hmmm? What is what?”
“Your fingers are twitching.”
I looked at them and made them stop. “I feel like killing someone, but there’s no one I’m sure needs killing. Harro’s a bastard, but not enough of one for me to put a knife into his eye.”
“I … can’t imagine what that must feel like.”
“Really? You can’t? You’ve never been angry?”
“Well, yes, of course I’ve been angry.”
“That’s what it feels like.”
“All right.”
We didn’t speak for a little while after that.
“Back then,” she said at last. “Did you ever explain what you were doing?”
“Sort of.”
“Want to try again? If I can help you, I will.”
“All right. Do you know about the mirrors?”
“The practice room? Of course. I work out there every day.”
“No, the other mirror room.”
“Oh. I’m not to go in there.”