“Sorry, chum.”
I stretched myself out, enjoying the feeling that there was blood circulating, and all those other good things.
“I can’t tell you how happy I was when those two let me know that they weren’t going to kill each other, though,” I summed up.
“Hmmmmph!” said Aliera. “You sure couldn’t tell us then. You were too busy going down for the third time.”
“Was it that close?” I asked.
“It was that close.”
I shuddered. Cawti stroked my forehead, gently.
“It works both ways, I guess. I was also mightily pleased to see that you made it after all. I didn’t tell you before, but I was plenty worried about that whole business,” I said.
“You were worried!” said Aliera.
“I still don’t understand that, Aliera,” said Kragar, who, I discovered, had been sitting next to her the entire time. “How is it that you survived the Morganti dagger?”
“Just barely,” said Aliera.
He shook his head. “When you first went over it, you said it would work out, but you never said how.”
“Why? Do you want to try it? I don’t really recommend having your soul eaten as a form of entertainment.”
“Just curious . . .”
“Well, basically, it has to do with the nature of Great Weapons. Pathfinder is linked to me, which really means it’s linked to my soul. When the dagger threatened to destroy me, Pathfinder acted to preserve me by drawing my soul into itself. When the threat was gone, I was able to return to my body. And, of course, we had the Necromancer standing by, just in case there were problems.”
She looked thoughtful for a moment. “It is an interesting perspective from in there,” she remarked.
“It is a rather frightening one from out here,” put in Morrolan. “I thought we’d lost you.”
Aliera smiled at him. “I’m not that easy to get rid of, cousin.”
“In any case,” I said. “It all worked out.”
“Yes,” said Morrolan. “I would imagine that you did rather well for yourself out of the affair.”
“In more ways than one,” I said.
“I suppose,” said Morrolan.
I shook my head. “It isn’t just the obvious. It seems that certain parties were quite pleased with the return of the gold, in addition to everything else. I’ve been given responsibility for a somewhat larger area.”
“Yeah,” said Kragar, “and you didn’t even have to ask your friend to kill anyone for it.”
I let that pass.
“I should point out, though,” said Kragar, “that, in actual fact, you don’t have anymore responsibility than you did before.”
“I don’t?”
“Nope. You just make more money. I’m the one with more responsibility. Who do you think does all the work, anyway?”
“Loiosh,” I answered.
Kragar snorted. Loiosh hissed a laugh.
“You are hereby forgiven, boss.”
“Lucky me.”
Morrolan was looking puzzled. “Speaking of the gold reminds me of something. How did you discover where it was?”
“Daymar took care of it,” I told him. “Just before Mellar teleported me out, Daymar did a mind-probe on him. It was the only time he could have had a chance of succeeding, with Mellar completely disoriented. He caught him with his psychic pants down, you might say. Daymar found out where he had hidden the gold and found out about the arrangements he’d made for the information about the Dzur to get out. And, of course, it was the mind-probe itself that finally broke down Mellar and sent him into a panic.”
“Oh,” said Morrolan, “so you did find out about the information he had on the Dzur.”
“Yep,” I said. “And we suppressed it.”
“How did you do that?” asked Morrolan.
I looked over at Kragar, who had actually handled the matter. He smiled a little.
“It wasn’t difficult,” he said. “Mellar had given it to a friend of his in a sealed envelope. We picked up this friend, brought him to the dock where we’d dumped Mellar’s body, and pointed out to him that there was no reason for him to keep the thing anymore. We talked a little, and he ended up agreeing.”
Best not to know anymore, I decided.
“What I don’t understand,” Kragar continued, “is why you didn’t want the information to come out, Vlad. What difference does it make to us?”
“There were a couple of reasons for it,” I told him. “For one thing, I made it clear to a few Dzurlords I know that I was doing it. It never hurts to have Dzur heroes owe you favors. And the other reason was that Aliera would have killed me if I hadn’t.”
Aliera smiled a little, but didn’t deny it.
“So, Vlad,” said Morrolan, “are you going to retire, now that you are wealthy? You could certainly buy a castle out of town and turn properly decadent if you chose to. I’d be curious. I’ve never had the pleasure of seeing a decadent Easterner.”
I shrugged. “I may buy a castle somewhere, since Cawti’s been wanting one, and now we can afford a few luxuries like a higher title in the Jhereg, but I doubt I’ll retire.”
“Why not?”
“You’re rich. Are you retiring?” I asked him.
He snorted. “From what should I retire? I’ve been professionally decadent for as long as I can remember.”
“Well, there is that . . . Say!”
“Yes?”
“How about if we both retire! What do you think about selling Castle Black? I can give you a good price on it.”
“Depend on it,” he said.
“Oh, well. Just asking.”
“Seriously, though, Vlad; have you ever thought about quitting the Jhereg? I mean, you don’t really need them anymore, do you?”
“Ha! I’ve thought about quitting the Jhereg a great deal, but so far I’ve always managed to be just a little bit quicker than whoever wanted me out.”
“Or luckier,” said Kragar.
I shrugged. “As for leaving voluntarily, I don’t know.”
Morrolan looked at me carefully. “You don’t actually enjoy what you do, do you?”
I didn’t answer, not really knowing at the time. I mean, did I? Especially now, when my biggest reason, my hatred for all things Dragaeran, turned out not to have the cause I had thought it did. Or did it?
“You know, Aliera,” I said, “I’m still not really sure about this genetic inheritance through the soul. I mean, sure, I felt something for it, but I also lived through what I lived through, and I guess that shaped me more than you’d think. I am what I am, in addition to what I was. Do you understand what I mean?”
Aliera didn’t answer; she just looked at me, her face unreadable. An uncomfortable silence settled over the room, as we all sat there with our thoughts. Kragar studied the floor, Cawti caressed my forehead, Morrolan seemed to be looking around for another subject.
He found one, finally, and broke the silence by saying, “There is still a thing that I fail to understand, concerning you and Rocza.”
“What is that?” I asked, as relieved as everyone else.
He studied the floor in front of the couch. “Exactly how do you plan on housebreaking her?”
I felt myself going red as the odor reached my nose, and Morrolan wryly called for his servants.
YENDI
When I was young, I was taught that every citizen of the Dragaeran Empire was born into one of the seventeen Great Houses, each named for an animal. I was taught that humans, or “Easterners,” such as I, were worthless scum. I was taught that the only choices we had, if we wished to amount to anything, were to swear fealty to some lord and become part of the peasant class in the House of the Teckla, or, as my father did, buy Orders of Nobility in the House of the Jhereg.
Later, I found a wild jhereg, and trained him, and set about to leave my mark on Dragaeran society.
When I was older, I learned that most of what I had been taught were lies.
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1
“Stay out of sight, in case they get rude.”
KRAGAR SAYS THAT LIFE is like an onion, but he doesn’t mean the same thing by it that I do.
He talks about peeling it, and how you can go deeper and deeper, until finally you get to the center and nothing is there. I suppose there’s truth in that, but in the years when my father ran a restaurant, I never peeled an onion, I chopped them; Kragar’s analogy doesn’t do much for me.
When I say that life is like an onion, I mean this: if you don’t do anything with it, it goes rotten. So far, that’s no different from other vegetables. But when an onion goes bad, it can do it from either the inside, or the outside. So sometimes you get one that looks good, but the core is rotten. Other times, you can see a bad spot on it, but if you cut that out, the rest is fine. Tastes sharp, but that’s what you paid for, isn’t it?
Dzurlords like to fancy themselves as pantry chefs who go around cutting the rotten parts out of onions. Trouble is, they generally can’t tell the good from the bad. Dragonlords are good at finding bad spots, but when they find one they like to throw out the whole barrelful. A Hawklord will find a bad spot every time. He’ll watch you cook the thing, and eat it, and he’ll nod sagaciously when you spit it out again. If you ask why he didn’t tell you about it, he’ll look startled and say, “You didn’t ask.”
I could go on, but what’s the point? In the House Jhereg, we don’t care teckla droppings about bad spots. We’re just here to sell onions.
But sometimes someone will pay me to remove a bad spot. This had earned me thirty-two hundred gold Imperials that day, and to let the tension drain out I visited the more or less permanent party at the keep of the Lord Morrolan. I was sort of on his staff, as a security consultant, which gave me a standing invitation.
Lady Teldra let me in as I recovered from the teleport and I made my way to the banquet hall. I studied the mass of humanity (I use the term loosely) from the doorway, looking for familiar faces, and soon spotted the tall form of Morrolan himself.
Guests who didn’t know me watched as I moved toward him; some made remarks intended for me to overhear. I always attract attention at Morrolan’s parties—because I’m the only Jhereg there; because I’m the only “Easterner” (read: “human”) there; or because I walk in with my jhereg familiar, Loiosh, riding on my shoulder.
“Nice party,” I told Morrolan.
“Where are the trays of dead teckla, then?” said Loiosh psionically.
“Thank you, Vlad. It pleases me that you are here.”
Morrolan always talks like that. I think he can’t help it.
We wandered over to a table where one of his servants was pouring out small draughts of various wines, commenting on them as he did. I got a glass of red Darloscha and sipped it. Nice and dry, but it would have been better chilled. Dragaerans don’t understand wine.
“Good evening, Vlad; Morrolan.”
I turned and bowed low to Aliera e’Kieron, Morrolan’s cousin and Dragon Heir to the Throne. Morrolan bowed and squeezed her hand. I smiled. “Good evening, Aliera. Any duels, yet?”
“Why yes,” she said. “Did you hear?”
“As a matter of fact, no; I was being facetious. You really do have a duel lined up?”
“Yes, for tomorrow. Some teckla of a Dzurlord noticed how I walk and made remarks.”
I shook my head and tsked. “What’s his name?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. I’ll find out tomorrow. Morrolan, have you seen Sethra?”
“No. I assume she is at Dzur Mountain. Perhaps she will show up later. Is it important?”
“Not really. I think I’ve isolated a new e’Mondaar recessive. It’ll wait.”
“I am interested,” said Morrolan. “Would you be pleased to tell me of it?”
“I’m not sure what it is yet . . .” said Aliera. The two of them walked off. Well, Morrolan walked. Aliera, who was the shortest Dragaeran I’ve ever met, levitated, her long, silver-blue dress running along the ground to hide the fact. Aliera had golden hair and green eyes—usually. Although she wasn’t carrying it now, she also had a sword that was longer than she was. She had taken it from the hand of Kieron the Conquerer, the head of her line, in the Paths of the Dead. There’s a story in there, too, but never mind.
Anyway, they walked away, and I drew on my link with the Imperial Orb, did a small sorcery spell, and chilled the wine. I sipped it again. Much better.
“The problem for tonight, Loiosh, is: how am I going to get laid?”
“Boss, sometimes you disgust me.”
“Tell me about it.”
“Aside from that, if you own four brothels—”
“I’ve decided I don’t like visiting brothels.”
“Eh? Why not?”
“You wouldn’t understand.”
“Try me.”
“All right. Put it this way: sex with Dragaerans feels more than half like bestiality, anyway. With whores, it feels like paying the . . . whatever.”
“Go on, boss. Finish the sentence. Now I’m curious.”
“Oh, shut up.”
“What is it about killing someone that makes you so horny, anyway?”
“Got me.”
“You need a wife.”
“Go to Deathsgate.”
“We did that once, remember?”
“Yeah. And I remember how you felt about the giant jhereg there.”
“Don’t start on that, boss.”
“Then shut up about my sex life.”
“You brought it up.”
There was nothing to say to that, so I let it drop. I sipped my wine again, and felt that peculiar, nagging sensation of there’s-something-I-ought-to-be-thinking-about that heralds someone trying to reach me psionically. I quickly found a quiet corner and opened up my mind for contact.
“How’s the party, boss?”
“Not bad, Kragar. What’s up that can’t wait for morning?”
“Your bootblack is here. He’s going to be made Issola Heir to the Throne tomorrow, so he’s finishing up his calls.”
“Funny. What is it really?”
“A question. Did you open up a new gambling joint in Malak Circle?”
“Of course not. You’d have heard about it long ago.”
“That’s what I thought. Then there’s a problem.”
“I see. Some punk thinking we won’t notice? Or is somebody trying to muscle in?”
“It looks professional, Vlad. He’s got protection there.”
“How many?”
“Three. And I know one of them. He’s done ‘work.’”
“Oh.”
“What do you think?”
“Kragar, you know how a chamber pot gets when it isn’t emptied for a few days?”
“Yeah?”
“And you know how, when you finally do empty it, there’s all that stuff stuck on the bottom?”
“Yeah?”
“Well, that stuff on the bottom is how I feel about this.”
“Gotcha.”
“I’ll be right over.”
I found Morrolan in a corner with Aliera and a tall Dragaeran who had the facial features of the House of the Athyra and was dressed all in forest green. She looked down at me, figuratively and literally. It’s frustrating being both a Jhereg and an Easterner—people sneer at you for both reasons.
“Vlad,” said Morrolan, “this is the Sorceress in Green. Sorceress, this is Baronet Vladimir Taltos.”
She nodded, almost imperceptibly. I bowed with a deep flourish, dragging the back of my hand over the floor, bringing it up over my head, and saying, “Gentle lady, I am every bit as charmed to meet you as you are to meet me.”
She sniffed and looked away.
Aliera’s eyes were twinkling.
Morrolan looked troubled, then shrugged.
“Sorceress in Green,” I said. “I’ve never met an Athyra who wasn’t a sorcerer, and the green I can see, so I can’t say the title tells me—”
/>
“That will be sufficient, Vlad,” said Morrolan. “And she isn’t—”
“Sorry. I wanted to tell you that something’s come up. I’m afraid I’ll have to leave.” I turned to the Sorceress. “I’m sorry to do this to you, my dear, but try not to let it ruin your evening.”
She looked back at me and smiled sweetly. “How would you,” she said, “like to be a newt?”
Loiosh hissed.
“I asked you to desist, Vlad,” said Morrolan sharply.
I dropped it. “I’ll be leaving, then,” I said, bowing my head.
“Very well. If there’s anything I can do, let me know.”
I nodded. Unfortunately for him, I remembered the remark.
* * *
Do you know what the single biggest difference between a Dragaeran and an Easterner is? It isn’t that they are so much taller and stronger than we are; I’m living proof that size and strength aren’t that important. It isn’t that they live two or three thousand years compared to our fifty or sixty; in the crowd I hang around with, no one expects to die of old age anyway. It isn’t even that they have a natural link with the Imperial Orb that allows them to use sorcery; Easterners (such as my late, unlamented father) can buy titles in the House of the Jhereg, or swear fealty to some noble, move out to the countryside and become a Teckla—thereby becoming citizens and getting the link.
No, the biggest difference that I’ve found is this: a Dragaeran can teleport without feeling sick to his stomach afterwards.
I arrived in the street outside my office about ready to throw up. I took a few deep breaths and waited while my gut settled down. I had had one of Morrolan’s sorcerers do the actual spell. I can do it myself, but I’m not very good; a rough landing makes things even worse.
My offices at this time were on Copper Lane, in back of a small gambling operation, which was in back of a psychedelic herb shop. My offices consisted of three rooms. One was a screening room, where Melestav, my receptionist-bodyguard, sat. To his right was Kragar’s office and the files, and behind Melestav was my actual office. Kragar had a small desk and one hard wooden chair—there wasn’t room for anything else. The screening room had four chairs that were almost comfortable. My desk was a bit bigger than Kragar’s, smaller than Melestav’s, and had a well-padded swivel chair facing the door. Next to the door were two comfortable chairs, one of which would be occupied by Kragar when he showed up.