From farther down the table, another of the Hoorka—Sartas— spoke. “My bet is that the Li-Gallant is ultimately responsible for this. That man’s a shameless coward, a disgrace to guilded kin.” A murmur of agreement came from the others. “Who has better reason to want Gunnar dead?”
“I don’t know that even the Li-Gallant would be that foolish, Sartas,” Valdisa said.
Gyll nodded his agreement. “Gunnar’s rule-guild may well benefit from Gunnar’s death in this matter, Thane. I don’t credit the Li-Gallant with great intelligence, but he has the craftiness and the sense to have kept most of his power for years. He wouldn’t undermine his own position. It’s possible, I suppose, but . . .”
Sartas drank from the mug in front of him. Then he thumped the drink back down. “Still, you have to admit that Gunnar’s death would give him great pleasure. He’s attempted this three times before, twice with us and once on his own. Vingi wanted Gunnar dead.” His long olive-tan face turned from Gyll to Valdisa.
Gyll shook his head. He glanced back at Aldhelm. The man stood, leaning back against the wall, arms akimbo under his cloak and his attention on Gyll. Yet—Gyll didn’t know why, perhaps something in the man’s easy stance, his seeming nonchalance—the glimmering of a faint suspicion came to Gyll: it had been Aldhelm who had advocated the alteration of the code during the last contract on Gunnar, and it had been on that contract that Aldhelm and Gyll had experienced the filial confrontation which had driven a wedge between their friendship. And it had been Aldhelm that had failed in that first contract— and he had felt Gyll’s knife for that failure. Aldhelm was a good assassin, good enough to have evaded any safeguards that Gunnar could have set around his guildhouse.
Gyll remembered the pack Aldhelm had when he’d gone out the night before. It was easily large enough to have held a render, and there was one in the Hoorka armory.
No, you old fool, you’re letting your paranoia and dislike play games with your common sense. Surely Aldhelm wouldn’t do such a thing.
But he fell silent, and he looked at Aldhelm with a new intensity.
Valdisa had begun speaking during his musings. “ . . . This is all the more reason to continue with the ruling made last meeting. No kin will go into Sterka without my knowledge and permission. And you might do well to be sure that you have a companion, since all the attacks have been on lone Hoorka. You’re all well trained, but training means nothing to ambush or overwhelming numbers.” Valdisa glanced at Aldhelm. “We keep the code strictly. We perform as we’re supposed to. And we should make every attempt to do well—that would do the most to allay suspicions.” She waited; a breath. Someone coughed in shadow. Cloth rustled against stone.
“We have a contract for tonight,” she continued. Gyll, torn from his inward contemplation, sat up sharply: he was next in the rotation. “It will begin, at least, in Sterka, so Vingi and those that speak against Hoorka will be watching. I can’t stress its importance enough, in light of what Aldhelm has told us.”
Gyll knew that she was well aware of the rotation schedule, but she would not look at him. He fidgeted, wondering why she wouldn’t meet his eyes.
“Who works tonight?” d’Mannberg asked.
“I.” Sartas, from his seat, his dark eyes alight.
“And I,” Gyll said softly.
“Ulthane Gyll.” Valdisa turned to him now, one hand stroking her forehead as if in concentration. Her hand threw deep shadows over her eyes. “I have need of someone to meet Kaethe Oldin tonight. The woman owes us payment for last night’s contract. I’d like you to go. She’s an offworlder and of the Families, and I’d like to represent us with someone more than an apprentice.” She spoke too hurriedly, as if anticipating his anger.
There was silence when she finished. Gyll looked down at his mug, his hands around it, the fingers stroking the ceramic smoothness. “I work tonight, Thane,” he said. His voice was low, his eyes still fixed on the mug. He waited.
Don’t force this, Valdisa.
“Gyll,” she began.
He broke in, glaring at her. “Thane, don’t say it. I will work tonight.”
She did not look away. Her words were suddenly cold with distance. “I’ll consider your feelings, Ulthane.”
He allowed himself to relax slightly. “I thank you for that.”
“Beyond that, I make no promises.”
That was all she would say.
• • •
The radiance of a captured sun blazed about her, cloaking her naked body in bronze. She stretched out her arms to embrace the glow, basking in its warmth and feeling it, a thousand fingers, on her skin. She sighed, she squirmed in immodest delight.
“You keep using that and your skin’ll look like a lizard’s.”
Kaethe laughed from within her bath of light. She reached out and touched one of the four metallic posts that surrounded her. The throbbing aura began to die as the posts receded into the carpeting of the floor. “You’re too sour, Helgin. You make up in foulness what you lack in height.”
“Wisdom from the bitch?” Helgin, a Motsognir Dwarf, scowled up at Oldin, staring at her with eyes the color of smoke, his gaze unremittingly critical as it moved from crown to feet. She endured his inspection, smiling. “You’re ten kilos too fat for Neweden—if you didn’t choose your clothes carefully, you’d never get a second glance. And the Battier Radiance hasn’t made a damned bit of difference. It’s a passing fad for the stupid and gullible. That skin’s destined to get old just like the rest of you.”
“I’ll shrivel up and look like a Motsognir?”
“I’m as human as you.”
“So you claim.” She laughed. Bending at the waist, she touched the Motsognir’s head with cool lips. “Where would I be without your pessimism, Helgin?”
Helgin backed away from Oldin, two quick steps. She grinned down at him, and he turned his head to spit on the rug of the compartment. “You’d still be your grandsire’s whore, spreading your legs for his captains.”
Kaethe pursed her lips. “So touchy,” she said, as if to an unseen observer. She walked away with her long-legged stride; in the reduced gravity, she seemed to glide. The room was large, by ship standards, as comfortable as her rooms at OldinHome. Deep, soft rugs covered the plating of the floor in subtle earth hues, the deck itself sculpted into irregular hills and valleys— there was no need for other furniture here. The only reminder that Kaethe was on a ship rather than planetbound was a circular viewport that covered most of the ceiling. There, in a sea of darkness flecked with star-foam, Neweden floated, attended by its two moons, Sleipnir and Gulltopp. In this, her refuge, music would come at Kaethe’s bidding, the walls would shift, the lighting would respond to her moods; here, she had no pretensions, and here she allowed few visitors. The crew, most of her staff, prospective buyers of the goods stored in
Peregrine’s
vast holds: these she would see in the ostentatiously gothic office, two decks below.
Kaethe stretched, yawning, and turned. Abruptly, she sat, lounging back against a carpeted hillock. Helgin followed her graceful movements, glowering at her. He had the typical build of the Motsognir Dwarves, that half-mythical race wandering the frontiers of human space (and, it is rumored, far beyond) since the Interregnum, when the First Empire died and left humanity in darkness. An experiment in genetic manipulation, they had been bred for the heavy planets. The Motsognir were nearly as broad as they were tall, standing about a meter in height, with thick-bunched muscles. Their strength was legendary, as was their vile temperament. The Motsognir, by preference, tended to stay with their own; to see one was something to tell one’s children.
“Your trouble is that you’re too sure of yourself. What are you going to do when you fail?” Helgin was as hirsute as the rest of his kind. He tugged on the full beard that masked his large mouth.
“I don’t plan on failing.” Kaethe closed her eyes, relaxing. Stretching out her legs, she hugged herself, then let her arms go to her sides. “I don’t care how much you scoff, Helgin—the Battier makes me feel regenerated and alive, and you saw that it worked for the Nassaie.”
“The Nassaie are avian, not human. You heard what Nest-Tender said. He didn’t think the Battier would work for us, and wouldn’t guarantee there’d be no side effects.”
“But we’ve sold ’em.”
“Fools will buy anything,” Helgin grumbled, a voice like rock scraping rock.
“Don’t be so damned tiresome, Motsognir. Maybe the Battier could give you a little height—then you wouldn’t have to worry about knocking your teeth out on somebody’s knee,” she said sweetly.
“I’d bet on my teeth before your knee, Oldin.”
A smile. Eyes still closed, she waved a lazy hand toward him. “Did you send someone to get the geological reports Gies left with Renard?”
“I did.”
“Good. I’ll want to see it in a few hours. Now that Gunnar is dead, we make the shift toward Vingi—and the Hoorka still intrigue me.” She rolled to her side. Kaethe glanced at the Motsognir, standing—thick legs well apart, arms folded across his broad chest—near the door. “I read the profiles on their leaders. You might commend whoever got them for you—quite good. Gyll Hermond is no longer Thane?”
“No, but I suspect that he’s still their guiding force. They are his creation.”
“I want to meet him then. Get him here.”
“You have the most gentle way of making a request.”
“Yah. But you’ll do it, won’t you.” The last was a statement, not a question. Her face, for all its smiling, held little amusement. She seemed more tired than anything. “And soon, Helgin.” Kaethe lay again on her back.
“And
have Renard told that I want another report soon. He’s had enough time to give us an update.”
In self-imposed darkness, she listened to the Motsognir: a harsh breath, the beginning of another retort, then a guttural obscenity. Helgin’s heavy stride hushed on carpet—even in the light gravity, he sounded ponderous—and the door slid open with a hiss.
“Helgin.”
She could feel his eyes on her.
“When you’ve made the calls, find me a lover,” she said. “And make sure he’s tall.”
Helgin snorted derision. “You need to become more self-reliant.” The door shut behind him with the sound of serpents. Kaethe laughed.
She opened her eyes. Above her, Neweden basked in the radiance of the sunstar. She stared at the world.
• • •
The Domoraj Sucai could barely hear Vingi’s whining mumble. He scowled in irritation, trying to pierce the auditory murk that fouled his ears. Snatches of song clutched at the Li-Gallant’s words; his own thoughts, thundering, drowned them.
Vingi himself seemed to be encapsuled in a shifting cage of sapphire flame that, gelatinous, moved about him slowly. The Li-Gallant’s desk rolled like the open sea, but Vingi did not seem to notice. The Domoraj thought that peculiar but decided not to mention it.
Why bother? The Li-Gallant, dear bastard that he is and putting bread in all the kin’s mouths, should be allowed his whims. Quiet, quiet; what is he saying?
Ignoring the muted orchestrion that insisted on playing in the back of his skull, the Domoraj—head of Vingi’s guard—cocked his head with intense concentration.
“. . . to my attention that you’ve, well, taken up some odious habits, Sucai,” Vingi said. “I’ve been told you’ve used lujisa, other drugs—man, how do you expect to guide my guards in this state?”
I don’t. I don’t want to.
Then:
Did I speak that aloud? No, he’s still talking. The flames around him are larger now. How can he not feel the heat?
“. . . understand why this sudden sloth, this abuse. What’s going on inside your head, kin-brother? You were my most trusted captain, one with whom I could be honest . . .”
Inside my head? Listen: There is a trumpet sounding like green-white shards of ice, and a crystalline note that smells of spices. You hear velvet or taste fire. I don’t have to think of the disgrace you—no, there is the smell of silken cloth against my skin.
“. . . since the lassari I had you hire to kill Gunnar a half-standard ago failed. I’ve grieved over that decision a hundred times, Sucai, believe me. I know it caused you considerable pain to send a shameful lassari rather than declaring bloodfeud. But the Li-Gallant must always hold a larger view. It was for the good of Neweden—it gives you no disgrace. Believe that, Domoraj—you should feel no shame.”
Shame is a ruby spear. It slices through you and you can’t see the lifeblood on the stone. It stays, gigging you whenever you move, and you can’t tear it out.
“. . . and any dishonor should fall to me. Not you. You were following your kin-lord’s orders, as any dutiful kin-brother would. When you reported the failure, I was
glad
the attempt had failed. Do you wish time to think this through, Sucai? Do you wish my help? I could set up an erasal at Diplo Center—d’Embry would do that for me, and the Alliance has an excellent psych unit. Answer me, Domoraj, please.”
Sucai struggled to pierce the fog in his head, the hues and tints that chased each other behind his eyes. He spoke, hesitantly, his voice a harsh whisper, his fingers knotting and moving in his lap as he sat before the Li-Gallant.
“I . . . forgive me, Li-Gallant, but I feel . . . disgraced. You’ve brought shame to me . . . I’m sorry, I wasn’t ready when you called for me today . . . I was the instrument of shame.”
The ruby spear.
“I’ve tried . . . a few times since, to talk with . . . our gods. They—” Sucai stumbled over the words, his tongue moving, his face contorted as if he were about to weep. “They . . . don’t answer me.”
Vingi was speaking again, but the Domoraj could not hear him. A wind like emeralds whispered in his ears, twisting around the ruby spear that impaled his chest and pulling so that the weapon wrenched inside him. He shook his head and the storm abated, moving away. Sucai stared at Vingi and saw that a forest of dark towers had sprung up around the Li-Gallant, each with a scarlet light on its craggy summit. “. . . an erasal whether you wish it or not. As the kin-lord, I command it. You’re of no use to me in this state, Domoraj. That, above all, should bring you the most shame.”