Authors: Scott Lynch
“I’m here as an ambassador,” said Jean. “Touching on a personal matter of Mistress
Gallante’s. Of course, I don’t have an appointment, but she’ll want to see me anyway.”
“I’ll tell you what,” said Vordratha, “you’re free to kneel and kiss one of my boots,
in which case I might possibly consider relaying your petition.”
“Friend Vordratha,” said Jean with a smile, “in your capacity as Verena’s majordomo
and all-around mirthless damp prick, you deserve congratulations. In your capacity
as any sort of meaningful opposition to my fists, you’re half a second of easy work.”
“You’re a crude bastard, Callas.”
“And you’re still favoring lamentably tight breeches.” Jean feigned a yawn. “I’ll
take the same two hostages my colleague did. I invite you to ponder the difference
in our sizes and proportional strength of grip.”
Vordratha showed Jean to the now-familiar private dining hall, warned him that the
wait might be lengthy, and slammed the door behind him.
Time passed, and Jean paced quietly, alert for trouble. He estimated
it was a quarter of an hour before the door opened again and Sabetha came in.
She was dressed mostly in black, black tunic and breeches under a heavy mantled black
coat with silver buttons and chasings. Her hair was loose and wind-whipped, her white
scarf hanging in folds around her neck, her boots covered in fresh mud.
Not for the first time, Jean felt a strange sense of displacement as his memories
of Sabetha tangled with the woman before his eyes. It was like looking at a reverse
ghost, a reality somehow less tangible than the recollections five years gone. He’d
lived those five years so gradually, but to his eyes she’d received them all at once,
and in studying the new lines time had sketched for her he felt the faint tug of his
own passing years, like a weight in his heart. How much older did he look to her?
He took a deep breath, banishing the broody thought. While Jean was often bemused
by the philosophical notions that made free with his heart and head, long hours of
tutelage in arms had also given him the trick of shoving such notions aside, cubbyholing
them for contemplation once he’d survived his immediate responsibilities.
Sabetha pressed herself back against the door, closing it, and folded her arms.
“If this continues,” she said, “Vordratha might become the first man in the history
of the world to have himself made into a eunuch for reasons of self-defense.”
“In fairness,” said Jean, “I can’t imagine he’s ever found much use for the blighted
things.”
“He’s a devoted father of seven.”
“You’re joking!”
“I was as surprised as you. Seems he’s equally dedicated to his children and his career
as a professional asshole. Please don’t actually hurt him again.”
“My oath to the Crooked Warden,” said Jean. He pulled an envelope from within his
coat. “Now, to why I came. This— Well, I don’t want to speak for him. But you ought
to know it’s taken him a few nights to finish this. Much lost sleep and many false
starts.”
“As it was in the beginning, I suppose.” She took the envelope with a hand that shook
just enough for Jean to notice, then slipped it into her coat. “And … is that it,
then?”
Had the question sounded tired, Jean would have taken it for a dismissal, but Sabetha
sounded wistful, almost hurt. He cleared his throat.
“Diplomacy and curiosity don’t always mix,” he said. “We’re not strangers, Jean.”
Jean slipped off his optics and made a show of polishing them against a coat sleeve
while he considered his words.
“All I can see,” he said at last, “is two people I care for being divided and ruled
by the words of a stranger. This bullshit of Patience’s! I’m sorry. I didn’t come
to lecture you. But surely you can—”
“You delivered his letter,” said Sabetha. “Now you’re inquiring into his business.
Is Jean even here right now? Jean I could speak to, but Locke’s … legate to my court,
that man’s business is dispensed with and the door is open.”
“Again, I’m sorry.” Jean realized that their physical situation had the look and feel
of a standoff; so long as they both remained on their feet informality and relaxation
would be difficult to kindle. He eased himself into a chair. “You know that I worry
about him. I worry about the pair of you. And I regret that I haven’t, ah, exactly
paid you a social call since our return. When you first invited us here, I was a little
cold.”
“You were preoccupied.”
“That’s kind of you to suggest.”
“And then I dropped twenty hirelings on your head and packed you off to sea.” Sabetha
sat down and crossed her legs. “It couldn’t have helped. I hope you don’t think I
was pleased you broke your nose.”
“You provided us with a comfortable ship,” said Jean. “Leaving it in the middle of
the night was our decision. I was annoyed at the time, but I know it was just business.”
“Maybe there’s been a little too much ‘just business.’ ” Sabetha fussed self-consciously
with her gloves. “I kept your hatchets as a sort of assurance, and then as a sort
of joke, and then I handed them to Locke like you were some kind of … hireling. I
would not have desired to give that impression.”
“Gods, Sabetha, I’m not made of porcelain! Look, we’re not— We haven’t been
bad
friends, merely absent ones, long apart. And if there
are more difficult possible circumstances for a reunion, I’ll eat my boots. Cold.
With mustard.”
“Now who’s being kind?” she said. “I’ve missed you. Personally and professionally.”
“I’ve missed you,” said Jean. “Sharp edges and all. Life was always better with you
around. Everyone around you catches your light. We’re doing it now, even across the
city, working against you. I haven’t seen him like this … well, not for a long while.
Sick with worry and totally exhilarated.”
“The conversation turns to our mutual friend again.”
“Yes. I mean— Look. Let me say this much, please.” Jean took a deep breath and pushed
on before she could interrupt. “He and I had a dangerous misunderstanding in Tal Verrar.
We both looked at the same thing, and we both made bad assumptions that led us in
opposite directions. We got lucky, but bad assumptions … they’re a possibility to
be aware of, you see?”
“Jean.” She spoke haltingly, each word crisp and fragile. “You must trust … do I seem
at ease to you? Do I seem wholly myself? You must trust that I have reasons,
urgent
reasons for my behavior, and that they are as much to my grief as they are to his—”
“Stop.” Jean raised his hands placatingly. “Sabetha, however damned foolish I think
you’re being, you do have a right to your own judgment. I don’t like the judgment,
but I’ll respect the right, all the way to my grave. I’ve said my piece.”
“Thank you,” she said, and her smile warmed him like a fire. “It seems you and he
have both grown more diplomatic since we parted.”
“We’ve made second careers out of finding excuses not to murder one another. It’s
had a salutary effect on our manners.” Jean found his feet again and held out his
hand. “Sister Bastard, I’d like to detain you longer and make my job that much easier,
but I imagine we’re being watched. We can’t afford to try the patience of our employers.”
“Brother Bastard.” She took his hand and squeezed it. “I wish I didn’t have to agree.
Thank you for talking to me.”
“I hope we get to do it again.”
“One day at a time,” she said, softly. “Until we find out what’s waiting at the end
of all this. But hope is a good word. I hope you’re right. About everything.”
“Is there any message I can take back for you?”
“No,” she said. “Whatever there is to say, I’ll say it myself, in my own time.”
They embraced, and Jean swept her off her feet. She laughed, and he turned the sweep
into a complete twirl that ended with her elegantly set down atop a table. He bowed.
“I return madam to the pedestal on which she usually resides.”
“You cheeky lump! And here I was almost feeling sorry about trouncing the bright red
fuck out of you in the election.”
“Tsk. Whatever you are, you’re not the least bit sorry,” said Jean, waving as he let
himself out. “As you said … we’re not strangers.”
THE ROOM
, so warmly lit, so invitingly decorated, felt cold after the door closed behind Jean.
Strange how the empty seats and unused tables suddenly contrived to give the place
the air of a deserted temple. Sabetha had never felt so isolated here before.
She leapt off the table and landed softly on the toes of her boots, scarf and coat
rustling. The envelope was out of her pocket before she knew it, hands moving faster
than the thoughts that usually ruled them.
“Of course I’m not alone,” she said. “You’re here.”
The room was still. The bustle of Black Iris business could be heard only faintly
through the floor.
“I am a grown woman having a conversation with an envelope,” she muttered several
heartbeats later.
He was there like smoke, like a ghost in the room, like a scent in her clothing. It
had been so long that she had forgotten the actual scent, only that she remembered
carrying it. Remembered wanting it, then not wanting it, then wanting it again despite
herself.
There were two Lockes, she thought, turning the envelope back and forth in her hands.
Two real Lockes under all the faces he wore in the course of his games. One of them
put such a sweet sharp ache in her heart she could scarcely believe that a younger,
softer Sabetha had sealed the feeling away and managed to leave. That man broke all
the patterns of law and custom and dared the world to damn him for it.
The other Locke … that man was bound tight to those patterns, their absolute prisoner.
He would do
thus
because
thus
was the way it always had been in Camorr, or the way it had always been for a
garrista
, or for a priest, or a Right Person, or a Gentleman Bastard. The reasons were endless,
and he would cling to them viciously, thoughtlessly, tangling everyone around him
into the bargain.
Even his eyes seemed different, when he was that second man. And that was a problem.
If there were two, might there not be three? Patterns behind the patterns, secrets
behind the secrets, new strings to dance on, and these ones leading all the way back
to the Bondsmagi of Karthain. Another Locke, unknown even to himself. What would become
of the Lockes she knew if that stranger inside them was real? If he woke up?
“Which one of you wrote this?” She sniffed gently at the envelope, and the scent of
it told her nothing.
Everything about the room was suddenly wrong. She didn’t want to be here in this quiet
citadel, this orderly heart of her temporary power. The business between her and Locke
was thieves’ business; she needed a thief’s freedom to face it. And a thief’s most
comfortable roof was the night sky.
She swept an alchemical globe into her coat pocket and shook her boots off, scattering
flakes of drying mud on the floor. Barefoot, she padded to one of the room’s tall
windows and cracked it open.
Sabetha had adjusted the lock mechanism herself and rehearsed the process of slipping
out many times; she’d mentally mapped four distinct routes around and down from the
roof of the Sign of the Black Iris. The stones beneath her feet were cool but not
yet unbearably cold.
Up she went, night breeze stirring her hair, soft moonlight showing all her possible
paths. The world of streets, alleys, horses, and lamps receded below her, and she
grinned. She was fifteen again,
ten
again, hanging on ancient stones with nothing but skill between herself and the fall.
She was on the roof, quiet as a sparrow’s shadow, heart pounding not with exertion
but with the thrill of her own easy competence and the anxious mystery of the envelope.
Her rooftop sentry, crouched in the shadow of a tall chimney, all
but exploded out of his shoes when Sabetha’s hand fell lightly on his shoulder.
“Take a break,” she whispered, straining to keep the sound of her smile out of her
voice. “Get some coffee and wait below for me to come fetch you.”
“A-as you say, Mistress Gallante.” To his credit, he was tolerably silent as he moved
off. Not a patch on a proper Camorri skulker, but willing to make an effort.
Sabetha settled into his spot, pulled the alchemical light from her pocket, and once
again turned the envelope over and over between her fingers.
“Get on with it,” she said, knowing it was empty theater for an audience of one. “Get
on with it.”
Minutes passed. Silver cloud-shadows moved and blended across the dark rooftops. At
last she found her hands taking the initiative from heart and mind again. The seal
was cracked before she knew it, the letter slipped out. The handwriting was as familiar
as her own. Her teeth were suddenly chattering.
“Dammit, woman, if you’re vulnerable to him it’s because you wanted to let yourself
be vulnerable. Get on with it.”
Dear Sabetha, she read:
I have instructed J. to put this into your hands directly and so presume to write
your name, selfishly. I want to say it out loud, over and over again, but even alone
in this little room I am afraid of sounding like a lunatic, afraid that you would
somehow be able to sense me making a damned idiot of myself. At least, having written
it, I can stare at it as long as I like. It keeps snatching my attention away. How
can any other word I write expect to compete? This is going to be a long night.
I suppose it’s true to the peculiar course of our courtship that so much of my courting
takes the form of apologies. I like to think I have some talent for them; gods know
I’ve had so many opportunities and reasons to practice.
Sabetha, I am sorry. I have put my recollection of everything said and done since
I came to Karthain under a magnifying
lens, and I realize now that when I returned after escaping from your arranged vacation,
I said some things I had no right to say. I took offense at your deception. I confused
the business with the personal, and piled self-righteousness high enough to scrape
the ceiling. For that, and not for the first time, I am deeply ashamed. It was wrong
of me to throw such a fit.