‘See the light? That tells you I’m a mage, so you will know I haven’t taken a lock of your hair to keep as a memento.’
Grisat stiffened, and felt the dagger dig a little further into his skin.
‘I see you grasp the situation; good. Now, I know who you are and I know who your employer is. What I want you to do is return to the temple and act the good penitent again.’
‘You were sent after us?’ Grisat croaked in disbelief.
‘Not quite, but I want you back there all the same. The clerics have been broken, but there’s still some life left in the cults, and you are going to be the one to organise unrest in the city - at my direction, of course. I intend there to be a secret war in Byora, a guerrilla resistance to Natai Escral’s inevitable measures against the cults.’
‘Father Hiren is in charge and he hates me,’ Grisat began. ‘I don’t know that he’ll even take us back.’
‘If he doesn’t, go to the Temple of Karkarn - you will need to be convincing, but at least the warrior-priests will be useful for more than just political backing.’
‘Why me?’
He heard a soft laugh. ‘One monkey is as good as any other. I choose the one who pisses highest.’ The dagger pushed a little deeper and Grisat gave a small yelp. ‘I will be keeping track of your progress - you have one week, or I shall prove just how adept a mage I am. You’ll find a little hair goes a long way.’
Without warning the pressure on the back of his neck was lifted and the faint green light winked out. Grisat listened to the rapid, insistent thump within his own chest for a dozen heartbeats before he turned around. He wasn’t surprised to discover the outhouse empty and the yard beyond it as silent as the grave.
‘Shit,’ he muttered as he took a step back away from the shadows and into the gutter.
‘Opening at dusk, Harys? Are you practising for something?’
The broad-hipped woman gave a gasp of shock and whirled around in a flurry of green silk. Kohl outlined her pale blue eyes and her blonde hair was piled elaborately on top of her head. She stood in the centre of a room too poorly lit to betray the threadbare state of the sofas to normal eyes. A pair of teenage whores hovered at her side.
One of the girls gave a small cry of surprise when the shadows fell away to reveal two other figures in the room. At a look from Harys the whores both fled past the heavy curtain that served as a door, and Zhia caught a glimpse of the hallway, which was considerably less ornate - and less garish - than this room. She could see why the lighting was so bad in here, where the house’s patrons were plied with drink whilst enjoying the talents of the singers Harys employed; with their clothes on, people had enough time to notice their surroundings.
‘Mistress, I apologise - you startled me. I had not known you were even in the city,’ Harys gabbled as she sank into a deep curtsey and looked up at the newcomers as though squinting at the sun. ‘My Lord.’
‘We did not want to announce our presence to the city,’ Zhia replied. She didn’t bother to add that they’d been listening to Harys’ conversations for the last hour, gauging not just the state of the brothel business, but also ensuring there were no other loyalties binding the woman.
‘Shall I have wine brought to the high room for you?’ Harys asked.
‘And food.’
Harys hesitated, then started, ‘I have a new girl here—’
‘Oh don’t be such a fool, woman,’ Zhia snapped impatiently,
‘
actual
food; a meal to go with our wine. I intend to talk over supper. Now do get up and see to it, if you would.’
‘Of course, Mistress,’ Harys said hurriedly, retreating towards the doorway. She stopped and turned back. ‘Ah, Mistress - will you be wanting Diril there too?’
‘Diril Halfmast? Gods, no; she’ll put me off my supper. Send her up half an hour after the food.’
Harys curtseyed again and fled.
‘Mistress?’ Koezh said softly from the darkness. ‘She isn’t a White Circle agent, is she?’
‘No, just devoted to me,’ Zhia assured him.
‘And Diril Halfmast?’
Zhia gave a small shudder. ‘Another agent of mine here, and the Land’s least successful whore - please don’t remind me when we’re eating.’
Koezh gave a soft laugh and gestured for Zhia to lead the way. ‘Isn’t upsetting sisters the obligation of elder brothers?’
Zhia didn’t answer as she led him into the large foyer. Koezh, noticing her tugging at the hem of her cloak, did the same, mouthing the charm to turn away idle eyes. There was an ornate bar on one wall, opposite a door, and in the centre of the room an assortment of men, clerks and young merchants in the main, sat drinking at various small tables. There were no girls mingling here; this was more tavern than brothel waiting room.
A stair on the left of the room clearly led up to the bedrooms. A big, bald man in dark silks sat at the table nearest to it, positioned so he could see the whole room. He was fat, but not so obese as to look slow, or in much need of the cudgel balanced against his chair. The wide grin on his round pink face put Koezh in mind of a carved pumpkin head.
Zhia led the way through a recessed open doorway by the bar to another, smaller staircase. They climbed two flights to a low room at the top of the building, where they found Harys busy shuttering the wide windows that occupied much of three of the walls.
‘I’m sorry about the light,’ she said, seeing them enter. ‘I usually eat up here myself so I can watch the sunset.’
‘It won’t bother us,’ Zhia replied, before adding with a smile, ‘Enjoy your sunsets while you still can.’
Koezh noted the pleasure that blossomed on Harys’s face.
Ah, one of those
. ‘You always did love to be worshipped,’ he said to his sister in their native tongue.
A look of anxiety crossed Harys’s face, but it vanished when Zhia responded as though he’d told her a joke.
‘Koezh, you were always too impatient with people, even as a boy. That I have little sympathy with her wish to share our curse does not mean it cannot be useful.’
‘And having brothel owners in your pocket helps us how, exactly?’
‘She’s a fine contact, and the best source of information in this city,’ Zhia said, removing her cloak and settling herself in a chair with exaggerated elegance. Underneath she wore plain travelling clothes similar to her brother’s, with a long skirt covering her breeches to conform to local customs. ‘Litse men do love their whores,’ she added, ‘and you know how indiscreet they are.’
He joined her at the table, a long thin piece of mahogany so dark it was almost black.
‘What was it Valije Nostil called you when she found out you were Aryn Bwr’s lover? Whore of the Dawn? You’ve not always been too discreet yourself.’
Zhia’s face became stony. ‘I remember my brothers laughing because he was cheating on a queen with second sight. I thought I heard her laughing from beyond the grave when we faced the judgement of the Gods.’ She sniffed and made a dismissive gesture. ‘Whore of the Dawn indeed.’
She turned to Harys, indicating the woman should join them. ‘Tell me, what is the state of the city? What has changed since I was last here?’
Harys bobbed her head and said, ‘Where would you like me to start, Mistress - the fall of the White Circle?’
Zhia gave a nod. ‘Be brief.’
‘People are calling it the civilised coup, but that makes it sound more dramatic than it really was,’ she said. ‘When we got news of the fall of Scree, it was clear that the White Circle no longer existed, not in any real sense. The ruling sisters fled to Tor Salan, so I heard. The rest of them just took off their shawls and walked away from their public positions. Some people panicked when they saw a division of Knights of the Temples waiting on the border, but the Duchess of Byora intervened.’
‘She persuaded the others easily?’ Koezh interjected.
‘I doubt it was easy, but Sourl and Celao aren’t fools; they’ve both been hearing as much from the south as Natai Escral has. Everyone knows about the Menin conquest - and what’s the old saying? “Where war is found, its brothers soon shall follow”?’
‘The saying refers to pestilence and famine,’ Zhia said pedantically, ‘but you’ve reached the correct conclusion all the same. Civil war is the last thing the Circle City needs. Its strength comes from trade, and I’m sure Tor Salan will be recruiting erstwhile members of the Chetse armies. Once the balance of power is upset, everything is up for grabs.’
‘Tor Salan won’t be attacking anyone,’ Harys piped up. ‘Word arrived in the city a week or so ago - the Menin overran their defences in a day.’
‘What?’ Zhia snapped, her sapphire eyes flashing in the darkness. ‘You didn’t think to mention that first?’
‘Yet more people underestimate Lord Styrax,’ Koezh said softly, one hand rubbing his shoulder, the site of the fatal wound the Menin lord had given him. ‘At least I was ahead of the pack there,’ he added.
‘I haven’t been able to work out what happened exactly,’ Harys said quickly. ‘Some say the mercenaries defending the city opened the gates to him. The other rumour is that Lord Styrax rode up to the Giants’ Hands alone and created a storm that knocked them all down like stalks of wheat.’
Zhia nodded gravely. ‘It sounds like an object lesson to the rest of us, whatever the truth might be. He identified their strength and attacked it. The man’s arrogance is matched only by his ability.’ She leaned forward, elbows on the table and stared fixedly at Harys. ‘This is not a trick question, although it might be a strange one, but you will indulge me.’
‘Of course, Mistress,’ the brothel madam said quickly, shrinking back in her seat. She looked terrified.
‘Have you heard any stories recently, from whatever source, about a child?’
Koezh could hear the thump of her heartbeat quicken as she opened her mouth to reply. ‘A child? I don’t really—’ She stopped, and frowned. ‘The only thing I can think of is the duchess’s new ward.’
‘She is noted for taking in orphans, no?’ Zhia said, trying to encourage Harys.
‘She is. I haven’t paid much attention, I’m afraid, for it’s talk among the young maids and my girls rather than the men who come in here. It’s foolishness, for the main part; something about his cries inspiring a coward to take on the duchess’s entire guard - and the Gods themselves striking down two priests during the clerics’ revolt when they tried to hurt the child.’
Koezh looked at his sister. ‘You were right.’
‘It was a reasonable guess,’ Zhia replied, looking pleased. ‘What we saw in Scree was the shadow at the heart of events, letting chaos unfold around it. Whatever is to come next, it will likely be centred on the Circle City or Tor Salan.’
She gave an elegant shrug and flicked an errant curl of black hair away from her face. ‘We came here first because it was closer, not because of the duchess’s habit of adopting strays.’
‘Mistress, are you saying what happened in Scree could happen here next?’ Harys asked with mounting alarm.
‘I doubt it,’ Zhia replied carelessly. She began to tap her perfectly manicured nails on the table surface, as if following a tune in her head.
Koezh waited. His sister had always tried to test his patience; her way was one of teasing people to exasperation. He pitied the poor foolish boys, like that soldier from Narkang, Doranei. Even if her affection for him was true, it would not stop the immortal from playing games with him.
And love only goes so far
, Koezh thought as he pictured Doranei’s face. The young man was an exceptional soldier; he’d have to be to hold the position he did, but ever since Scree, Koezh couldn’t think of him as anything other than a lost puppy trailing after Zhia.
Don’t think love will protect you, my boy. If this shadow can give us what we want, Zhia will not even hesitate.
‘A con artist does not perform the same trick to a crowd twice,’ Zhia pronounced at last. ‘Misdirection is the name of the game here; the shadow may be so weak either of us could swat it like a fly.’
‘So if the trick is repeated, King Emin would know exactly where to stick in the knife,’ Koezh finished for her. ‘So what then is the new trick? This child?’
‘Presumably - we just need to work out what role it has to play. Our clues to the riddle will be in the stories folk are telling: the inspired coward, the priests struck down.’
‘Both stories a Harlequin might tell,’ Koezh added pointedly, ‘but I’ll bet this is no quick con, not after what we saw in the north. It’s too subtle, and slow.’
Harys gave a hesitant cough to interrupt them. ‘I’ve remembered something else. One of the servant girls said she’d seen a leper at the gates of the Ruby Tower. The guards had driven him off, but he kept coming back every day, even though he just got driven away again. He kept saying something about begging for intercession with the Gods.’
Zhia raised an eyebrow. ‘Accelerating the loss of faith? It cannot turn everyone against the Gods as it did in Scree, so instead it provides an alternative?’
‘And then do what?’ Koezh argued, ‘kill the child to leave them bereft of a figure of worship? That won’t happen quickly, and while the Gods can be notoriously slow to react, I doubt their servants will be tardy in cutting off such a threat at source.’
‘It makes a martyr of the child; that’s a powerful figure when used properly.’ Zhia sounded far from convinced of her argument, but after watching Scree collapse in flames she had resolved she would not be out-thought by anyone again.
‘A martyrdom that could have all four quarters of this city-state behind it and still come to nothing. The Circle City is an important trade centre, nothing more. It isn’t a power here, and it would take a decade of being led by a genius before that would substantially change. If the child had been adopted by King Emin or Knight-Cardinal Certinse, then you might have me convinced, but here there is nothing to win down that road.’
Zhia nodded. ‘Let us hope we have time to find out what we need to know before the time comes for us to choose our side. Kastan Styrax will head this way soon, I’m certain of it.’ She turned back to the woman and, switching back into the local dialect, asked, ‘Harys, tell me how I get close to the duchess.’