The Office of Shadow (26 page)

"That's encouraging," said Ironfoot glumly.

"Right on time, I see," came Paet's voice behind them.

Silverdun turned. Paet was standing in the street, leaning on his cane.
There was no carriage anywhere nearby.

"Where did you come from?" said Silverdun.

"I'm a Shadow, Silverdun," said Paet. "It's part of the job. Shall we go in?"

Paet approached the gate and placed his palm on one of the bronze bars.
He said a word of unbinding, and the gate swung open.

Paet led them up the walk. It was darker here than outside, the mosshung willow branches filtering out what remained of the daylight. It smelled
of roses and loam.

The front door of the house was black; the paint on the door and the trim
was chipped and peeling in places.

"The servants have clearly been on holiday for some time," said
Silverdun.

"You can grab a paintbrush and take care of it if you like," said Paet. He
took a ring of keys from his pocket and placed one in the front door.

The door opened into a totally empty room. Dust lined the windowsills
and blanketed the wooden floors. A soot-blackened fireplace hulked on one
wall. Very little light found its way through the drawn shutters. Paet produced a tiny witchlight torch from his pocket and lit their way toward the
stairs.

"Come on," he said. As they walked, Silverdun noticed that while their
steps kicked up dust from the floor, they left no footprints.

They climbed the stairs to the second story, which was as dusty and
empty as the first. Their steps made hollow echoes. Paet led the way to a back
bedroom, where an empty bed frame lurked in a corner.

"Through here," said Paet, indicating a closet door. He opened the door
and stepped in, beckoning for Silverdun and Ironfoot to follow. Silverdun
stood in the closet, crowded against Paet and Ironfoot, feeling foolish. Paet
smelled like pipe smoke. He closed the door and they stood in the cramped
space for a moment while Paet found another key on his ring in the torchlight. He placed it in the closet door lock and turned. The closet seemed to
turn upside down, and Silverdun's stomach heaved. Ironfoot gulped.

Silverdun looked down, and now he could see light coming from under
the closet door. Paet opened it and they stepped out of the closet into a small
reception room. A pretty young Fae woman stood when they entered.

"Good evening, Chief Paet," she said.

Silverdun looked around, disoriented at first, until he realized what was
going on. The entire house had been quite expertly spellturned. They had
simply stepped into a turned version of the bedroom they'd just left.

"Good evening, Brei," said Paet. He removed his cloak and handed it to
her. "I'd like you to meet Ironfoot and Silverdun, our newest Shadows."

"A pleasure, gentlemen," said Brei, reaching for Silverdun's and Ironfoot's cloaks as well. She smiled at Silverdun. "I've got keys for the two of
you, and there's tea or coffee if you'd like some."

Silverdun and Ironfoot looked at each other. Perhaps this wasn't going to
be so bad after all. "Tea, if you please," said Silverdun.

Paet led them from the reception office into what should have been the
hallway. In this turning of the house, however, all of the other upstairs inner
walls had been removed, creating an open office space that was filled with
desks.

"Welcome to the Office of Shadow," said Paet. "Your new home."

Paet walked them through the office, briskly introducing them to a
dozen different office workers: two copyists, a translator, and a cluster of analysts, whose job it was to read all of the documents and memos pertaining to
intelligence, and to prepare briefs. One shelf along the wall was lined with
message sprite jars; all the other walls were covered with maps. Papers were stacked high everywhere, on desks, in baskets; more bulged from a row of
special drawers along the wall beneath the message sprites.

One of the analysts was a young woman with a strong Eastern accent, a
lilt that Silverdun had grown accustomed to in his days at the prison of Crete
Sulace, and now found that he missed. When Ironfoot was introduced, she
smiled, her eyes wide. "I've so been looking forward to meeting you," she
said. "I've read all of your monographs on forensic thaumatics."

"Well, I'd be happy to discuss the subject with you anytime you like,"
said Ironfoot.

"Come along," said Paet. "You can flirt with the help another time."

Ironfoot shrugged. "We'll talk later," he told the analyst, who grinned at
him.

Paet pointed to the stairs. "My office is down there, as is the mission
room and the Shadows' lien, which is where you'll be spending most of your
time."

They went downstairs. Here, the layout of the house hadn't been altered.
The main room with its fireplace was here, but it now held several tables surrounded by chairs, all covered in maps and scrolls. A row of books-atlases,
almanacs, and censuses-lined one wall.

"The mission room," said Paet. "This is where you'll be briefed on your
various assignments."

Through one door was a large office that was Paet's. It was sparse and
neat. Another door opened to a smaller office with three desks in it, all three
of which were empty. The room smelled a bit musty. Paet turned on the
witchlamp on the wall, and the office filled with a warm yellow glow.

"This is the Shadows' Den," he said. "This is your office."

Silverdun ran his finger along one of the desktops, leaving a line in the
dust there. "Hasn't been used in a while," he said.

"It's been a while since we've had anyone to use it," said Paet. "It's about
time, too.,'

"Where does the front door lead?" asked Ironfoot.

"Turns back in on itself," said Paet. "Very handy if you need to induce a
gag reflex."

"Three desks," said Silverdun.

"Hm?" said Paet.

"In the so-called Shadows' Den. There are three desks, and only two of
us.

Paet smiled. "Ah, yes. I thought Everess would have told you. You've got
a colleague. She'll be joining us shortly. Everess is bringing her."

Ironfoot and Silverdun shared another glance. She?

"In the meantime I've got work to do. Get yourselves acquainted with
things; have Brei show you where to find things like pens and ink and so
forth. When Everess shows up, we'll talk."

"Excuse me, Paet?" asked Ironfoot.

"Yes?"

"Where's my laboratory?"

"I'm sorry?"

"My lab. Everess promised me a lab. For my research."

Paet smiled. "Did he?" he said.

"Yes, he did."

"Hm."

Paet went into his office and shut the door, leaving Ironfoot and Silverdun alone in the mission room.

"That was interesting," said Ironfoot.

"Pens," said Silverdun.

"Indeed."

"I was expecting something quite a lot more sinister, weren't you?"

"I was expecting a lab."

"It seems nothing is quite what we expected."

Ironfoot smiled. "It'll all fall out. Now, if you'll excuse me, I believe I'll
go consult with Brei about those pens." He made for the stairs.

"Like hell," said Silverdun, following. "I saw her first. Besides, you've got
your Eastern analyst on the hook already."

There were footsteps on the stairs. Silverdun looked up and saw Everess
descending, followed by a vision in a white dress who was, quite simply, the
most beautiful woman Silverdun had ever seen. Their eyes met, and Silverdun nearly lost his breath.

When Everess had told her that she'd be working with two men, Sela hadn't
thought much about it. She'd assumed that these men would be like Everess
himself, fat and officious, though it occurred to her as she stood on the steps,
staring, that it was a foolish notion. The man at the bottom of the stairs was
nothing like Everess. His hair was long and dark, and it flowed beautifully
when he turned his head to look at her. When she looked into his eyes, she
felt dizzy. Those eyes.

Was this love? Did it really happen this fast?

There was another man standing next to him, but Sela barely noticed
him. She stared until the dark-haired man finally tore his eyes away from her,
but even before he did, a thread wove itself between them, red and orange
and gold. When it connected it felt as though it were pulling taut, drawing
her physically toward him. It was silly, of course; the threads existed only in
her imagination. She could neither feel nor actually see them. But still.

She noticed that Everess was looking at her strangely. "Have you and Silverdun met already?" he asked.

Silverdun. His name was Silverdun.

"I'm sure I would remember," said Silverdun, approaching as she and
Everess continued down the stairs. The other man rolled his eyes from some
reason that Sela couldn't quite make out. No matter how deeply she was able
to read those around her, there was still so much they did that baffled her.

"Well then, I suppose introductions and brandy are in order all around,"
said Everess. "Where the hell is that gravedigger Paet?"

"Right here," said Paet, stepping out of his office. Paet had no love for
Everess, that was clear, even without a thread to read. And when a thread
finally did connect the two, it was green and brown both ways, with a hint
of violet fear emanating from Everess. He was afraid of Paet, only a little, but
she knew he would never let it show.

She watched the connections form between all of the men in the room; it
was a fascinating, nascent web, but she didn't have time to consider it all
because Everess was introducing her all around. The sad, angry man with the cane was Paet. The confident, intelligent one was Styg Falores, but she was
to call him Ironfoot. And the breathtaking one was Perrin Alt, Lord Silverdun. A lord, no less!

"But not much of a lord," said Silverdun, after Everess gave his title.
"You can simply call me `Silverdun."'

Sela suppressed a silly grin. She would call him whatever he liked!

Then fear soaked her. Surely these weren't the appropriate emotions for
someone in her position. Although the more she thought about it, the more
she realized she didn't actually know what her position was.

"Have a seat here in the mission room," said Paet. "Now that we're all
assembled, it's time to talk about why we're all here."

"Just so," said Everess. "You may begin, Chief Paet." Everess wanted Paet
to remember who was in charge. Paet behaved as though he didn't realize it,
but Sela knew he did.

Sela sat as far as possible from Silverdun, who seemed to be studiously
ignoring her. The thread between them was so strong that she could almost
feel his thoughts. She was adrift on the sea of him, trying to ignore him and
failing.

He looked at her, an eyebrow raised. He smiled a faint, almost imperceptible smile and shook his head ever so slightly. No. He waved his hand in a
quick gesture, and the thread between them simply vanished. He was gone.
She almost lurched in her chair at the sudden loss of him. She looked down,
and when she looked back at him he had the oddest look on his face. She had
no idea what it meant. Sadness? Confusion? Curiosity?

No one had ever done that to her before. It was disarming and distressing. At least now, however, she could concentrate on what Chief Paet was
saying. And just in time, it appeared, as he was now addressing them all.

Paet sat on the edge of one of the tables and looked across at Silverdun,
Ironfoot, and Sela in turn. "I cannot tell you how happy I am to see the three
of you sitting here before me," he began. Which was strange, since Sela could
easily sense that he was in no way happy. What he was feeling was more like a grim satisfaction. But it had been Sela's experience that people rarely said
what they truly felt.

"It has been five years since there was another Shadow in the building
other than myself. Five years since my ... injuries precluded me from performing active fieldwork. For most of that time, I've been afraid that there
would never be another.