Lies of Light (36 page)

Marek dropped to his knee, one creaking, popping joint at a time. His generously-proportioned body was unac—

customed to sitting on the floor and when his full weight settled onto his knees, they burned in response.

He looked Willem in the eyes, and with his free hand he brushed the hair from the younger man’s forehead.

“Pretty Willem,” he whispered in a mocking rendition of what he thought “soothing” might sound like. “Everything will be all right. You wanted this, didn’t you? You told me you did. You told me you envied them. You said you wanted to be one of them.”

Marek shifted his weight to hover closer and closer over Willem’s face. The younger man’s mouth hung open, and the tip of his tongue protruded just the tiniest fraction of an inch

“Willem, my dear, dear, sweet boy,” Marek whispered, “please believe me that if I thought there was any way to avoid this____”

Willem’s eyes widened as Marek moved closer still, then the Thayan couldn’t see his eyes anymore. His lips met Willem’s and closed around them. The tip of his tongue darted in, and though Willem was unable to return the kiss, at least he couldn’t back away. The poison made him appear dead—stiff and unresponsive—but Willem was still very much alive, warm and breathing.

Marek took his lips away from Willem’s and punctured the helpless Cormyrean’s skin with the tip of the sword.

Only his eyes responded at first. Marek knew that Willem could feel every inch of the f lamberge’s cruel blade winding its way ever so slowly from just to the right of his belly button, up under his ribs. Then Willem’s breaths started to come faster, and ever more shallow. Marek guided the blade to the middle of Willem’s chest in hope of avoiding either lung. Willem panted—a rapid succession of gasps that were almost all exhale, and no inhale. Tears streamed from his twitching eyes.

Marek shushed him and pressed harder with the sword. It took all his strength and skill to slide the long blade into Willem’s fast-beating heart. He could feel the firm

resistance of the thick muscle, and the blade jerked in his grip in time with its beating.

When it finally did pierce his heart, blood poured freely down the length of the blade and oozed out of the wound in his stomach. His eyes bulged, and for a moment Marek thought they might pop. Instead they relaxed, but they didn’t close. He let go of the sword hilt, leaving the flamberge sheathed in Willem’s body.

Marek let out a long, slow breath in time with Willem Korvan’s last exhale. He smiled down into the face of the dead man and smiled.

“Shhh,” he hissed. “That’s a good boy.”

66_

29Nightal, the Yearof the Banner (1368 DR) The Temple of the Delicate Chaos, Innarlith

Marek stepped out of the dimension door onto a rough flagstone floor that shifted under his weight. He staggered, his hands out to his sides, and almost fell. The stone bobbed on something that might have been water, but was too thick. The effect was the same as floating, but the movement was slower.

As the spell effect dissipated behind him his eyes began to adjust to the dim light from torches set in iron sconces on the tiled walls. The tiles had apparently been salvaged from wherever tiles could be salvaged from. Few were the same size, and almost none of them were of matching colors. The effect might have been pleasing had they been arranged with the care and vision of an artist, but it was no mosaic, just a random jumble of shapes and colors.

Marek stepped to another flagstone, riding the slow undulation under his feet, growing more secure with the uncertain footing. The flagstones did indeed float in some thick, gelatinous medium. Marek swallowed to settle his

stomach. His first few steps had disturbed many of the stones around him so that the floor rose and fell in waves throughout the chamber.

The room itself was a circle that Marek judged to be a hundred feet in diameter. The torches were not set at even intervals around the circumference so there were bright spots, and places where the shadows were deep as night. He got the distinct feeling that something—more than one something—watched him from the shadows, so he quickly ran through a spell.

Blinking, he refocused his eyes, and a bluish cast descended over the room. The shadows were peeled back when he set his attention on them, and indeed strange creatures that might have been insects or lizards stared at him, following his every move with twitching antennae, darting forked tongues, and bulging compound eyes.

Another spell, and blue-green fire flickered over his body, covering his robes in a glowing sheen that would give the creatures a painful surprise should they choose to attempt to do him harm.

“That won’t be necessary,” Wenefir said from behind him.

Marek knew better than to try to turn around too fast on the undulating floor, so instead he took his time, planting his feet with care.

“Well, better safe than breakfast,” Marek said, stalling.

Wenefir laughed a little and stood with his hands clasped in front of him. He wore breeches of billowing purple silk but was naked from the waist up. Folds of hairless fat drooped off him, and Marek was reminded of why he so rarely went shirtless himself. His smile was cautious, suspicious, and set to turn at the slightest provocation.

“I was surprised to see you step into this place so easily,” Wenefir said. “Well done, Master Rymiit.”

“I can show you how to ward against dimensional intrusion,” Marek replied.

“For a price, of course?”

“I’m sure we can come to a mutually satisfactory arrangement,” said Marek.

“And yet I’m sure that you had a very different purpose in mind when you made the decision to invade the sanctity of Cyric’s holy shrine this morning.”

Marek dipped into as deep a bow as his girth and the floating floor would allow him, and said, “Indeed, my good friend. I suppose it would be safe to consider this a social call.”

“This is not a salon, Master Rymiit, but a holy place,” said Wenefir, but Marek could tell the man was curious to hear what he’d come to say.

“Then I will dispense with further niceties and bring us to the meat of the issue,” the Thayan said. “Your mas-excuse me… your friend Pristoleph has made a very bad decision of late and I’ve come in the hopes that between the two of us we can either show him the error of his ways, or at the very least mitigate the damage his impetuosity might cause.”

“Whatever do you mean?”

“The girl,” Marek said, and left it at that.

Wenefir wore his thoughts clearly on his face. Marek didn’t need a spell to see that the Cyricist was no friend of Phyrea’s. Marek smiled, trying to defuse the expression with as much sympathy as possible. If he had guessed right about how Wenefir would feel about Pristoleph’s sudden and acute obsession with Innarlith’s most beautiful prize, the rest would be easy.

Remembering where he was, and that Wenefir was likely capable of mind-intruding magic gifted him by his mad god, Marek tried to keep his surface thoughts clear.

“It’s a matter of the heart,” Wenefir said, though his eyes pleaded for argument. “I can’t imagine what we might be able to do to make him feel differently.”

“All that in due course,” said Marek. “For now, though, can we agree that the relationship is an unhealthy one?”

“Perhaps, but I’d be curious to hear your reasons for thinking so.”

Marek nodded and replied, “She is married to another senator. You know that well enough, having performed the ceremony yourself.”

“Cyric smiles upon those who change their minds,” Wenefir said, almost showing his disappointment over that bit of scripture. “No marriage in his name is ought but temporary.”

“Be that as it may, among the city’s social circles it will be frowned upon.”

Wenefir nodded, happy enough to concede the point. “Has there been talk?” he asked.

“Oh, there’s always talk,” said Marek. “Had it simply been a matter of divorce and remarriage tongues would wag among the wives and servants, but ultimately the city-state would have gone on about its business, but that, I’m afraid, is not the worst of it.”

“Oh?”

“There’s the matter of Senator Willem Korvan,” Marek said.

Wenefir raised an eyebrow and asked, “What of him? He’s been drinking, but don’t we all? I understand he’s been mostly away, at the canal site. I can’t imagine he’d be stupid enough to publicly resist Pristoleph.”

“Oh, and he isn’t,” Marek assured him. “In fact he’s done just the opposite. Instead of crying on the shoulders of his fellow senators and making a sticky social situation any worse, he’s disappeared.”

“I’m sorry?”

“He’s gone, and no one knows where,” Marek said, though he knew precisely where Willem Korvan—or what was left of him—was.

“A young senator on the rise like that, with influential friends….” Wenefir thought aloud.

“Why, even if he was humiliated by Pristoleph’s appropriation of his cheeky young bride,” Marek said, leading

Wenefir in a disturbing direction, “why would a rising star like Willem simply walk away from all he’s worked so hard to build? In some ways he’s the heir apparent to Innarlith.”

“I can assure you that neither Pristoleph nor myself had anything to do with his disappearance,” Wenefir said. “I was told that he had acquiesced—surrendered, as it were, of his own free will.”

“Such as a boy like Willem has free will, yes,” Marek said. “Please believe me that I did not come here to make that accusation.”

“So you believe he’s gone to ground?” Wenefir asked, dire thoughts clouding his eyes. “Is he holed up somewhere planning some reprisal, or gathering allies against Pristoleph?”

“And Pristoleph,” Marek said, “like all of us, has enemies to spare.”

Wenefir nodded, and his eyes played over the shadows along one unlit section of the curved wall. Marek followed his gaze and saw the strange creature there take a tentative step forward, looking to Wenefir for instructions. The Cyricist held up a hand—a subtle gesture—and the creature slinked back into the deeper darkness.

“He was one of your boys,” Wenefir said. “What has he told you?”

Marek brushed aside the implication that weighed heavily in Wenefir’s eyes and said, “I have not heard from him, nor seen him, in days. But there is more to consider than Willem Korvan. There’s the master builder. Phyrea is his daughter, after all, and he fought for the marriage with Willem. And he isn’t necessarily counted among Pristoleph’s allies. And the master builder has the ear of the ransar.”

“And you have the mind of the ransar,” Wenefir retorted. “What have you told Salatis to think?” “You overestimate me.”

“No, Marek, I don’t think I do,” Wenefir said. “You were right to come to me. This relationship has implications,

and those implications will have to be more carefully considered.”

“Carefully considered,” Marek suggested, “by someone with a clearer view, unfiltered by love, lust, and so on.”

Wenefir’s eyes went cold, and a tickle of fear played along the edges of Marek’s consciousness.

“I’ll show you the way out,” Wenefir said.

Turn on each other, Marek thought as he followed the soft, strange man to a hidden door. Turn on each other over a girl.

He tried not to laugh as he climbed the spiral stairs that would take him a hundred feet up to the street.

67_

30Nightal, the Yearof the Banner (1368 DR) The City of Ormpetarr

~Please, please, can’t you let us go home? the little girl begged. Don’t look at him.

He has replaced you, said the old woman. He’s replaced you in his heart. There are other women. He didn’t wait for you.

Surely you didn’t expect him to wait for you, said the man with the scar on his face.

He should have, the younger woman sobbed. Why didn’t he?

Phyrea stood at the foot of the skeletal pier that stretched out into the calm expanse of the Nagawater. The ghost of the old woman stood in front of her, and most of what she saw of the pier was filtered through her insubstantial violet form. Phyrea hugged herself and shivered. Even her heavy wool weathercloak didn’t keep the chill away from her bones. When she caught the ghostly woman’s eye she shivered worse. The spirit’s freezing gaze cut her like a dagger, and her head ached.

“He won’t kill me,” Phyrea whispered.

Yes, he will, the little girl replied. “You will,” she whispered.

The woman sneered at her, her eyes flickering orange. Phyrea put her hands over her eyes. The old woman’s shriek rattled her skull, and beneath her the planks shuddered.

“Go away,” she whispered, and opened her eyes.

The old woman was gone, and before her stood Ivar Devorast.

Phyrea took a step backward.

“I can’t go away,” he said. “I have work to do.”

He wore the same simple tunic and breeches he always wore, and though it was cold, he didn’t have any sort of cloak or coat. He held a carpenter’s hammer in one hand, loose and comfortable at his side.

“Not you,” she said, shaking her head.

Phyrea expected one of the ghosts to say something, but they remained silent. She looked around but couldn’t see any of them. She smiled.

“You’re not surprised to see me,” she said.

He shook his head, but said nothing. His red hair whipped around his face in the steady wind.

“What are you doing here?” she asked.

“Helping to build a pier,” he said.

“But why?” she asked.

“They want to start building ships,” he replied.

She waited for him to say more—then smiled. It had been a long time since she’d had to do that, to wait for him to say more. She couldn’t believe how much she’d missed it.

“Will you build ships, then?” she asked.

“I’ll build the pier,” he told her.

“And you won’t think of the canal?”

“I think of the canal every day,” he said, and a darkness descended over his face that made Phyrea shiver.

“Will you come back?”

He just looked at her. He didn’t shrug or nod or shake his head.

“I have something I wanted to tell you,” she said. He waited for her to go on, and that made her smile again.

“I’m going to be married again,” she said.

“Again?” he asked.