Living With Ghosts (39 page)

“If he’s behind that man disappearing, maybe you should back off for now.” Yvelliane took Miraude’s hand. “Be careful, Mimi. I can’t spare you.”

“I’m always careful.” Miraude squeezed her fingers and looked at the dance floor.

Yvelliane followed her gaze. She could still see Gracielis amidst the dancers. There was a curious hesitance to his movements, as if he sought too hard for some form of control. Yvelliane looked away again and found Firomelle’s eyes on her. The queen raised an inquiring brow. Yvelliane gave her a small nod and turned back to the dancers in time to see Gracielis come to a complete halt, displacing the measure. Quenfrida said something, and Gracielis replied, before pulling away from her with a violence that ripped all grace from him.

The disruption rippled out over the dancers. Quenfrida smiled and shrugged, returning to her seat. Miraude said, “And there’s another mystery.”

“I’ll tell you later.” Catching Firomelle’s eyes, she held up three fingers and saw the queen nod in reply. “I have to go.”

“I’ll try to talk to Thierry. He should come home.” It could do no good. But Miraude was gone before Yvelliane could say anything. She possessed herself of a bottle of wine from a buffet and let herself out through a side door. She found Gracielis standing in a window embrasure in the corridor. His forehead was pressed to the glass. His arms were wrapped about himself. He did not look around.

She said, “Well?”

He was silent so long that she began to think he would not answer. Eventually he drew in a long breath and said, “Does it matter?” His accent was pronounced.

“You tell me.” She kept her voice light. “There’s a private room just over here.”

He looked around. He said, “Very well,” and accompanied her into the chamber.

She poured wine for both of them and sat. He stood staring into the empty fireplace. She said, “Will you tell me?”

“I don’t know,” he said. And then, “I wish it would stop raining.”

“What?” Yvelliane said.

“Nothing. I rather wish you hadn’t done what you just did.”

“You know the reasons.”

“Yes.” He sighed. “Forgive me. I made a scene.”

“I’ve seen worse.”

He hesitated, then tugged off one of his gloves and began to rub at a wrist. It was bandaged. She looked inquiring, and he shook his head. Then he said, “Quenfrida . . . The worst thing is that she makes humiliation almost into a pleasure. She’ll kill me for this.”

“We can give you protection.”

“Not against Quenfrida.” He smiled a little. “You should look to yourselves, in that department.”

“We will.”

He studied her in silence. Then he said, “In the long term, you know, it doesn’t matter which of you wins. You can’t undo what she has done.”

“I’m concerned with the short term. And I don’t like absolutes.” She hesitated. “What did she say to you?”

“Nothing of significance . . .” He sighed and picked up his wine. “She told me what it’s like to bed with her newest disciple.”

“Does that matter?”

“Yes.” He sat, and looked at his hands.

Yvelliane said, “Do you want to go? I can excuse you to Miraude.”

He shook his head. “No, that would be a discourtesy. She—Quena—is finished with me, I think.” He lifted his wine and studied it. Rather abruptly, he drank it off. “And I have yet to be presented to Kenan Orcandros.”

Yvelliane watched him, noting the effort that was restoring composure. He was stronger than his airs suggested. She said, “I’ll arrange it. But there’s another I’d have you meet first.”

He wound the lovelock about a finger and smiled at her, his old, polished smile. “Why not?” he said.

No one was watching Iareth Yscoithi. No one noticed when she made her way from the hot room onto the terrace outside. It was raining. The terrace was empty. She stood on the stone, with her head tipped back, and let the rain soak into her hair and gown. The stars were hidden from her. To the west she could just make out a fragment of Mothmoon, disk near-covered by cloud. Handmoon was a faint, unshaped nimbus. She raised her hands to the sky, restless with heat and tension, and from the shadows at the terrace-edge a voice said, “Iareth
kai-reth
.”

She had half-expected him. She turned, green eyes adapting to the dim light, and said, “Valdin Allandur.”

He stood with his back to the torchlight. His tall figure was cloaked in darkness. His eyes were very clear. He said, “Rain becomes you.”

“I thank you.”

He stepped forward, dressed in black, hair tied back, diamonds bright in his ears. He said softly, “Dance with me?”

They could not touch. But she did not say that. She looked up into his eyes and smiled. Music spilled from the building behind her. His face held a need that spoke louder than any word. She hesitated, then said, “Certainly.”

He bowed, and his insubstantial hand reached out. She held hers over it, not quite touching. There was an instant of stillness, then the measure took hold. Two steps, and turn; two more, and bow. They might not make the lifts, the quick, joint-dependent swings. She circled him on silent feet and heard that he made even less noise than she. He leaned over her and cast no shadow. She moved under his arm and shivered as the end of her braid went through him. He seemed not to notice. Light patterned them from the windows. He was almost gone, stepping into it. Then he emerged in stronger color from the other side. They danced on, unspeaking, untouching, and she was serene in the damp night.

The music stopped. She had her back to him, arrested part way into a measure. She looked back, suddenly afraid, and his gray eyes smiled at her. He said quietly, “I shall always be waiting for you.” She found she could not speak. He smiled at her and said, “We’ll be together again. I swear it.”

The door banged behind them. He leaned toward her, as if he would leave her with a kiss. She said, “Valdin
kai-reth
. . .” and saw him warm to her.

He said, “Soon,” and he was gone.

Perhaps it was only the wind that brushed her cheek.

Yvelliane had left him alone for a few minutes. Gracielis was grateful, mindful of his need to reacquire his self-control. He sat in silence, teaching his breathing to become slow once again and sipping at the wine she had left him. His hands were not quite still. He was not quite safe. If he ever had been.

Quenfrida had known, of course; she had always known. She had doubtless rejoiced at the charade. He sought to put from him the memory of mocking, sky-blue eyes.

It hardly mattered. It was already too late. Even his death would lack meaning.

It was not that which frightened him, though he had hinted such to Yvelliane. What truly alarmed him was that he had no memory of how he had come to be in the corridor where Yvelliane had found him. An image of Quenfrida, smiling at him coldly, choosing the next weapon with which to assail him. And then . . . glass cold against his brow, body shaking, half-governed; and in his mouth an aftertaste of anger, lacking any words to trace it.

A few minutes only. But enough for a man to lose himself. There was no mirror in the room, but the curtains were open, and he could see his reflection in the window. He stared at it for long moments, then shook his head. Stern black, severe, reminiscent not of his own taste, but of that of lost Valdarrien. He smiled and said, “Well played,” to himself, or perhaps to another. “But not quite well enough.” The earring was paste. He reached back and untied the velvet bow, shook his hair forward. He rubbed one marred wrist. It seemed, after all, that it was not death that he feared.

So. He poured himself a third glass of wine and considered it. For now at least he must live, mad or sane. He owed that to Thiercelin. He was stronger now than he had been at scared and homeless seventeen. It was what he was bred to, this game of watchfulness and silken deceit. He was unlikely to win it; but he could try to do what he had promised.

When Yvelliane returned to fetch him, he favored her with a smile of devastating sweetness and offered her his arm. She looked skeptical but accepted the arm. She said, “Better now?”

“I’m much restored by your kindness.”

She laughed. “Not by my wine?”

“What vintage can compare with your presence?”

“Several, to my certain knowledge. It’s a subject you might discuss with Thierry.”

“I might not. It would hurt him.”

She looked down. There was short silence. At she said, “We should go.” She led him to a door at the end of a corridor. She knocked, awaited a response then opened it. Taking her hand from Gracielis’ arm, she said, “Go in. I’ll wait for you.”

It was not a large chamber; nor was it richly furnished. Dark curtains were drawn across the windows. Light came from two candelabra standing on a long sideboard. The face of the woman who sat at one end in a high-backed chair was hidden in shadow.

There had been no cause in his nine years in Merafi for Gracielis to be presented to its queen. Making his living from her gentry and nobility, he moved far beneath her ambit. Nevertheless, he did not at once make obeisance, born of another race, subject to another dynasty. For long moments they regarded one another. Then a draught set the candles a-flicker and he caught sight of her face.

One might not feel pity for a queen, however tired, however ill. But one might perhaps feel a brief instant of recognition of a burden shouldered and held unflinching. The oak-paneled room was alive with it. He could feel the echo of her past pain beneath his fingers, even through his gloves. As the candles burned down, he knelt, as he would to the emperor of Tarnaroq.

Firomelle looked at him. “Gracielis de Varnaq?” She had not given him permission to stand. To the floor, he said, “Yes, madame.”

“You may rise.” He stood and waited before her. She said, “Yvelliane d’Illandre tells me you will do us a service.”

“Yes, madame.” In the dim light, one might make out the kinship between Yvelliane and Firomelle.

She said, “Yvelliane would have you write and sign a sworn statement regarding the woman Quenfrida d’Ivrinez.”

He said again, “Yes, madame.”

“You are willing?”

It was pointless. The expulsion of Quenfrida could not save Merafi, not now. It was too late. It could not turn the river back, or halt the rain. He could say none of that to Firomelle, face-to-face with the extent of her pain. She had as little time as her city. He looked at the floor and said, “I am willing, madame.”

“Thank you,” Firomelle said. “I’ve taken the liberty of having the papers prepared. You’ll find them in that bureau.” She pointed. “It isn’t locked. There’s pen and ink, so that you may amend it, if you wish.”

He opened the bureau and took out the papers. Whoever had readied them had a beautiful hand, as neat and clear as his. He hesitated, then removed a glove and let his naked palm touch the paper, smelling fresh ink and sand, hearing the regular scratching of the pen. Local paper, made fine and heavy. He felt the secretary’s anxiety, hurrying to meet Yvelliane’s deadlines, and only half-conscious of what he—no, she—copied. She might have shared the secret of his dual nature, had not duty come between transcription and comprehension. He was glad of that.

He put the glove back on and concentrated on the words. Behind him, Firomelle called a servant to fetch the witnesses. They were both strangers to Gracielis. Making his bows to them, he kept his eyes downcast. An informer and a whore had scant honor in his own house, let alone that of another. They watched as he added a line or two to the statement, confirming that Quenfrida was
undaria
and naming Kenan as her accomplice. Below that, he signed all his names in full, lest at some future time his identity be questioned. Firomelle signed next, then the witnesses. Looking up, Gracielis found Yvelliane watching him. She must have come in during the signing. She smiled at him.

Firomelle thanked and dismissed the cosignatories. Then, to Gracielis, she said, “Thank you.”

He bowed. She held out a hand. The rings she wore seemed too large, too heavy for it; her long sleeves were almost as much a disguise as his. Her bones were beautiful. He could see the sickness that gnawed them. He knew he should tell her of the danger to Merafi. He could not. She bore too much already. He had warned Yvelliane, and that would have to suffice. He said, “Good night, madame.”

She smiled. “Good night, Monsieur de Varnaq. Fortune attend you.”

“And you also, madame,” said Gracielis. He wished he had the power to make it come true.

Kenan sat on the edge of the dance floor and considered. It was only duty that had brought him here tonight. Tafarin might find such parties amusing, but he did not. He would have left an hour since had it not been for the chance that had alerted him to the presence of his rival. Quenfrida had given him no warning, and he had been less ready than he might have been. A measure of his inability, of the defect in him—in his clan-blood—which left him blind where he should see.

Quenfrida’s shuttered face had given him the clue his newer senses had failed to provide. At last he had identified the other, the rival, the supplanted acolyte, Gracielis. Kenan watched the side door through which Gracielis had gone with Yvelliane d’Illandre an hour since. Gracielis was said to be a whore. No surprise, then, in finding Yvelliane consorting with him. He could make use of his acquaintance with her to meet Gracielis and see for himself what manner of weakling he had replaced.

Tafarin arrived beside him, breathing wine fumes. Kenan looked at him in distaste. Tafarin slapped his shoulder. “You miss all the fun, Kenan
kai-reth
.”

“So?”

“The loss is yours, of course; yet I would persuade you otherwise. You might learn something, even.”

He stood between Kenan and his view of that side door. Smiling with an effort, Kenan said “Peace, Tafarin
kai-reth
. You know well my pleasures lie in different directions. Enjoy this night on my behalf, as well as your own.”

“As you please.” Tafarin made him a salute and swirled off into the throng. Kenan sighed and looked back at the door.

It was open. Typically, those he sought had returned while his attention was elsewhere. He forbore to curse. Instead he rose and attempted to scan the room. Almost impossible, of course, in the crowd.