But then the blond man continued. “Your Grace, my Lord Vaeste, I nevertheless have something of note to mention regarding our dark dangerous Vorn. Something rather intriguing.”
“What?” said Hestiam, tensing.
“Why, the fact that he, your oh-so-terrible one is somehow affected by color orblight.”
“What do you mean?” said Vaeste.
“I mean,” continued the blond, “he cringes. Yesterday, during the Wedding Ceremony, at Eroh’s Temple. Was anyone else besides myself not looking at the bride only? Though, lovely creature that she is, I admit—”
“Stop,” said Elasand. “What did you see?”
Elasirr leaned forward to place his right elbow on his knee, and stared at the two men. His eyes, for an instant, lost the slitted narrow look, and sparkled like two pieces of silver, animated, alive.
“I saw that Lord Vorn of Qurth has a weakness,” he said softly. “Something that must be studied and examined from all sides. Something that we could use to our advantage. And we don’t have a moment to lose.”
“Are you saying that color light may distress him?” said Hestiam. “Possibly, he is just a barbarian that had never experienced color before, where he came from.”
“No. It was not just distress. There was an aversion, a fear in him that I could see. A real fear. And there could be no fear of that kind in one such as himself, unless there’s also a known potential for harm. Something about color affects him. And maybe, it might affect the rest of his men.”
“Were there any color orbs lit last night?” said Elasand.
Hestiam frowned, then tugged at his beard. “I actually don’t recall. There almost always are, you know. I love their bright exotic quality. But last night’s festivities were all Deileala’s doing, none of mine—Besides, Vorn again retired somewhat early, leaving me to better enjoy myself, thankfully—”
Elasand was growing more still with each passing moment. Ranhé noticed his breathing had become almost nonexistent, and he was deep in some kind of private contemplation.
“What’s on your mind, my thoughtful Elasand-re?” said Elasirr, turning to him with mocking expectancy.
Elasand took a big breath, and let it out. And then, deliberately ignoring the blond man, he addressed Hestiam. “Your Grace, I need to talk to you for a moment privately.” He turned to Ranhé, saying, “Would you mind waiting outside for a little while, freewoman?”
She nodded, stonelike, and left the chamber.
“And you also, lord.”
The blond allowed his brows to rise, and then, with a faint smile, followed Ranhé out the door, saying absolutely nothing.
As the door closed behind them, Ranhé found herself alone in the Palace hallway—indeed, reliving a nightmare—with the man whose flesh only yesterday she had felt against her skin.
The man Elasirr stepped out into the corridor, shutting the door behind them. And for a moment they were silent in the poorly illuminated twilight.
“So,” he said after a while, leaning with his back against the wall of the hallway, looking directly ahead. “Here we are.”
And then he slowly turned to stare at her.
Ranhé threw one sharp knife-gaze sideways at him, then began to pace the corridor.
At which he chuckled softly, and continued staring at her with a basilisk gaze.
“I wonder,” he said, “what you look like with your hair unbound. Softer, maybe? I never got a chance to see that last night.”
She remained silent. Her boots rang against the marble of the corridor, as she paced.
“Ranhé, oh Ranhé . . .” he pronounced softly, at last turning his head away, leaning his head back against the wall. In the shadows, his profile was like one of the faces from an ancient silver dirghe coin. She noted also a glimpse of detail—his straight brow, the slightly upturned nose with fine nostrils, the line of mouth and chin, the pulse at his throat. And then he closed his eyes, and his lashes extended against his cheeks, and she watched their pale silhouette.
Ranhé stopped pacing. She stopped to stare at that artistic profile.
He knew that she had stopped. That she was looking at him. And yet he continued facing straight ahead, his eyelids covering his eyes, pale lashes resting against cheeks.
She stood, hands folded before her, booted feet planted apart.
After ten heartbeats, they could hear each other’s breathing, and the marble silence of the corridor.
“Do you have any idea,” he began suddenly, “what His Pathetic Grace and your lord and employer are now discussing?”
“Obviously it’s something neither of us are expected to hear,” she replied, speaking for the first time.
His lashes lifted over his eyes like birds taking flight. And he turned to look at her. “Ah, gods strike me, Ranhé speaks! I was beginning to worry that I’ve permanently made you mute with indignation.”
“Not a chance,” she replied, with a blank face. “I don’t like to waste words.”
“Were you going to say—with vermin?”
Her face gave away nothing. “Who are you, really? You must be a lord, for you fraternize with lords and regents.”
He sighed, almost sadly, and then his lips curved into a sweet smile. “That, indeed, I do.”
“Then,” she said, “what have you to do with any of this business, with any of us? What role do you take?”
“Why,” he said, “surely, that of the assassin.”
And Ranhé knew him at last.
When he was left alone with Hestiam, Elasand got up, and turned his face to the view of the City in the bright window.
“Well, what is it?” said the Regent.
Elasand remained staring far away, while the day-glow danced and sank in the recesses of the dark that was his hair—all but a single pale streak.
“Your Grace,” began Elasand. “Let me start with a tale. . . .”
“Do we have time for this?” said Hestiam.
At which Elasand sadly laughed. “It only makes it somewhat easier to explain,” he said. “The tale begins when a young proud man born to one of the Noble Ten, wakes up one night from an extraordinary dream. The dream is vivid, clear, as though he had visited the place himself. And the young man is still young enough to forget his pride in lieu of wonder.”
As he was speaking, Elasand began to pace the chamber.
“Go on . . .” said the Regent, making himself comfortable on the sofa. “What is the dream about?”
“The dream is—it’s about nothing. Rather, the dream is filled with something—”
Say it, pronounce it at last. . . .
Violet.
“Well?”
Elasand stopped pacing. He stood, a gaunt elegant silhouette against the window. The Regent found that from that angle he could not see his face.
“The dream,” said Vaeste, “is about a woman . . . A goddess. The lady of Violet. She whose name is pronounced with the softest reverence—Laelith. . . .”
Hestiam’s eyes began to come awake.
“And so,” Elasand continued, “in this living dream, this true vision, the Tilirreh comes to visit the man. Or rather, he comes to visit her, comes within her radiant violet garden. And there, she fills him with such emotion, such intensity, that when he wakes, he is unable to forget. . . .”
Elasand paused. “I am that man,” he said. “And I have seen the lady. The first time had been almost two winters ago. And now I see her often. In the dream I am given a knowledge, a premonition of something that I cannot seem to grasp, something that however, I must. And it eats at me, this presence, this knowledge. It devours and haunts me, day and night . . . And I see the one called Laelith, next to whom all mortal women pale in comparison. And I know she expects me to act, and I beg her to help me retain the knowledge when I awake. . . .”
The Regent’s face was serious. “Dreams . . .” he whispered, “I too have dreams. Only, unlike yours, I see no radiant gods. My dreams only keep me from welcoming sleep,
every single horrible night.”
“Your Grace,” said Elasand softly. “That’s the end of my tale. There are details, of course, but none that would make a difference. But now I must explain why I divulged this to you in the first place.”
Again, he looked away, and began to pace the room.
“I’ve heard,” he began, “how—I no longer remember—that somewhere in the deep forests of the West Lands, at least two days’ ride away from the City, there is an old shrine. I know of it, for on more than one occasion I’ve heard stories told around Tronaelend-Lis of travelers being lost, of merchant caravans straying off the correct path, and coming upon an ancient structure somewhere in the forest.
“They call it the Shrine of Light. Supposedly, once, very long ago, before any of our grandfathers were alive, the shrine had been built to honor the Seven Tilirr of Rainbow.”
Hestiam involuntarily smiled. “I’ve heard of this shrine. A pretty legend. My nurse used to tell me about it when I was a little sprite myself. But—a legend only. The travelers simply get lost, waste time, and then have to excuse their own stupidity before their superiors. So, they make up a story that they had seen the ancient shrine, all overgrown and hoary, in the deepest part of the wood. Even recently, I’ve had my idiot messengers report people having seen this fable of a place—when they are deeply in their cups, of course.”
“What if I told Your Grace of a man who had actually been to that place himself, and knows the way?”
The Regent shook his head, playing with his untrimmed beard. “Elasand-re,” he said, with an uncharacteristic calm. “What are you getting into here? Is this relevant to the current problem?”
“I believe, very much so. And I do know of someone who’d been to the Shrine of Light. You know him too, Your Grace. You might remember him as Nilmet the Philosopher.”
“Ah-h. Yes, I do recall that one. He entertained us well at Dirvan last spring, with his quirky wisdoms and tales of the Rainbow. Deileala wanted to retain him permanently at her side as a court fool, and when he refused, wanted to imprison him as a joke, just so he wouldn’t leave.”
Elasand’s lips curved. “That wouldn’t do at all for Nilmet. He’d wilt like a cut flower, if forced to stay in one place.”
Hestiam smirked. “I agree, but try telling my sister what she can or cannot have. This Nilmet is insane, of course. Not of any noble stock, yet he had his pretensions. Whatever happened to him?”
“I just saw him at a roadside inn not far from the City.”
“So,” the Regent said. “Your Nilmet claims to have seen the Shrine of Light? And you believe him? He is a tale spinner, Vaeste.”
“Your Grace—he has been there, by the very look of him. He pretended not to recognize me this last time, and I did not press to speak to him. But I overheard him talk again of the Rainbow. Under the guise of philosophy he reveals truth to those he speaks with. And from what he said, I am convinced he has been there. The shrine exists, and I can locate it.”
“And how would that serve us? What will you find at an overgrown ruin in the middle of the forest?”
“That which I never thought to seek,” said Elasand simply.
The Regent laughed. “Ah . . . Elasand-re. You are a dreamer.”
“You make it sound so futile, Your Grace.”
“Well, isn’t it? Really, what do you expect to find? A revelation? Why bother traveling so far, when you can visit the Sacred Quarter, right here in the City, and for a handsome sum, you can purchase revelations from all the gods in the pantheon?”
Elasand sighed.
Hestiam nodded his head at his own cynical words. “I know, my dear Elasand-re, I know what you would say—true revelations cannot be purchased. But then, you first have to believe they exist, and I don’t. Haven’t believed in truth or the gods, or our glorious Rainbow for a long time now. A very long time.”
Elasand neared the Regent, and then sat down next to him, looking into the other man’s eyes.
Hestiam watched the Lord Vaeste, sweeping aside for a moment his ever-present suspicion, his fear of the dark, his epicurean stupor, his self-pathos. And for a moment only, underneath it all he revealed himself to be a man worthy of the once great Family Grelias.
“Can you . . . help me?” said he, the man who bore the name Grelias, to the other. He spoke simply, terribly. Because, for a long time, he had been living in a void.
And Vaeste looked at this man, this hopeless one to whom he had sworn fealty so long ago, and whose Family he obeyed in the name of the ancient royal no-longer-existent Monteyn.
“Yes . . .” he said to the Grelias. “But for that, suspend your disbelief. As of now. And listen to me.”
A wind, carrying scents of the gardens from the outside, swept into the chamber like a capricious ghost. But its sweetness was ignored by the two men, so enraptured by words.
“I believe,” said Elasand, looking directly into the other’s eyes, “that a time of strangeness is upon us now. Lord Vorn is merely a precursor of something greater, dangerous, terrifying, inevitable. And yet, my visions, my contact with the otherworld through my dreams, is also indicative. Something so important that it has dared to infringe upon this world even in our waking moments. And this call from the other side is not to be ignored. Therefore, Your Grace, since I believe all things that happen do so for a reason, I believe that the answer to out problem lies out there—deep in the forests, somewhere in a wild remote true place.”
“So then. . . . If I ordered you to go there in my name, Elasand-re, in the name of Grelias, and in the name of this City, would you do it then, being so certain of some truth that only you seem to know?”
But Elasand, looking still into his eyes, replied softly, “No, Your Grace. I would not go there in your name, nor that of Monteyn. But I would go there for this City, and for my own sanity’s sake. And when I return, I will return with the answer.”
“How can you be so sure?” Again, there was the trace of the twilight shadow in the Regent’s words.
“I am sure of this one thing more than of anything in this world.”
Vaeste’s intensity in speaking this brought a momentary respite from fear to Hestiam. The Regent sighed, and thought for a moment of his own lost illusions. “Then go,” he almost whispered. “Go now, immediately, don’t waste a moment. Do what you alone know must be done.”
Elasand inclined his head in a short bow, and said, “I will prepare to leave this very hour, and will be on my way at dawn. And—Your Grace, thank you for giving me this chance.”
With those words, he walked over and opened the chamber door, looking into the hallway. “Come, Ranhé, and you too, Elasirr-re. Everything else is for your ears also.”
The tall woman entered, followed by the blond assassin.
“You will accompany me, Ranhé,” said Vaeste. “Tomorrow we ride outside the City on an urgent matter for His Grace. And now, I ask His Grace’s leave to get ready.”
Elasirr approached Hestiam reclining on the sofa, and said before Elasand could leave, “Not so fast, my lord.”
Elasand turned at the other blankly. “If you want to know what happened here, ask His Grace.”
“Actually, I could care less what happened between the two of you, Elasand-re. Only one matter concerns me. And you know what it is.”
“I have no time for that one, not now,” said Elasand, knowing where the conversation was heading. It was regarding that other thing, the very reason he’d originally made an appointment to see Hestiam in the first place. But seeing the Regent’s state, not to mention his own, Vaeste had changed his mind, and decided not to bring it up. But obviously Elasirr was not going to let the matter rest.
“Your Grace,” said Elasirr, standing before the Regent. “Our Lord Vaeste has forgotten to mention a certain matter to you.”
“What is it?” said Hestiam, his eyes acquiring a newly alarmed expression.
“I was going to speak with you about it some other time,” said Elas
and, returning to the Regent’s side. “But I see that’s not to be. Very well, Elasirr-re. I speak on behalf of the major Guilds in this City, Your Grace.”
“What’s this?” Hestiam began to frown, straightening in his seat.
“It’s regarding something this City has found to be imperative—although now, with the coming of Vorn, it might take second place. The matter of a City-wide Guild Council.”
“Several months ago, Your Grace,” interrupted Elasirr, “You had denied this very thing to a group of Guildmasters, including myself, when we brought it up to your attention. Now, we believe, you must seriously consider the needs of this City as they must be served through such a Council. The ancient and venerable Council of Guilds had existed long before the Grelias had come to power by proxy of Monteyn. And even Your Grace has no authority to deny it as a body of political power.”
“You are insolent, Elasirr—” began Hestiam.
“I am merely passionate, Your Grace,” interrupted again the blond, his eyes like quicksilver. “And knowing Your Grace’s love of the truth, such a lapse is surely a matter of oversight, but an oversight that is to be remedied now. I realize my words are out of line, but Your Grace knows me, I am not afraid, had never been afraid of Your fair judgment and wisdom. In fact, I trust to such an extent that Your Grace will decide wisely, that I now pledge the full backing of my Guild for Your Grace’s current support, and if needed—future protection.”
“Are you saying,” muttered the Regent, “that Bilhaar will stand behind the Regency now in all things, if I were to call the Council? That all manner of underhanded suspect activity will cease on your part? No more hired vendetta murders in the Families, no more executions outside the law? Will your network of operatives continue to pit Guilds against each other by providing costly protection to all sides in convoluted layers of power hierarchies? Does it mean that you would swear a straightforward fealty to Grelias?”
“Sweet lords of Rainbow, no. . . .” Elasirr began to chuckle, then sat down unceremoniously before Hestiam on the sofa.
Both Elasand and Ranhé observed this scene with deep interest.