Lies of Light

60

11 Uktar, the Yearof the Banner (1368 DR) Pristal Towers, Innarlith

" I don’t remember the last time I was in the Fourth Quarter,” Phyrea said, swallowing the breathless awe that threatened to overwhelm her.

Her host smiled graciously, but she hardly took notice. The opulence around her made her legs shake.

“If you have any questions about anything you see,” said Pristoleph, “please don’t hesitate to ask.”

Ask him why he lives in such luxury, surrounded by starvation and want, the old woman said.

Phyrea shook her head at the apparition, checking out of the corner of her eye to see if he had noticed. If he had, he was too much of a gentleman to comment.

“It’s not the…” she started. “You have impeccable taste.”

He looked at herreally looked at her, in a way that only one man had before.

Get out of here, the man with the scar on his face said. This one is not to be trifled with.

“It’s quite something that we haven’t met before,” Pristoleph said.

Phyrea stopped at a burled wood side table to admire a tea set that looked to have been cast from platinum traced with gold and accented with diamonds. She couldn’t have begun to guess at its value.

Do you like that? the little girl asked. Phyrea looked over at her. She stood on the other side of the hall next to an identical side table. She had her hand on a cup from a similar tea set, but one made of the most delicate porcelain. Is it better than this one?

Phyrea didn’t respond. She tried not to respond to the ghosts when people were able to hear her, but she desperately wanted to tell the little girl to stop.

The ghost picked up the teacup.

Phyrea gasped.

“Is something wrong?” Pristoleph asked.

The teacup shattered on the floor. The little girl smiled and faded away.

“What?” the senator said, crossing the hall in a few long strides. “How did that happen?”

Phyrea didn’t follow him. She couldn’t move.

Well, the man with the scar on his face saidshe saw him standing at the foot of the wide, sweeping stairs, that’s — never happened before. How did she learn to do that?

Phyrea shook her head and closed her eyes.

“Was that you?” he said.

“What?” Phyrea gasped. “No.”

It was me, the little girl said into her mind.

“Is there someone with you?” Pristoleph asked.

“What?” Phyrea muttered. “No.”

“The man with the scar in the shape of the letter Z?” the senator asked.

Phyrea stared across the hall at Pristoleph and when he approached her she backed away, fending him off with her hands. He stopped a few paces from her. She looked around herself but couldn’t see any of the apparitions.

None of them spoke to her.

“How do you know about him?” she asked, not sure she wanted to hear the answer.

“The pince-nez,” he replied. She squinted at him, and he explained, “Spectacles… lenses that you wear over your eyes. Marek Rymiit gave them to me. When I put them on I could see through your eyesit was as though I were you. That’s when I saw you for the first time, eighteen days ago, in your own mirror.”

“And you saw… him?”

“It looked as though he was there, but not entirely. It was as though he was somehow added onto what I was seeing.” “Made of purple light,” she whispered, and he nodded. “Do you see him now?” he asked. She shook her head. “Do you see him often?”

“Most of the time,” she replied. “They appear to me everywhere, any time they wish, except when I was with”

She almost choked on his name. The ghosts were gone, then, just like they used to stay away when she was with Devorast.

“Used to,” she whispered.

“What did you say?” Pristoleph asked. “Are you talking to him now?”

“No,” she said, and felt the almost forgotten sensation of a smile on her face.

He smiled back at her, and for the first time she noticed his hair, red like Devorast’s, but differentnot human, somehow. It appeared to move as though blown by a wind from below.

“Why did he give you those lenses?” she asked. “Why would Marek Rymiit want you to see through my eyes? Why would he arrange for us to meet tonight?”

Pristoleph said, “He arranged this meeting because I asked him to. As for the pince-nez, I have no idea, but I’m happy that he did.”

Phyrea smiled, still, even when she began to cry.