The White Gryphon

Five

There was a familiar knock at the door, a little after dinnertime and just before Court. The servant spoke a sentence or two in hushed tones.

“Don’t tell me,” Skandranon groaned, as the servant—once again—ushered in Leyuet and the Spears of the Law. This was the third time in six days. “Another murder.”

Leyuet nodded grimly. His dark face was drawn and new worry-lines etched the corners of his mouth. And was there more gray in his hair? It seemed so. “Another murder. Another professed opponent of the treaty. This time, in a room locked and barred from within. It must be by magic. You were, of course, watched all afternoon during your sleep period?”

Skan gestured broadly to indicate the pair of heavily-muscled spear-bearers, standing stoically in what passed for the corners of the room. “They never left my side, and they never slept.” After the second murder, a single watcher had not been deemed enough to insure Skandranon’s innocence by some parties, so a second Spear of the Law had been added to make certain that the first was not duped or slumbering. “I’ve either been here or in the garden. Just ask them.”

Leyuet sighed, a look of defeat creeping over him. “I do not need to, for I know that they will confirm your words. But I also know that no magician of the Haighlei could have done this. As you rightly pointed out, to overcome all the disturbances in the use of magic would require more power than any of our priests or mages has available to him. Thus the mage must be foreign, with foreign ways of working magic.” He rubbed his eyes, a gesture that had become habitual over the past several days, as Leyuet clearly got less and less sleep. “No Haighlei would ever have committed murder so—so crudely, so impolitely, either.”

Skan coughed to keep from choking with astonishment. Every time he thought he understood the Haighlei ways, someone said something that surprised him all over again. “You mean to tell me that there is a polite way to commit murder?” he blurted.

Leyuet did not rise to the bait; he just shook his head. “It is just the Haighlei way. Even murder has a certain protocol, a set ritualistic aspect to it. For one thing, a murderer must accomplish certain tasks to be certain that the spirit of his victim has been purged from the earth. How else could the perpetrator feel satisfaction? But this conforms to nothing Haighlei. It is not random, but there is no pattern to it, either.”

Zhaneel coughed politely, drawing Leyuet’s gaze toward her. “All the victims were women as well as being opposed to the alliance,” Zhaneel suggested delicately. “Could it be a case of a jilted lover? Someone who approached all three of the women about an assignation and was rebuffed—or someone who once had affairs with them and was cast off for another?”

But Leyuet only shook his head again. “There would be even more of ritual in that case. No, this has no pattern, it was done by magic, and it is like nothing we have ever seen in the Empire.”

As if some madman among the Haighlei could not act in a patternless fashion. “It is new, in other words,” Skan said flatly. “And since it is new, and we are new, therefore—”

“Therefore I must summon you before the Emperor Shalaman once again,” Leyuet finished for him, spreading his hands wide. “It is the pattern.”

Skan simply bowed to the inevitable. I have no choice, after all. I cannot even try to go back to White Gryphon now; they might decide that retreat was an admission of guilt and send an army. “Lead on,” he replied, gesturing with his foreclaw. “I am at your disposal.”

And I only hope that isn’t a prophetic phrase! I would very much prefer not to be “disposed of!”

Kanshin worked the little wooden ball up and around his fingers, from the index to the littlest finger and back again, in an exercise often used by street-entertainers who practiced sleight-of-hand and called it magic. He was no street-entertainer, however. He was a thief, and a master thief at that. More than any street-entertainer, he needed to keep his hands supple.

His father would be horrified, if he still lived, to know what “trade” Kanshin now plied. Better to be a master thief than a master-ditchdigger. That was what Kanshin’s father had been, and his grandfather, and so on back for ten generations. That, so the priests and the gods decreed, was what Kanshin should have been.

Kanshin sneered at them all, at his father for being a fool, at the priests for the “decrees” that duped so many. A pox upon priests and gods together. Assuming there even are any gods, which I doubt.

He worked the ball around his left hand, across the palm, and up to the index finger again. My father believed in the gods and the priests, and we starved. I like my way better.

Kanshin had more intelligence than to believe the pious rhetoric spewed out in regular, measured doses by the priests—especially when the only way to “be certain” of a better position in one’s next life was to bestow all of one’s wealth on the priests in this one. Not that a ditch-digger was going to acquire much wealth over the course of a lifetime, but Kanshin’s father had devoted every spare coin to the purchase of that new life, to the detriment and hardship of his own children.

Perhaps that was why Kanshin had seen through the scheme by the time he was five. Hunger undermined manners. Polite people didn’t question.

He glanced at the door to the guest room, thinking he had heard a sound, but it was nothing.

Even our guest would certainly agree with me and not with my father. He might be insane, but he certainly isn‘t stupid.

He had hoped for a while that he might escape the endless cycle of backbreaking labor and poverty by being taken by the priests as a mage—but that never happened. No mage-craft and easy life for me. What a joke! If the gods really existed, they’d have arranged for me to have the powers of magic, wouldn’t they? If they had, I’d be one of their fat priests or fatter mages right now, and there would be many people still in the incarnations I cut short. But there were no gods, of course, and no priest had come to spirit Kanshin away to a better life. So, one day, when his father and mother and bawling, brawling siblings were all sleeping the sleep of the stupefied, he ran away. Away to the city, to the wicked, worldly city of Khimbata, and a chance for something better than blisters on his hands, a permanently bent back, and an early grave.

Kanshin smiled with satisfaction at his own cleverness. So much for the gods, who sought to keep him in his place. For although he could not go higher in caste to win himself the fortune and luxury he craved—he could go lower.

He transferred the ball to his right hand, and began the exercise all over again.

He had started out as a beggar, self-apprenticed to one of the old hands of the trade, aged Jacony. Jacony had taught him everything; how to wrap his body tightly with bandages to look thinner, how to make his face pale and wan or even leprous, how to create sores from flour, water, and henna, how to bind his leg or arm to make it look as if he were an amputee. That was all right for a while, as long as he was young and could look convincingly starved and pathetic—and as long as the sores and deformations his master put on him were strictly cosmetic. But when the old man let drop the fact that he was considering actually removing a hand or a foot to make Kanshin into a “wounded lion hunter,” Kanshin decided that he’d better find another trade and another master.

I can’t believe the old man thought I’d stand for that. I wasn’t that desperate! But—maybe he was. And missing a hand or afoot, I’d be a lot more conspicuous if I tried to run off—a lot more dependent on him, too, I suppose.

It didn’t take him long to find a new master, now that he knew his way around the city. By that time, he was quite conversant with the covert underground of beggars, whores, and thieves that swarmed the soft underbelly of the lazy metropolis, like fleas living in the belly-fur of a fat, pampered lapdog. And he knew what he wanted, too.

There were other masters ready to take me at that point. Lakshe, for instance. He hadn’t ever given Lakshe’s offer serious thought because he didn’t intend to become a boy-whore, although the trade paid well enough. He would have only one chance in ten of earning enough before he became too old to be called a “boy” anymore, and there wasn’t a lot of call for aging catamites.

And the odds of becoming a procurer like Lakshe are even lower than earning enough to keep you for the rest of your life.

He’d tried being a beggar, and he just looked too healthy, too strong; not all the paste-and-henna sores in the world would convince people he was really suffering, not unless he did undergo a self-amputation. I didn’t like begging, anyway. No chance for a fortune. And scraping out a living that way was hardly better than digging ditches.

So—that left thief, an avocation he was already attracted to. He smiled as he worked the ball across his fingers. I’d even picked a pocket or two by then, so I was ready, ready to learn more.

He was still young enough—just—to get a master. He chose one of the oldest thieves in the city, an alcoholic sot who lived on cadged drinks and a reputation many doubted. No one knew that Poldarn was more than a drunk and a liar. Kanshin had not doubted him after several of the stories had, on investigation, proven to be true. Nor had he doubted the man’s ability to teach him, if only Kanshin could keep him sober and alive long enough to do so.

He had managed both, and now, if he was not the master-thief in the city, he was certainly among the masters. Poldarn did know every trick of the trade, from picking locks to climbing up walls with no more gear than ten strong fingers and toes. He was good, I’ll grant him that. Too bad drink addled his wits.

And his master? Dead, now; collapsed back into the gutter as soon as Kanshin left him on his own. He couldn’t stay sober a day without me. He was drunk the day I set up on my own, and I never saw him sober after that. I don’t think he lived more than a fortnight after I left.

Hardly a surprise; the man’s liver must have been the size of a goose. Either that—or he went back to drinking the same quantities of strong liquor that he had of weak, and the drink itself killed him. Small loss, to the world or to me. Where were the gods for him, when he was drinking himself into a stupor?

The young thief had been good—and careful. He neither over- nor under-estimated his own abilities, and he always brought back the goods he’d been paid to take.

Now Kanshin had all the things he had dreamed of; a house, slaves, fine foods to eat and wines to drink. The food was as good as that from the King’s table, and the wines were often better.

The house was a grand affair, like the dream of a palace on the inside—granted, the house was in the heart of the Dakola District, but no one was stupid enough to try to rob Kanshin. The last fool who’d tried was still serving out his punishment, chained to a wall in Kanshin’s basement, digging a new cesspit. That was afar more effective deterrent than simply killing or maiming interlopers. After all, most of them, like Kanshin himself, had become thieves to avoid hard labor. When they found themselves little better than slaves, forced to wield shovels and scrub dirty dishes, they never tried to rob him a second time.

He listened very carefully, and smiled when he heard the faint scrape of a shovel on dirt. Now there was one unhappy thief who would not be making a second visit to Kanshin.

The house itself looked like every other filthy, rundown heap in the district—outside. Inside, it was crammed with every luxury that Kanshin could buy or steal. Perhaps service was a little slower than in the homes of the nobles—the slaves were hobbled with chains to hinder their escape—but Kanshin didn’t mind. In fact, he rather enjoyed seeing people who could probably boast higher birth than he, weighted down with iron and forced to obey his every whim. Slavery was not legal in this kingdom, but none of these people would dare to complain of their lot.

Not all of this was due entirely to his own work, but it was due to his own cleverness.

He set the ball aside, and began to run the same exercises using a coin. It was clever to find this perfect partner. It was clever to see his cleverness. Some eight or nine years ago, right after that strange winter when the priests all seemed to vanish for a time and there were rumors all over the city of magic gone horribly wrong, a young and comely stranger began walking the streets of the Dakola District. He claimed to be a mage, which all men knew to be impossible, since no mage—by definition a Law-Keeper—would ever frequent the haunts of the Law-Slayers. So all men laughed him to scorn when he told them this, and that he was looking for a thief to partner him in certain enterprises.

No one believed him. They should have known that a story so preposterous had to be true.

All men laughed at him but one—Kanshin, who bethought him that if a ditchdigger could slip through the Law to become a master-thief, could not a renegade mage slip through the Law as well to retain his magic? So he sought out this man, and discovered that what no one else would believe was nothing more nor less than the barest, leanest truth.

He—the man called himself “Noyoki,” which meant “No one”—was a mage. And he had, by sheerest accident, slipped through the hands of the priests. At seventeen he had been discovered in some unsavory doing by the priests, his teachers—what, Kanshin never bothered to find out for true, although Noyoki said it had been because he used his powers to cheat at games of chance.

That seems unlikely . . . but then again, these priests find cheating to be a sin only second to murder. I suppose it never occurs to them that they are the real cheats. They had, of course, decreed that he should have his powers removed, as always. No child caught misusing his powers could be allowed to retain them. For that matter, it was rumored that adult mages had been stripped of their powers for misuse.

A useful rumor to circulate I suppose, if you are intent on preserving the illusion of the integrity of your adult mages.

It was the mad magic that had saved Noyoki, that first wave of mad magic ten years ago that had lit up the night skies, created abortive and mismade creatures, muddled everything and turned the world of the mages upside-down. The priest that should have burned the magic out of his head had been struck down unconscious and died the following week without ever waking again, but Noyoki had the wit to feign the sickness that came when such a deed had been done. And with magic gone quite unpredictable, no one of the priests could tell that it had not been done.

So he was sent back to his family in disgrace—powers intact, and lacking only a few months of training to be a full mage.

They were told he should never be trusted, never given power, a high office, or any responsibility. Kanshin smiled at that. Another challenge to the nonexistent gods; if they had never given this boy magic, he would never have turned against the world and cultivated Kanshin. If he had never met Kanshin, there were things stolen and deaths recorded that would never have happened.

So much for the gods.

It was a lofty house, for Noyoki had quarters of his own within the Palace itself. Noyoki had waited until they ceased to put eyes on him wherever he went, and left him in scorn to seek whatever excesses might soonest bring his cycle to the earliest end. That was what he was supposed to do. No one dreamed he had any ambitions at all; they should have been burned out with his magic.

Then, once no one bothered to watch him anymore, he went down into the quarter of the thieves, to seek a thief as a partner.

Kanshin and Noyoki were successful beyond Kan-shin’s original dreams of avarice—though Noyoki never seemed to want the gems and artifacts, the drugs and the rare essences that Kanshin stole with his help. No, Noyoki was most interested in paper, documents—

Well, that was fine with Kanshin. Let Noyoki have the documents; Kanshin knew better than to try to take them to use himself. That required subtlety which Kanshin had, but it also required knowledge of their owners and the enemies of their owners which he did not have. He was smart enough to know that he could and would never learn these things in time to make proper use of the stolen papers.

Noyoki also had another power—rarely used and hard on him—that allowed him to place Kanshin within a locked and barred room and extract him again. At first he had not been able to do this more than once a year or so, but lately, he had been able to accomplish it much oftener. For a thief, such a talent was beyond price, and Kanshin treasured his partnership, suffering insults and slights from Noyoki he would never have suffered from another living being.

Things have been going well. Kanshin frowned. So why has Noyoki suddenly gotten greater ambitions?

Everything had gone according to the plan Kanshin had worked out for his life—when the unexpected happened. Kanshin had wealth, power, a certain amount of fame, and needed only to work when he chose. But one day not long ago, Noyoki had brought the madman now in Kanshin’s guest chamber to Kanshin’s home and bade him care for the pale-skinned creature.

Hadanelith was the madman’s name, a man with the white skin of a leper, the pale-blue eyes of a lemur, and hair like bleached straw. Kanshin would have thought that this “Hadanelith” was some kind of misbegotten sport, created from a normal man by the mad magic, if he had not once seen the Emperor’s kestra’chern, The Silver Veil, with his own eyes. She had skin as pale, eyes as washed-out, and hair of an even stranger silver color. So the madman was not a misbegotten thing, but only a man from another land.

I do not understand this creature. Hadanelith found humor in things not even Kanshin found amusing; he made slaves of the slaves, manipulating their minds in such a way that Kanshin could remove their chains at any time and never fear their escaping. Of course, once Hadanelith had done with them, they were useless to anyone but him. Kanshin was just glad he had not given the man access to more than three, of which only two were female. Hadanelith had no use for males. Kanshin refused to allow himself to be intimidated by the man, but his strange behavior unnerved him.

On the other hand, he is frighteningly intelligent. He had learned their language so quickly that Kanshin wondered now and again if the man had plucked it from their minds. But no—he had only learned by listening, and when he finally spoke, it was with no real accent. He might giggle like an hysterical girl with pleasure in the work he had done for them, but it was competent work, and within the limits he and Noyoki set, Hadanelith worked well.

One of the slaves—one that Hadanelith had not spoiled—came to the door of Kanshin’s work room, a chamber filled with the tools of his trade and the instruments he used to keep his body as supple as that of the young thief he had once been. “Master,” said the man, his head lowered submissively, “Noyoki awaits your pleasure in the reception chamber.”

“Good.” Kanshin placed the coin back in the holder beside the ball, and rose from his chair. “Tell him I will be with him shortly.”

With a faint clinking of chain, the slave bowed and shuffled out. Kanshin smiled at his back.

Then he surveyed himself in the full-length mirror to be certain there was nothing lacking in his appearance. He suspected Noyoki to be of extraordinarily high birth, and he had tried, since the beginning, to look as outwardly respectable as someone of high caste could. Noyoki himself cultivated a rapscallion appearance, wearing untidy robes of odd cut, his hair woven into braids like a working man, but that did not mean he was not influenced without his realizing it by the appearance of respectability. Every trick that came to hand was necessary when dealing with Noyoki.

There was nothing to mark Kanshin as a person of anything less than the caste of bankers and professionals.

He smoothed his robes with a proprietary hand and went in search of his partner.

Noyoki sprawled casually on one of the couches in the reception chamber, his hair beaded as well as braided, his bright cotton robe made of patchwork material, like that of a mountebank or street-entertainer. He was examining a piece of carving that Hadanelith had left on one of the tables, looking it over with intense scrutiny, a frown of concentration on his handsome, chiseled features.

“What do you make of this?” he asked as Kanshin entered, followed by the slave with a tray of fruit ices for their refreshment. He held it up; there was no mistaking what it was meant for, but the shape was odd. It was carved to resemble a rabbit, with long ears pressed tightly together, and a misshapen, bulbous body. The expression on the rabbit’s stupid face was that of sheer terror. Not the sort of expression one would expect to find on a toy of that nature. It was not unheard of for these toys to be shaped like animals, but the animals always looked as if they were cheerfully enjoying themselves.

“It is one of your friend’s toys,” Kanshin replied easily. “And I suspect it would give us a great deal of insight into his way of thinking if we knew why he had carved it that way. He presented me with it this afternoon. There was blood on it.”

“Charming.” Noyoki did not put it down immediately, as Kanshin had thought he might. Then again, given that he had turned to blood-magic, perhaps the thing held some arcane significance for him. “He performed well this afternoon.”

“You would be the one to know, not I, by the results of your working.” Kanshin raised his eyebrows in inquiry; Noyoki only smiled, and ran his fingers along the smooth wood of the carving, caressing the toy with his touch.

“If that is a question, yes, the blood-power came through strong and clear. It more than tripled the reserves I expended to put him in place and take him out again.” Noyoki had told Kanshin that only the power that came through pain and spilled blood was strong enough to allow him to work magics in the old way, before magery had run wild. What he was doing, Kanshin did not ask. He really did not want to know. The less I know of his doings, the safer I am. He knew very well that Noyoki would not hesitate to be rid of him if the mage thought he knew too much.

Whatever magics the man worked now, it was something to put Noyoki back in a position of power, though whether overt or covert, Kanshin would not even guess. He knew that the victims Noyoki had chosen for his “pet” to slay were all rivals or former rivals; perhaps he was ridding himself of his male rivals by using the deaths of their females to undermine them.

“It is a pity that we cannot persuade the man to broaden his—ah—interests,” he said carefully.

Noyoki frowned. “If I could find a way to coerce him to take men—well, perhaps coercion would be a bad idea. He is an artist in his way, and when one coerces an artist, the work is always flawed.”

Kanshin nodded, although the turn of Noyoki’s phrase surprised him. Had the mage spoken from past experience?

Their dual role in this was to use Hadanelith to simulate murder by magic. Kanshin would find a way to insert Hadanelith into the victim’s chambers and get him out again; if there was no other way in, Noyoki would spirit him in and out by that odd talent of his when he was done, using the excess of the power released from the victim’s suffering and death. In between, Hadanelith had free rein to work whatever atrocities on the victim that he chose, up until the moment he received the signal to kill.

A clever plan, which required a minimum of magic to carry out. At the moment, Kanshin’s payment was coming through Noyoki, and both maintained the polite fiction that Noyoki was working for someone else, some great noble who wanted obstacles removed from his path, but in such a way that these dangerous new pale-skinned allies were also placed under suspicion.

It is easier to discredit foreigners anyway. It is just a good thing that their arrival coincided with the beginning of our plan. Kanshin had not told Hadanelith any more than was strictly necessary to carry out the work, but he wondered if the man had guessed who was taking the blame for the murders. If so, he did not seem at all displeased by the idea of what might be his own countrymen being falsely accused.

Perhaps he simply doesn‘t care. Or perhaps these people drove him out of their ranks. . . . That was an interesting thought. If Hadanelith had tortured and killed before, it would account for his peculiar competence in that area.

He was a good, if flawed, tool. He followed his instructions to the letter, as long as he knew why he was supposed to be doing something. When the signal to kill came, he never balked.

The trouble is, we cannot be certain how much longer he will remain tractable.

As Kanshin understood it, for Noyoki’s blood-magic to work, the power he received had to be incredibly strong, which meant the murders must be committed with a diabolical, rabid brutality. Despite the fact that the Emperor was trying to keep the news suppressed, rumors of the murders were already in the lower districts of Khimbata, and hardened criminals spoke of the scenes and the victims with troubled awe, as if even they could not imagine doing such things.

“How much longer do you think we can keep a leash on our dog?” Noyoki asked, as if he was aware of Kanshin’s doubts.

Kanshin shrugged. “How much longer do you need him? He seems stable enough for now. I think as long as he knows that we are the only route to what he wants, he will obey. But he is not sane, Noyoki. He could suddenly change, and we would have no warning of it.”

Noyoki nodded, face solemn, the beads on the ends of his braids clicking with the movement of his head. “His carving might give us a clue.”

“True.” Hadanelith had a mania for carving; he always had a knife in his hands and a piece of wood, and there were more of his twisted little sculptures all over the house. Kanshin didn’t mind the mess and the shavings at all; while Hadanelith carved, he was not getting into other mischief.

“I think he knows about the visitors taking the blame for the murders,” Noyoki said, suddenly switching topics. “I think it pleases him. Perhaps these people were his enemies.”

“Perhaps they were his jailers!” Kanshin retorted sharply. “Never forget what this man does, Noyoki! Never forget that Hadanelith is mad, and he could decide he wants to do it to you! We may turn the tiger upon the tracks of our foes, but the tiger can decide to turn back again and seek us instead!”

“Yes,” Noyoki replied with an odd and disquieting smile. “And that is what makes the game all the more interesting, is it not?”

Madness must be contagious, for he surely is mad! Kanshin thought with astonishment.

“I am not mad, Kanshin,” Noyoki said, in another uncanny answer to words left unspoken. “I am simply interested in a challenge, and Hadanelith presents such a challenge. If it is possible, I should like to tame him to my hand as I have tamed the lion and the pard.”

Kanshin shrugged. “On your head be it,” he replied. “I am interested only in getting rid of him once our tasks for him have been completed. If you choose to take him into your own household, I simply ask that you take him as far away from me as possible.”

“Perhaps I will,” Noyoki observed, stretching like a well-fed and very lazy cat. “And with that, I shall take my leave of you; I will bring you the information on the next of Hadanelith’s playfellows tomorrow.”

Kanshin bowed him out to the street and stood in the doorframe, watching his back as he disappeared into the swirling crowds. He is not a fool, but he is foolhardy, the thief thought as he closed the door and retreated into the perfumed safety of his own home and away from the noisome babble and stenches of the streets. Too foolhardy for me. Once this set of jobs is over, I am retiring, far away from here. He had just the place in mind too; a lake big enough to be considered an inland sea. Such recklessness is like teasing a lion; you never get a second chance to learn how much is too much.

He retreated deeply into the depths of his home, past rooms that only opened when he had picked a complicated lock, and which relocked themselves when the door closed. He took himself to the farthest of those rooms, a place where Hadanelith did not go and where, hopefully, he could not go.

The trouble was, the madman learned at a terrible speed. There was no reason why he could not learn to master all those locks, as he had already mastered the language and the thief’s tricks that Kanshin had taught him.

Kanshin flung himself down on a couch, and laid his right arm across his eyes. How long would the madman remain “safe?” That was a good question.

He only wished he had an answer.

Skandranon was making some decisions as he marched toward the Audience Chamber under armed guard for the third time in a week. For one thing, he was getting damned tired of taking the blame for someone else’s murders! Especially when the law-keepers didn’t seem to him to be making much of an effort to find the real culprit!

His control over his temper had improved over the past several years, but he was just about to lose all that hard-won control. He felt the hackles on the back of his neck rising, despite a conscious effort to make them lie flat.

How can they even pretend that I’m still a suspect? he growled to himself. I’ve been under guard for two of the three killings! After the second, they should have removed my guard, not doubled it!

The situation was uncomfortable enough for him personally, but by now it was obvious that someone, probably someone in Shalaman’s own court, was trying to discredit the Kaled’a’in. We should be uniting to find the culprit, he seethed. They should have asked me to bring in the other mages from White Gryphon, mages who might know other techniques to get at the truth! Instead—here I am, being hauled up in front of the King again!

These murders were jeopardizing everything he had worked for since Urtho’s death, threatening to put the Kaled’a’in in the position having to make an untenable choice—abandon the city and rebuild elsewhere, where the arm of the Haighlei did not reach, or stand and fight for what they had built so far, against a vastly superior force.

By the time they reached the Audience Chamber, Skan was so angry he was just about ready to disembowel something.

So instead of parading meekly into the chamber as he had the past two times, this time he shouldered his guards aside and pushed his way up to King Shalaman. The courtiers quickly leaped aside when they saw the look on his face, the parted beak, the raised hackles, the anger in his eyes. The King’s bodyguards instinctively stepped forward when the last of the courtiers jumped out of his way, leaving nothing between him and Shalaman but those two guards. But Skan waited for Leyuet and the escort to catch up—which didn’t take long—and then he opened his beak and let the words pour out.

Leyuet was babbling, trying to keep up with his own flowing torrents of words. Skan ignored him, in part because he had a suspicion that Shalaman didn’t need an interpreter.

“. . . and what I don’t understand is why no one has even begun to look for a suspect besides me!” he ranted, his voice coming close to a shriek on the last few words. People winced and tried to cover their ears. “What is wrong with you people? I mean, I know that magic’s gone bad, but surely with enough power behind a simple spell your mages could make it work! If your mages don’t know anything about using magic to find criminals, then mine do, and I’ll bring them here from White Gryphon if that’s what it takes!” He was in fine style now, pacing and lashing his tail, radiating enough anger to have sunburned anyone near him. “Are you deliberately obstructing the investigations? Have you even started them? I saw no signs of it!”

There was horrified scandal in the murmurs he heard, the faces he watched as he paced and ranted.

He was actually beginning to enjoy himself. Evidently this was something that was just Not Done in Haighlei society.

Well, murder is Not Done, and accusing someone falsely of murder is Not Done—and it’s about time someone woke them up to that fact.

Since the polite approach had produced no obvious cooperation on their part, perhaps violating all their social rules would!

Leyuet watched in horror as the huge white gryphon broke away from his escort and began to force his way through the courtiers—although it didn’t take long for the courtiers to notice what Skandranon was doing, and leap hastily out of the way. What did the creature think he was doing? Surely he wasn’t going to—

But Skandranon stopped short of the throne and began to pace back and forth, his voice raised to a shout, accusing the Haighlei of trying to blame him for the murders for the sake of convenience. Accusing the King of originating the plan!

The gryphon was angry, showing more anger than Leyuet had ever seen demonstrated in his life. His rage was a palpable thing, radiating from him in waves of passion as he paced and turned, never once ceasing in his accusations.

He is innocent. Leyuet was sure of that on all counts; such rage could not be the product of guilt, and that was nothing more than simple fact. Leyuet himself had ascertained the gryphon’s innocence a dozen times over, with far more than the simple facts to guide him.

So now what do we do? For the very first time since the strangers had arrived here, Skandranon was acting like a King, like the equal of any of the Haighlei Emperors, addressing Shalaman as an equal, demanding his rights, demanding action. This, along with their basic understanding of the gryphon’s position as the Kaled’a’in leader, only confirmed his real position in Leyuet’s eyes—and presumably in the eyes of every other Haighlei present.

And that only complicated the situation.

I will have to remove the guards, of course. A King simply could not be imprisoned or under guard—or held for ransom—or even questioned publicly!

“I swear to you, to you all, if you don’t do something, I will!” Skandranon shouted, his feathers standing on end with rage, his beak snapping off the words as if he would like very much to be closing it on someone’s arm. “I will find the murderer! I will bring him to justice!”

Leyuet’s dismay deepened, as he surreptitiously gestured to Skandranon’s guards to take themselves elsewhere. Now what were they going to do? Kings didn’t run about trying to solve a murder! They left that up to the Truthsayers and the Spears Of the Law!

Except that the Truthsayers and the Spears hadn’t been doing very well. The gryphon was right enough about that.

Whatever were they going to do?

The Emperor caught Leyuet’s eye and gave a slight nod in Skandranon’s direction. Leyuet cast his own eyes upward for a moment, then nodded back. Some called it magic, some felt that it bordered on the blasphemous powers of seeing into another’s mind, but the Truthsayers were trained by the priests to know, infallibly, whether or not someone was speaking the truth. And Leyuet had just told Shalaman without words that the white gryphon was doing just that. It was only a surface touch of the soul; Leyuet dared not go deeper, as he would with a human. He had no notion how his own soul would react to such an intimacy. But at the moment the surface touch was all that was needed.

The skin around Shalaman’s eyes twitched. That was all, but it was an unusual display of emotion from the Emperor.

We are in a tangle, and I see no way out of it. But I am not the King. Perhaps Shalaman—

The gryphon finally ran out of words—or his rage overcame his ability to speak—and he stood quietly, sides heaving with angry pants, glaring at Shalaman. The silence that fell over the court was so profound that the calls of birds and monkeys penetrated into the Audience Chamber from outside.

“I understand your anger,” Shalaman said quietly in the foreigners’ own tongue—shocking Leyuet. The Emperor never demeaned himself by speaking the language of another!

Unless, of course, the other was a King in his own right. In one stroke, Shalaman had just confirmed the gryphon’s status and changed the rales of the game.

“I understand it and sympathize with it,” he continued. “Look about you—you are no longer under any sort of guard.”

Skandranon nodded shortly without looking around. Good. He is willing to take Shalaman’s word for it. Leyuet let out a tiny sigh of relief, for that was one small obstacle dealt with.

“I know that you have not seen any of our investigations; be assured that they are going on, even at this moment,” Shalaman continued. “It is only that all such things must take place within the grounds of the temples. That is our way. That is probably also why you have noticed nothing of a magic nature taking place in the vicinity of the palace.”

“Ah,” the gryphon replied, a little more satisfied. “Now I understand. I had taken the lack of spell-energy for lack of effort.”

“It is an effort,” Shalaman admitted. “As you yourself are aware, that event you call the Cataclysm has changed everything for both our peoples. The mages and priests have, thus far, come up with no suspects—but they have eliminated you, which gives you yet one more voucher of innocence.”

The gryphon muttered something under his breath. Both Leyuet and the Emperor pretended not to notice.

“Please, I earnestly ask you, do not bring your foreign mages here,” Shalaman continued. “Such an act will only serve to drive a wedge between yourselves and our priests. That would be a bad thing for all concerned.”

“Then what can I do?” Skandranon demanded.

“Be patient,” Shalaman told him. “Please. You are once again free to come and go as you will in this Court and Palace. You will not be guarded nor watched.”

Leyuet wondered if the gryphon realized that Shalaman was giving him tacit permission to go fly off and perform his own investigations.

Probably, he decided. The gryphon is not stupid. If he can master the court dances the way he has, he will be able to read what is not said as well as what is said.

But that would only give him one more personal headache; how to keep the gryphon safe while Skandranon was winging his way everywhere.

The gryphon’s feathers slowly collapsed, bringing him down to a more normal appearance. He and Shalaman exchanged several more words, now in calmer tones, and with less vehemence behind them. That was when the gryphon surprised Leyuet yet again by replying to one of Shalaman’s questions in the Haighlei tongue, neatly turning the diplomatic tables on the Emperor.

Although all of this was very good, a headache still throbbed in Leyuet’s temple when it was all over and the gryphon had gone away, bowing gracefully.

Leyuet did not follow; the Emperor’s eyes held him where he stood. For a moment, he feared that Shalaman would summon him to the side of the throne, but once the gryphon was well away, the Emperor only nodded, releasing Leyuet from any further need to dance attendance on him.

Shalaman’s nod was accompanied by the faintest of sympathetic smiles, telling Leyuet that the Emperor had noticed the lines of pain about his eyes and mouth. Shalaman was good at noticing things, and was only unkind to his subordinates when need drove him to unkindness.

Leyuet took himself out, quickly. Silver Veil had not been in her Advisor’s position at the throne, and neither had Palisar. The latter was probably in the temple complex located on the Palace grounds, overseeing the magical investigations into the murders. The former must be in her quarters.

This was, for Leyuet’s sake, a very good thing, the first good thing that had happened today.

A Truthsayer must always find the truth. A Truthsayer could not be bought for any coin. This was a weighty responsibility; and all those bearing weighty responsibilities went to Silver Veil for solace. That solace was generally not the kind of physical comfort that the lower classes assumed. Leyuet could have that at any time, from any number of skilled ladies. No, the solace that Silver Veil provided was of another order altogether.

His feet took him to Silver Veil’s suite without a conscious decision on his part, purely in the hope that she might not be giving another the privilege of her skills. He had not gone to her in many days, respecting her need for privacy in the wake of the horrifying murders—but now, his own pain and need were too great. The physical pain of the headache warned him of worse to come if he did not have it tended to, now.

Silver Veil’s servants answered his knock and ushered him into a room he knew well, a room where the harsh light of the sun was softened by gauze curtains drawn across many windows, where the scents of flowers blended gracefully with those of soothing herbs, where the only furnishings were low couches covered in soft, absorbent fabrics, couches that could also be used for massages.

The colors here were all cool; deep greens and blues, strong, clear colors that accentuated Silver Veil’s pale beauty. She entered once the servants had settled him on one of the couches, and had clothed him in a light robe suitable for a massage.

She slipped among the gauze hangings like a slim silver fish through water-weeds, a silver-chased basket in her hands. She put it down beside him, and experimentally touched his shoulders with her fingers.

“My goodness,” she said with an upraised eyebrow. “You should have come to me several days ago! Palisar certainly didn’t hesitate.”

“I am not Palisar,” he reminded her.

“No, you aren’t. You are Leyuet, who sacrifices his own comfort far too often. Here—” She flipped open the lid of the casket, revealing the contents.

It contained neither massage oils nor treasure, but Leyuet’s own secret passion and guilty pleasure: sugar-powdered pastries and cookies.

“Oh—” he said ruefully, in mingled appreciation and concern. “Oh, my dear child, I shall eat these and put on so much weight that my robes will strain across my stomach!”

“You will eat those because a little bird told me you have eaten next to nothing these past three days,” she said firmly. “You will eat these because you need them, for the soothing of your spirit, because you deserve them. Besides, they are good for you. I used special recipes. I do not ascribe to the belief that what is good for you must taste like so much old, dried-up hay.”

Leyuet finally broke into a smile, selecting a plump pastry. He held it and devoured it first with his eyes, anticipating the sweet savor, the way that the first bite would melt away to nothing on his tongue, releasing the mingled flavors of almond, vanilla, and honey. He closed his eyes, brought the pastry to his mouth, and bit into the flaky crust, as sugar-glaze broke and scattered over his hand.

It tasted every bit as good as he had imagined, and before he realized it, he was licking the last crumbs from his fingers.

Leyuet opened his eyes to see that Silver Veil was watching him with a pleased smile on her lips, her hands folded in her lap. He laughed.

“Silver Veil,” he asked, feeling a warm contentment begin to loosen those knotted muscles in his shoulders before she could even place a finger upon them, “how is it that you always know what someone needs before he himself knows? How is it that you can do the things that are kind as well as the things that are duties, in the face of all obstacles?”

She continued to smile serenely. “I could say it is a professional secret, dear heart—but the truth is that I simply think of another’s hopes before my own, and the kindnesses follow, as naturally as flowers follow buds. It is really no more mysterious than that.”

Leyuet shook his head. “If these strangers, these folk of the Gryphon King, could possibly be anything like you—”

“At least one is, for I taught him, and I think that I know him as well as any person can be said to know another,” she interrupted, directing him to turn his back to her so that she could begin to work on the muscles of his neck and shoulders. He was tempted by the still-open casket beside him, but resisted the temptation.

“Amberdrake, you mean.” He sighed. “He is so foreign—and their King, more alien still. I do not understand them, and I wonder how they could ever understand us. They seem to, but how could they, really? How could anyone who has a King like theirs ever hope to understand us?”

“Would that not make it easier?” she countered. “If someone can understand the ways of a creature like a gryphon, should it not be easier for them to understand the ways of fellow humans?”

He let out his breath in a hiss of pain as she struck a nerve, then shook his head again. “You and they are of a piece, my dear. Their lands gave birth to you and nurtured you. Yet somehow you fit in here as well as with them, and I find that even more mysterious than anything else about you. How can you move so well in two different worlds?”

Silver Veil worked on his muscles for a little longer before she answered.

“Perhaps—” she hesitated. “Perhaps because I have lived long enough that I no longer pay a great deal of attention to what is different, only to what is the same,” she answered slowly. Then her tone grew lighter. “And one of the things that is universal is that no one can truly have his back worked on while he is sitting up like an old nursemaid displaying perfect posture!” She rapped him reprovingly on the shoulder. “Down, Truthsayer! Give me the space to work my will upon you!”

Chuckling, he obliged her, and for the space of an hour at least, he forgot the troubles that had brought him there.