Part 6 (1/2)
”Not really.” Thiercelin stirred his soup. The royal aisle. Valdarrien's ghost and the message he did not understand. Tell Iareth Yscoithi she was right. Perhaps Yvelliane would know what that meant. He could not tell her, not now when she was so anxious.
There was a silence. Only Miraude was eating. Thiercelin said, ”And tonight?”
”It's the reception for the heir to Lunedith, remember? I told you last week.”
He had forgotten, somehow. It would be a chance, perhaps, to speak with Iareth Yscoithi. Did Yvelliane know she was back in Merafi? He did not know if he could risk asking. Yvelliane went on, ”You don't have to come, if you like. It'll be very formal.”
It would be an evening with Yvelliane. And if she did not know about Iareth, then he would be there to support her. He said, ”Of course I'm coming. I want to see you in your party dress. And Mimi, too, of course.”
”Yviane's intending to wear that dark gray thing again.” Miraude sounded disapproving. ”I tried to make her get a new one, but she kept being too busy.”
”You have enough new dresses for both of us,” Yvelliane said, a smile in her voice. Thiercelin looked up, just to catch it on her lips. She went on, ”Besides, I don't want to stand out. Kenan Orcandros and I have met before. He disapproves of me.”
”He has bad taste, then.” Thiercelin said, hoping to keep her smiling.
He failed. ”No, he just has bad politics,” Yvelliane said, and sighed. ”Firomelle needs me there. She . . .” Her voice died.
He looked at her. ”Is she worse?”
Yvelliane looked at Miraude before replying. Then she said, ”I can't tell.” She rose. ”I'm sorry, Thierry; I don't feel like talking. Later, perhaps?”
Later. When she was weary from work and wanted only to sleep. There would be no time at the reception. She looked tired and sad. This was no time to speak to her of her brother or of Iareth Yscoithi. Rising, he held the door open for her. She smiled at him in pa.s.sing, but her eyes betrayed that her thoughts were elsewhere. He sighed as he sat down again, and Miraude looked at him curiously.
Later. He was losing his faith in later.
Miraude said, ”Thierry, is something wrong?”
She was watching him with a certain caution. He said, ”No, I don't think so.”
”It's just . . .” Her tone was thoughtful.
He put down his spoon and stared at her. ”What?” She evaded his eyes. ”It's just something I heard yesterday, from Mal.”
”From Mal?” He was baffled. ”My so-called friend Mal? As in Maldurel of South Marr? The one with the big mouth and the small brain?”
”You know another one?”
”River forfend! Are you going to tell me what he said?”
”Well . . .” She fidgeted with a knife. ”Apparently one of Mal's sisters is supposed to have seen you in a coffeehouse with one of the professional kind. The beautiful Gracieux-Gracielis de Varnaq. And you've been preoccupied lately, and I just wondered . . .”
”If I'd taken a lover?” Thiercelin was torn between outrage and a species of bitter amus.e.m.e.nt. Dead for six years, Valdarrien, it seemed, was still nevertheless capable of getting him into trouble. He said, ”Well, I haven't and so you may tell Mal!”
She considered him. ”Mal said he was holding your hand.”
”It was nothing like that.” For the thousandth time, Thiercelin found himself regretting having ever introduced Miraude to Maldurel. ”I love Yviane; you know that.” Miraude continued to stare at him. ”Do you want me to swear on a holy book or something?”
”No, I don't think so. Men aren't your thing. And I believe you wouldn't hurt Yviane. It's just Mal . . .”
”Mal talks too much.Valdin always said so.”
”Oh, Valdin,” said Valdarrien's widow dismissively.
Thiercelin was still dealing with his outrage. ”If he's going to be telling everyone, I'll . . .”
”Oh, he won't. I convinced him it was nonsense. And anyway, he always said that his sister had too much imagination.” Miraude had charming dimples. They appeared now, as she smiled and leaned forward. ”So: tell me about Gracieux. You doknow him? He's supposed to be absolutely fabulous.”
”Well, he's fairly unlikely, anyway,” Thiercelin said. Miraude pulled a face. ”I don't know him well. My connection with him is just . . .” He hesitated, unsure of what to say. ”He does translations.”
She raised her brows. ”You're interested in Tarnaroqi literature?”
”No, but . . . it's for my younger brother.” Miraude still looked disbelieving. ”I swear it, Mimi, I'm not having an affair with him. Or with anyone else, for that matter. And so you may tell Mal!”
”All right, I'm sorry.” She leaned over and kissed his cheek. ”I didn't mean anything. I was just worrying.”
He looked at her, ”You, too? Is something wrong?”
”Not really. I suppose I'm concerned for you and Yviane. And this weather!” She gestured at the window. ”All this rain. It makes me restless.”
”Like Valdin.”
She looked interested. ”How?”
”He hated to be bored. Weather like this . . .” He shrugged. ”He was always more . . . excitable at such times.” Her expression suggested that she had noticed the euphemism. He looked apologetic. ”More violent, then. He had an abominable habit of fighting duels in the rain. Very unpleasant for the seconds.”
”Poor Thierry.”
Thierry, forgive . . . Abruptly, Thiercelin said, ”It was worth it. It has to be.” He had to face Iareth Yscoithi, tonight, if he got the chance, and without Yvelliane knowing of it. He could hardly burden Yvelliane with his present problems.
”What is it?” Miraude sounded concerned. ”Are you sure you're all right?”
I could tell her, Thiercelin thought, looking into her wide eyes. She was Valdin's wife,she's young, she might understand. It would be easier, shared. Then he remembered Iareth, who had abandoned Valdarrien when she had learned that he had a wife. Iareth Yscoithi, and a chill autumn night, and slim fingers holding his. He shook his head. ”It's nothing, Mimi. I'm just . . . I'm just worried about Yviane.”
It appalled him that this was, in the end, a lie.
It was late afternoon before Quenfrida left. Her potions and caresses had eased his discomfort, but Gracielis found no peace. The lieutenant's ghost mocked him, and he flinched from it, afraid of shared comprehension.
She was planning something. She was using him to some purpose that he did not understand. He liked it not at all. Dressing with uncertain fingers, he went over it in his mind. Good blood . . . He had never studied the pedigrees of the lesser n.o.bility of Gran' Romagne. He did not remember hearing that Thiercelin's duLaurier line shared Gracielis' own kind of blood. That was the kind of thing he was schooled to know and to recognize. But his out-of-practice eyes had seen no such traces in Thiercelin.
A ghost out of time. Out of order. (A glance, there, for the lieutenant's ghost, watching him as he drew black lines below his lashes.) In addition, it was raining too much, unseasonally. There was something wrong. Something in Merafi's air bespoke change.
It was not his concern. He was Tarnaroqui, bred to beauty and artifice. There should be no place in him for compa.s.sion, for Thiercelin or for dead, murderous Valdarrien. It was nothing to him, what Quenfrida schemed.
Except when she reminded him too sharply of his dependencies. He stroked color along his cheekbones. It was folly, this compa.s.sion, in either of his professions. He was merchandise, no more. In him, attacks of conscience tasted only of sophistry. What right had one who lived through the sale of his body to any dominion over his soul? He could not afford the luxury of integrity.
He was, after all, no better than the rest. The lieutenant's ghost watched him, its face expressionless, as if it distrusted this sudden bitterness. Well, and so he did himself. He was better accustomed to fear and dissimulation. They had honed him to be a weapon, the priests of his people, and cast him aside when he failed. Cast aside, but not lost, as long as Quenfrida lived to bind him. The gift and the burden of the undarii, the perfumed ones, servants of love and death. They were bearers of the other blood, the true blood that was feared in Merafi, bound together in heritage.
He ran a comb through his disordered hair, and caught the eye of the ghost in the mirror. It took no part in his life, save in its self-appointed role of mockery. Whatever it knew of the changes, it would not share.
No more than Gracielis might share any of his own suspicions with Thiercelin of Sannazar.