Part 7 (2/2)

Eldyn had sometimes thought the same thing. Even with Vandimeer dead, it was no easy thing to step out from under the shadow of his father. He finished his own whiskey and refilled both their cups. ”So what was it your father summoned you home for?”

”I thought it was because I left university,” Rafferdy said.

The bottle clattered against the table as Eldyn fumbled it. ”What do you mean you've left university?”

”Didn't I mention it?” Rafferdy said, his glum expression replaced by a sly smile. Rafferdy always waited to deliver news when it would have the most dramatic effect.

”No, you didn't mention it, as you know perfectly well.”

”But you must have noticed I haven't been hanging about the colleges or the coffeehouses.”

”You hate the coffeehouses,” Eldyn said. ”What was it you told me? Beer might make a smart man dull, but coffee is worse because it can delude a dull man into thinking he's sharp. Besides, there's no way I might have noticed you weren't hanging about the university. You know I wasn't able to...that I didn't go back to university this term myself.”

By the look on his face, this was a fact Rafferdy had forgotten. ”I'm sorry, Garritt. It slipped my mind.”

”As does everything not related to clothes or gambling or your own appearance in a mirror.”

Rafferdy was not a selfish or unkind man; he was quite the opposite, really. But like many the son of a lord, a life of privilege had trained him to be generally preoccupied with himself before others, and he had a habit of a.s.suming everyone had the same choices he did.

”You liked university, didn't you?” Rafferdy said, topping off their gla.s.ses. ”My father thought it important that I go, but I found it a load of rubbish. Half the professors were drunks, and the other half were mad. The only useful thing any of them taught me was that I had better clean my teeth if I don't want to have a frightening smile when I'm forty. But I should have known you would like it, Garritt. You have a perverse way of enjoying things that are dreadful and disdaining anything that is marvelous. I've seen you sit in a musty corner, happy as can be reading some dreary old book, and frown when a pretty young woman pa.s.sed by and waved her fan at you, as if it were the most unwelcome of distractions.”

”I did like it,” Eldyn said, and he left it there for a moment, for how could he explain to Rafferdy, to whom it had all meant so little, how to him it had meant so much? At university, he felt as if he was making something of himself-something better. At last he said, ”Sometimes I still go to the coffeehouses. I was at Mrs. Haddon's the other day. I saw Talinger there, and Jaimsley and Warrett.”

”Be wary of those troublemakers, Garritt. Especially Curren Talinger. The gap between discussing politics and proposing treason is not so great as you might think, not these days.”

”But it's only talk,” Eldyn said, even though the same concerns had occurred to him. ”It can't harm anyone.”

Rafferdy shook his head. ”That's where you're wrong. Why do you think my own speech is always so silly and worthless? I've not your brains by half, but I'm not witless either. I speak this way because I know how perilous speech can be. Look there if you think I'm wrong.” He nodded to the copy of the Rules of Citizens.h.i.+p posted on the tavern wall. ”A word is all it takes to put a man in prison, or to seize his property, or to end his life. A saber might be stopped by a s.h.i.+eld. A bullet might be dodged by a stroke of luck. But you can't dodge a word. If one is flung at you, it will hit its mark unerringly. No, Garritt, there's nothing in the world more dangerous than talk.”

Eldyn frowned. These were unusually somber words from his usually cheerful companion. ”By the saints, Rafferdy, what happened to you in Asterlane?”

”I suspect my father wishes me to marry.”

”Really, Rafferdy, what's so unexpected about that? Your father has always urged you to take on more responsibility.”

”It was different this time,” Rafferdy said, fidgeting with his empty gla.s.s. ”He's getting old. And he's not well. He can hardly bear the journey to the city anymore.”

Eldyn lowered his voice. ”But you always knew this must happen.”

”Must it?” Rafferdy said, reaching for the bottle.

As so often, Rafferdy was an enigma to Eldyn. Sometimes he wondered why they were friends at all. They dwelled in different worlds-a fact that Rafferdy sometimes forgot but that Eldyn never did. If they had not known each other from boyhood, they would certainly never have formed an a.s.sociation now. However, their grandfathers-both scions of well-to-do houses-had been devoted friends, and while Rafferdy's father had risen as far as Eldyn's own had fallen, and the two men had held nothing but disdain for each other, their sons had been given the opportunity to form a close friends.h.i.+p while their grandfathers yet lived.

However, at the moment Eldyn's friend confounded him. ”I don't understand, Rafferdy. I've often heard you complain about your father's decisions and practices. Well, one day you will be Lord Rafferdy. That will be your chance to do things as you see fit, to make yourself into something.” He leaned over the table. ”Don't you want to be something, Rafferdy?”

”Yes,” Rafferdy said. ”I want to be utterly harmless.” And he raised his gla.s.s and drained it.

”What are you talking about? You're to be a magnate.”

”And I have seen what magnates do, Garritt. Despite what you might have heard me say, I believe my father is a good man. Yet even he has...” Rafferdy looked away. ”It is a terrible thing to be lord over another man, Garritt. To be the master of his fate. Only G.o.d should have that power.”

”Better to be lord over another man than to be lorded over, to have your fate rest in another's hands,” Eldyn said, unable to keep a bitter note from his voice. ”But I said it once, and I say it again. What happened at Asterlane? What did your father say to you?”

”He told me he is enclosing his lands,” Rafferdy said. And after that they drank their whiskey in silence.

At some point while they sat there, a rather large group spilled into the tavern and took over the booth opposite their own. They were mostly men, but a few women were with them-though which were dressed more lavishly or outlandishly was hard to say. As a whole, they offered such a profusion of velvet, lace, and brocade-in every variety of hue from crimson to cerulean to the deepest violet-as to make a flock of peac.o.c.ks appear drab. The men and women alike wore powdered wigs and powdered faces, pale contrast to their rouged lips and cheeks.

The newcomers called out for drink, and laughed, and sang in high voices. It was a beautiful music but forlorn as well, and for some reason it made Eldyn think of exotic birds locked in filigree cages. From time to time a flash of light issued from the booth across the tavern, catching the corner of Eldyn's eye. However, each time he turned he saw nothing save mouths open in laughter, and a tangle of white arms and long white necks.

”You must forgive me, Garritt,” Rafferdy said, looking up from his cup, which was empty once again. ”I'm dreadful company tonight. I should never have dragged you out. But you're here, and the damage is done, so tell me-what of you? How have you been occupying yourself since you're not in university this term?”

A burst of trilling laughter rang out across the tavern; Eldyn made an effort not to turn and look. ”Would that I had something of great interest to report. I'm working on a few business ventures, that's all. I have a hope they will do me and my sister well.”

Eldyn described in general terms how he intended to invest in a trading company to the New Lands. However, Rafferdy was not paying attention, and it was just as well. For some reason, describing his dealings with Mr. Sarvinge and Mr. Grealing left him uncomfortable; perhaps it was only that he did not want Rafferdy to know how great his need was. In truth, he feared Rafferdy would insist on helping him raise the necessary funds, and he did not wish to be indebted to a friend. Not that it was likely that Rafferdy had ten regals to spare, let alone a hundred. He was not Lord Rafferdy yet.

”I'll go get us more to drink,” Eldyn said, picking up the empty whiskey bottle.

He went to the bar and handed off the empty bottle. As he waited for it to be refilled, he heard a sound behind him. It was soft amid the clamor of the tavern, like the voice of a dove.

Turning, Eldyn saw one of the women from the peculiar group. She sat in a chair apart from the others, dressed in a high-necked gown the color of apricots. Her face was a thing of perfect beauty, flawlessly white, framed by snowy ringlets of hair, her lips and cheeks painted on just so. Something was cradled in her cupped hands.

Eldyn approached. A warm scent rose from her. She smiled and opened her hands. On her palms rested a tiny bird. It was like no creature he had ever seen, for its feathers were pure silver, tinged with gold at the wingtips. Its beak was gold as well, and its eyes tiny sapphires. At first he thought it a clever facsimile wrought of metal, but then he saw its wings stir and its throat flutter as the soft music emanated from it.

The woman held the bird higher, and Eldyn reached out a finger to stroke it. However, even as he touched it, the bird vanished in a flash of white light. Eldyn let out a gasp, and mocking laughter fell from the woman's red lips. Resting on her hand where the bird had been was a silver disk, like some sort of coin. She held it out toward him. Eldyn hesitated, then took it.

”Your whiskey, sir,” said a voice behind him, and Eldyn stumbled around. He took the bottle, shoved the silver coin into his pocket, and, without another look at the woman, hurried back to his table.

”Be careful, Garritt,” Rafferdy said. His glum look was gone, and he wore an amused expression now. ”They are not what they seem.”

”What do you mean?” Eldyn said, too startled to say anything else.

Rafferdy arched an eyebrow. ”You really don't know? Haven't you ever been to one of their plays?”

Eldyn made an effort to hold his hand steady as he poured whiskey. ”Plays?”

”They are Siltheri, Garritt. Illusionists.”

Eldyn looked up from his pouring. Of course-their outlandish clothes and wigs were costumes. They were players, come into the tavern after a performance at some theater.

Rafferdy took his whiskey. ”Just because one looks to be a lady on the outside doesn't mean there's not something very unladylike hiding underneath that dress. As they say, if you see an angel on Durrow Street, it's sure to be a devil beneath. Or didn't you know that all Siltheri are men?”

Eldyn's cheeks glowed with shame, and he was grateful for the dim light. In recent years, the theaters of the illusionists had grown in popularity, if not so much in respectability. Not that Eldyn had ever attended any plays, for want of money. However, he knew that Rafferdy was right, that onstage all roles-both male and female-were played by men, as it was against the law for a woman to work in such a vocation. And if from time to time an illusionist was found floating in the River Anbyrn, it barely earned a mention in the broadsheets. For such things were only to be expected from time to time with men who did such things and who lived such lives.

”I'm sorry, Garritt, I shouldn't laugh,” Rafferdy said, then proceeded to do just that. ”But the look on your face is quite priceless. I've never seen you so addled.”

Eldyn glowered. Rafferdy was having far too much fun with this. The bird had been an illusion, nothing more.

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