“We need to set the terms of our agreement,” Ederras said stiffly, looking anywhere but at Velenne. It felt surreal to be so close to her, in the pleasantly civilized setting of a Wiscrani restaurant, with the windows thrown wide to a balmy late summer morning and pots of geraniums, white and red and brilliant pink, hanging between the filmy curtains. It was easy to imagine, or pretend, that none of the ugliness of their past parting lay between them.
A lie. But a tempting one.
“Our agreement?” Velenne toyed with the handle of her porcelain teacup. Today she wore a dress of frothed silk in green and gold, betraying not the smallest suggestion of her infernal vocation. Her smile made his chest clench. “About what?”
“If you insist on being part of this investigation, then I must have certain assurances. I won’t have the citizens of Westcrown suffering because of you.”
“Ah. You want me to avoid offending your code?” She lifted the teacup to her mouth, her dark eyes dancing above its rim. “Fine. Consider it agreed. At least for the duration of our work in Westcrown.”
Ederras scowled. “This isn’t a joke.”
“Did I give you the impression I thought otherwise? I apologize if so.” Setting the teacup aside, Velenne reached languidly for his hand. The diamond on her white gold ring flashed in the sun, ostentatious in its size and brilliance.
He recognized it with a pang. That ring was an heirloom of his house. Ederras had given it to her after the first time they’d lain together, when he was smitten and foolish and had actually believed that one day they might marry.
He jerked his hand away before she could touch him. “I don’t need your apologies. All I want is your word that you’ll not indulge in your usual perfidies for as long as we’re forced to work together.”
“You have it. As I said. For as long as we share this endeavor, and remain in Westcrown, I’ll maintain your code impeccably. Whatever restrictions you care to impose, I will obey. I’ll be very nearly a paladin myself, if that’s what you want.”
“Why only while we’re in Westcrown?”
“Because it’s easy here. I have all the weight of the law on my side, the arms of the dottari to call upon, the resources of House Thrune awaiting my whim.” Laughter warmed Velenne’s voice and crinkled the corners of her eyes. “I’d have to be a complete idiot if I couldn’t accomplish everything I needed to do in this city with one hand tied behind my back. Which is good, because that’s essentially what you’re asking. But when we leave Westcrown, I’ll give up all those advantages, and then I may want my hands untied.”
“When? Not if?” Ederras found himself both irritated and grudgingly amused by the diabolist’s nonchalance. She’d been like that every time they’d worked together in the past: acceding easily to much of what he wanted, while telling him exactly why it didn’t matter. It should have been infuriating, and sometimes was, but it also had a way of melting his annoyance. How could he stay angry when she conceded so readily, and when the concessions seemed so trivial?
Her shrug was an iridescent shimmer of green-gold silk. “It may be that our assassin has remained in the city and will be caught here. But I suspect we’re dealing with a professional, and in that case it would be foolish to assume that his or her behavior will be quite so predictable. Moreover, our road seems to be pointing toward Citadel Rivad, or even to Citadel Gheisteno—to answer some of our questions, if not to capture our culprit.”
“Jheraal’s already gone to Citadel Rivad. She’ll find whatever there is to find in that place. There’s no reason for us to go as well.”
“Marvelous. I love nothing more than reclining in idleness while others do my work.” Velenne studied the silver plate of pastries between them, eventually selecting a flattened, flaky dome crowned with small sour cherries and a lace of white icing. “In any case, are you satisfied with those terms?”
“For now.” If they left Westcrown, he’d have to renegotiate, but he’d deal with that eventuality when they came to it. Perhaps by then he wouldn’t need her anymore.
“I’m delighted to hear it. Now, did you have a plan for where to take our investigation? Vhaeros remains in Rego Cader, waiting to see whether our assassin drags more hellspawn into the ruins. I had planned to assist him, but my pet is more than capable on his own. If you have another task for me, I am entirely at your disposal.”
“I do, actually.” Ederras paused. He still wasn’t sure he wanted to let Velenne involve herself. This is probably a mistake.
And yet …
“I’d like you to come to a party with me,” he said.
Lord Mayor Aberian Arvanxi was famous for three things: the incompetence of his political scheming, the spite he showed to defeated enemies, and his love for the pomp and grandeur of Chelish opera. Since becoming the titular ruler of Westcrown, he’d expended enormous sums from the public coffers to expand and gild the city’s opera houses, hire the most acclaimed performers from across the continent, and host notoriously hedonistic opening-night galas.
It was widely rumored that the Lord Mayor was more interested in the starlets than their singing. Even in the short time since his return to Westcrown, Ederras had heard no shortage of scandalous tales. Aberian Arvanxi was a man of sizable appetites, and he indulged them extravagantly.
That extravagance bought the tolerance, if not the affection, of the ever-mercenary Wiscrani nobility. The Lord Mayor’s parties were infamous as orgies of sybaritic excess, and invitations were coveted among Westcrown’s wealthy. The first gala of the season was virtually mandatory for all the great houses, and for all who aspired to join them.
Even so, Ederras would have preferred to minimize his appearance—or, like Lord Kajen Tilernos, to avoid it altogether and send a frivolity-loving relative in his stead—if not for the fact that the guest list included several people who might have information about the fall of Citadel Gheisteno. The Lord Mayor’s gala represented a rare opportunity to introduce himself to them.
It also represented a rare occasion when he might actually want Velenne on his arm. Ederras was in no mood to spend the evening dodging debutantes’ snares and dowagers’ schemes, and he knew that the new heir to House Celverian was likely to prove an irresistible target. The only way he expected to get any peace was by pretending to already be claimed—and by a scion of House Thrune, no less.
If that is a pretense. He didn’t know how much longer that would be true. Every time he saw her, his desire burned hotter. A small devil voice had begun to whisper: Why not give in? Plainly Velenne wanted him. She had come back to Westcrown for him, had forced her way into this investigation for him. Why not use that, as Aedan had suggested?
The world was full of stories where brave souls were seduced to evil. Why couldn’t it work the other way?
His carriage slowed to a rattling stop, interrupting that line of thought. Loud laughter and genteel conversation drifted through the carriage windows. Straightening the stiff blue brocade of his surcoat and the gold-and-sapphire belt that cinched it tight about his waist, Ederras pulled aside the curtain to see what he was about to step into.
It was a crowd, and a very large one. All of Regicona seemed to have turned out for the premiere of The Winter of White Roses, the opera that would open Westcrown’s social season.
Twenty years ago, it had been the norm for the season to begin in mid-autumn, when the heat had dissipated enough for the aristocratic families to return from their summer homes and for the crowded theater houses to become bearable. The Lord Mayor’s extraordinary devotion to the opera, however, and his willingness to spend public funds on such niceties as enchanted breezes and misting fountains, had expanded the season considerably. Now the opening performance came in the waning days of summer, and the social importance of the opera had climbed to loftier heights than ever before.
Resplendent in their finest jewels and fabrics, Westcrown’s citizens thronged the street around the Regiconan Opera House. The oldest and stateliest of the city’s theaters, it was widely accounted to have the best acoustics to be found anywhere outside of Oppara or Egorian. Up to fifteen hundred people could crowd into its audience.
It would be crammed to capacity tonight. Ederras recognized a handful of Hellknights, stiff and uncomfortable in civilian dress, sprinkled among the scholars, tradespeople, and lawyers who waited to gain entry through the public doors. Whether they were genuine lovers of the opera or merely hoped to push their stars higher in Westcrown’s social firmament, no one with the money and connections to procure a ticket to the opening night’s performance had stayed home. The carriage driver had to use all his skill to navigate the milling crowd and reach the canopied entrance reserved for high nobility, on the opera house’s west side.
Once he did, however, the carriage stopped. A footman opened the door, and Ederras disembarked into a world of plush and polished luxury.
Boiseries of mahogany and cherrywood, touched with gilt and lightened with mirrors in baroque gold frames, covered the walls of the western wing. Fanciful chandeliers hung from the ceiling, each one a controlled burst of firelight caught in crystal. The carpets were crimson and lush, shot through with glittering threads of silver and gold. Portraits of Thrune royalty and the opera stars of bygone decades looked down over the night’s illustrious guests, while servants wove through the mingling crowd with silver trays of sparkling wines in pink and diamond yellow.
Velenne was standing before a portrait of the first Queen Abrogail, a flute of pale rose wine fizzing in her hand. She was dressed in black and burgundy, her dark hair pinned up in a twist and adorned with a brilliant diamond-and-platinum clasp that was, in its spikes and swirls, almost certainly Nidalese work.
Her perfume, however, was pure Cheliax: a rich, opulent amber, inflected with the incense and smoke of Asmodean ritual. It was far headier than the scent she’d worn as a girl, at once more overtly sensual and more formal. As much closer to the truth of her as the red and black of her diabolist’s dress. The perfume of a wanton empress.
He came up behind her and touched her waist lightly, as if pulling her into a dance. Let everyone think we’re closer than we are. “Have you been waiting long?”
Velenne turned smoothly, the silk of her dress warm under his palm. Kohl and silver dust accented her eyes, shimmering when she smiled. “Fifteen years, more or less.”
Ederras couldn’t think of anything to say to that. He was spared from having to make a reply by the appearance of a crimson-liveried usher, who bowed and addressed the glittering gathering as one.
“The Regiconan Opera House welcomes the distinguished lords and ladies of Westcrown to the inaugural performance of The Winter of White Roses. If you would be so kind as to proceed to your boxes, the curtain will rise in five minutes.”
“Lord Tilernos has offered to share his box,” Ederras said as the crowd began to filter out of the gathering hall.
The diabolist shook her head, slightly but decisively. The diamonds flashed in her hair. “He isn’t here. He’s sent his sister Sascar to represent House Tilernos in his stead, and I can’t abide that cackling drunk. She always chatters through the entire performance. Besides, you don’t need to court favor from Lord Tilernos. You already have it. Better to focus our efforts elsewhere.”
“Where?”
Her eyes flickered past him. Disengaging his hand from her waist, she approached a balding man who appeared to be in his late middle years. Black peacock feathers accented his silken robe, echoing the iridescent black pearls that adorned his belt and marched down the front of his surcoat in regimented bands. “Lord Oberigo! What a delight to see you here.”
“Lady Velenne.” Lord Eirtein Oberigo’s face creased in an easy smile. His voice was warm and mellifluous, so beautifully modulated that it had been rumored for decades that the patriarch of House Oberigo had secretly trained as a bard. “A rare honor to have you with us in Westcrown.”
“Your city has some compelling attractions.” Velenne glanced through her lashes at Ederras, who took the cue and stepped forward. “Lord Oberigo, please allow me to introduce Ederras Celverian.”
“A pleasure,” Ederras said stiffly, offering his hand. He knew Lord Oberigo by reputation, and had no liking for the man. Eirtein Oberigo cut a sinister figure in Westcrown’s higher circles. He’d been linked to innumerable scandals and blackmail schemes that had ruined more upstanding citizens. While no one had ever accused him directly, the rumors and innuendoes were too widespread, and too enduring, to ignore.
“Likewise.” Lord Oberigo took his hand briefly and released it. His touch was dry as snakeskin. “My condolences on your loss.”
“Thank you.” Ederras wondered what Lord Oberigo knew about his brother’s death. It was said that he heard every whispered secret in Westcrown.
“Will the Lady Auvadia be joining you this evening?” Velenne inquired. Auvadia Oberigo, Lord Eirtein’s elderly aunt, was one of the nobles Ederras had listed as likely holders of information about the fall of Citadel Gheisteno. Her late husband had been a Hellknight in the Order of the Scourge, and had participated in the march that brought down the citadel.
“Ah, no. Aunt Auvadia doesn’t care for the opera. Too wearying, she calls it.” Most of the guests had gone to their boxes, and Lord Oberigo glanced at the emptying hall. The ushers would never be so impolite as to interrupt the nobles’ conversation, but it was clear that the performance was about to begin. “Does House Thrune maintain a box here?”
“We do not. The Lord Mayor has been gracious enough to invite us to share his, but …” Velenne left the sentence hanging. A tiny shrug of her slim shoulders underscored the point. Aberian Arvanxi’s buffoonery scarcely needed elaboration.
Lord Oberigo understood her perfectly. “If it would not be too presumptuous, might I extend an invitation of my own? The Lord Mayor’s box has, of course, the best view of the stage, but House Oberigo’s is not far behind. It would be a privilege to share your company.”
He wasn’t lying about that, Ederras knew. Poaching Velenne from the Lord Mayor’s box would be a social coup: a very public affirmation of House Oberigo’s status and favor with House Thrune, an insult to a rival whom no one much liked anyway, and a chance to angle for news and gossip from Egorian, where all real power lay.
“We would be delighted to accept.” Velenne laced her hand through Ederras’s arm and followed the black-feathered Lord Oberigo up the carpeted steps to his opera box. Lady Oberigo and two of their daughters were already in the velvet-cushioned seats, a bevy of silent servants standing at attention behind them.
As Lady Oberigo murmured greetings and introductions on behalf of her clan, their patriarch leaned in toward Velenne. “Why did you ask about Aunt Auvadia?”
“Oh,” the diabolist replied artlessly, draining her wine flute and exchanging the empty glass for a servant’s full one, “I had hoped to ask her counsel on a minor scandal concerning one of the Henderthane boys. His betrothal is quite irreparably ruined. There’s talk of sending him out of the capital. Perhaps to Westcrown.”
“Is that so?” Lord Oberigo’s face remained unrevealing, but Ederras noticed his wife’s gaze flick to the two girls seated with them. Granddaughters, or maybe nieces, he thought, correcting his earlier guess. Not daughters. And unmarried, or they would have been with their husbands. No doubt they were here to meet eligible young bachelors—and, certainly, news that one had become available from House Henderthane would pique their family’s interest. If the youth was too stained to be marriageable, then the scandal itself might be worthwhile.
No obvious gesture passed between Lord and Lady Oberigo and their servants, but one of the maids slipped discreetly away through the back of their opera box.
“Perhaps we’re in luck,” Lord Oberigo said, his eyes on the curtain. The first chords rose from the orchestra pit. “It’s true that Aunt Auvadia doesn’t much care for the opera, but she loves a good party. I expect she’ll be at the Lord Mayor’s gala tonight.”
“Wonderful,” Velenne said, settling back to watch the singers come onstage.
From the shocked whispers that swept the audience when the lead female singer appeared, and Lord Oberigo’s hastily murmured explanation, Ederras gathered that the star they’d all anticipated had been replaced by an unknown ingénue; from the rapturous sighs and applause that greeted the end of the new singer’s first solo, he assumed that the unknown had just become a star in her own right.
Beyond that, however, he understood little and appreciated less. The music struck him as artificial, the performances as overwrought, the plot as absurd. When the curtains finally came down at the end, Ederras breathed a silent sigh of relief.
Velenne’s carriage came to bear them away from the opera house. It was a sleek ebony affair drawn by a pair of matched black horses, each one crowned by a pouf of blood-red feathers and harnessed in crimson traces. The driver was a handsome hellspawn woman, horned and tailed, but dressed like a man in trousers and a split frock coat. She asked for no instructions, and her mistress gave none. As soon as the two of them were inside, they were off to the Lord Mayor’s vaneo. Cobbles rattled under the wheels, and then the smooth creaking stillness of the barge across the channel.
Alone in the carriage, Velenne pressed into him, silk rasping against brocade. Her perfume filled the close space between them, drowning him in opulence. “You like this one, don’t you?” she murmured, running a jeweled hand along his thigh. “It excites you.”
He looked away, lifting a corner of the carriage’s black curtains so he could catch a glimpse of the streets. “It reeks of Asmodean temples.”
“Ah. Then it’s the reminder of diabolism that you find so enticing? Is it the scent of sin that enthralls you?”
“I hardly need a reminder of what you are.”
Velenne laughed, but she withdrew her hand and leaned away, looking to the opposite window. Ederras was as much disappointed as he was relieved. “What I am is the reason you’ll have the opportunity to talk to Auvadia Oberigo tonight. Some thanks might be in order.”
“They might,” Ederras agreed. “Depending on what she says.”
“We’ll soon find out,” Velenne said serenely. She gazed out the window until they reached Vaneo Arvanxi. The strains of a string quartet filtered through the cool night air, while colored lanterns cast a multihued glow across the vaneo’s lawns and shimmering magical lights darted through the trees like fireflies.
The house beyond those gracious trappings, however, was anything but elegant. Aberian Arvanxi had put his own stamp on the traditional dwelling of Westcrown’s mayors, and it wasn’t a particularly tasteful one. He’d clad the manor’s exterior in ochre and black stone and crowned its gables with squat, dancing gargoyles in clumsy imitation of the fashion in Egorian. The old, graceful lines of the roofs were now marred with spiky protrusions in rusting iron.
None of the guests seemed to mind, though. Their carriages rolled up to the gardens. Footmen helped them disembark, and then they drifted through the gardens and between the floating lanterns and vanished into Vaneo Arvanxi.
“Shall we go?” Velenne asked, taking his arm.
They joined the rest of the Lord Mayor’s guests in the grand entryway, then followed the mingling crowd to the banquet hall. That, too, had been altered to reflect current fashions. The walls were painted with unsettling scenes that showed Westcrown under the rule of devils. The support pillars had been carved into immense tangles of fanged black serpents.
It hardly seemed to make for a festive mood, yet once again Ederras had to wonder whether he was the only one who noticed. The other guests seemed entirely untroubled. Gaily they gossiped and chattered and feasted on the extravagant courses that arrived in an endless procession of domed silver plates. Velenne moved among them with a grace Ederras neither possessed nor particularly envied, often abandoning him when his presence might hinder her work, yet always returning.
Crimson-pickled hydra eggs, rabbits in ivory sauce, rare fruits cut and interleaved into sugar-trimmed fans: all came and went and were replaced by other, ever-stranger concoctions. Some of the spices seemed to be as much drug as seasoning. There was a rack of lamb crusted in peppery red seeds that burned the tongue and hazed the wits, and tiny roast quail stuffed with bitter, prickly leaves that left the guests flushed and giddy.
Wine and stronger spirits flowed in profusion, and although Ederras tried to keep his intake modest, he was more than slightly dizzied by the time the Lord Mayor stood and clapped his hands to signal that dinner was at an end. There was a short speech, none of which the paladin caught, and then the stars of the evening’s opera stood in a line and bowed to the assembled guests, to thunderous applause.
But the party wasn’t over. The minute that Lord Mayor Arvanxi finished his speech, servants came forward to escort his guests to the hedonists’ paradise that served as Vaneo Arvanxi’s inner gardens.
There, under an illusory, perfect sky, wildflowers bloomed around a crystalline stream and a rustic wooden bridge. In another part of the gardens, hedges of scarlet roses encircled a pool of golden honey. A third garden held a babbling fountain ringed by enchanted trees that produced half a hundred exotic fruits. Mangos and papayas nestled on the same branches, even the same twigs, as caimito and brilliant, green-tongued pink dragonfruit. Above them all, a sandalwood-screened balcony invited voyeurs to stop, linger, and watch the nobility of Cheliax at play.
Already there was much to watch. Inflamed by drink and drug-laced food, many of the guests had cast their dignity aside along with their clothes. Ederras turned away, acutely discomfited by the other nobles’ excesses, and accidentally locked eyes with a tiny, shrewd-looking dowager in a towering white wig.
“Lady Auvadia,” Ederras said, striding toward the old woman. He had glimpsed her at the feast tables earlier, but there’d been no opportunity to speak to her then.
The elder Lady Oberigo tipped her chin up in greeting as he neared. White powder blanketed her face and dusted the elaborate curls of her formal wig. She was seated in a horsehair-padded armchair at the gardens’ edge, her green and black skirts arrayed around her with military precision. Fragile as a bird and less than five feet tall, the old lady wouldn’t have reached Ederras’s shoulder if she had been standing, but an undeniable aura of power radiated from her. “Master Celverian. I understand you wished to speak with me.”
“Did Velenne tell you that?”
“She did.” The old lady snapped out a painted silk fan with a flick of her wrist and fanned herself vigorously. Not a hair in her wig stirred. “A fearsome lady, that one. She’ll make your house great. If you let her.”
Ederras laughed. The drink had gone to his head completely, loosening his tongue past the point of foolishness. “She is. Terrifying. Did she tell you what I wanted to discuss?”
“The Order of the Crux. She also said that my answering your questions was the price for her answering mine. A fair exchange, I suppose. If anyone’s being cheated there, it’s you. Old secrets are seldom of equal weight to new ones.” Lady Oberigo shrugged. “Still, a bargain is a bargain, and my Ferdieu is long in the grave. It’ll cause him no trouble to have those tales retold. This doesn’t strike me as the place to discuss such things, however, and you’re in no condition to hear them. Tomorrow, perhaps. Or the next day, if you exert yourself too much to recover on one day’s rest. Come to the vira. We’ll talk then.”
He wasn’t drunk enough to need a second dismissal. “My lady.” Sketching an unsteady bow, Ederras left the elder Lady Oberigo and made his way back into the gardens proper.
The debauchery was in full swing there. One of the Dioso ladies was painting a footman’s bare chest with honey, while on the other side of the shallow pool, a distinguished-looking gentleman licked more honey from her giggling sister’s toes. Others were wading—or writhing—in the pool, heedless of their ruined finery.
Ederras watched longer than he meant to, embarrassed for them but finding it strangely difficult to pull away. The feast had cast a peculiar haze over his senses. Everything was blurred and yet achingly acute.
Vividly—too vividly—he remembered how soft Velenne’s hands had been the first time she’d drawn him down like that. How warm her breath had been in his ear. How suddenly she’d buried her nails in his back, clawing at him in a hot red flash of pain that had ignited him beyond reason and set the course for everything that came after.
Shuddering, he turned away.
He didn’t know where Velenne had gone. The diabolist had vanished around the time the servants were bringing out the last course of cheeses and pastries enveloped in clouds of sweetly narcotic cream, and he hadn’t seen her since. She wasn’t in the honey pool, which was at once deflating and a relief. Nor was she under the branches of the enchanted fruit trees, although quite a few others were entangled in knots around the laughing fountain.
He found her on the banks of the silvery stream, reclining on the flower-strewn grass. She was alone. The Nidalese pin gleamed in her hair, reflecting the artificial stars in the garden’s false sky.
Velenne lifted a slender hand in greeting, or summons, as Ederras crossed into her sight. Her eyes were dark and dilated, her smile full of mystery. “Where have you been?”
“Talking to Lady Auvadia.” He knelt in the grass beside her. Standing suddenly felt too difficult. His knees had gone to water.
“Good.” Velenne reached up, twining her fingers around the brocade on his sleeve. He could feel the warmth of her hand like a shadow passing over his wrist. “So you have what you wanted.” Ederras nodded. Forcing words past the knot in his throat was nearly impossible, but he managed: “I do.”
Her fingers slid from the cloth to his skin. The edge of a nail touched him, just barely. “Then it’s time I got what I wanted. Don’t you agree?”
Ederras closed his eyes. It was too much. The wine, the drugs, the licentiousness all around them. Her scent, her smile, the familiar curve of her neck. For fifteen years he’d wanted her and hated her in equal measure. Since his return to Westcrown, she’d troubled his waking moments and stolen his sleep. He felt his restraint snap, almost audible in his mind.
“Yes,” he said. “I do.”