CHAPTER 1 THE CITY AND SOLITUDE

It has been said that, if a person is going to die, he should do it in the morning: when the day is new and clean and full of unanswerable questions, when the sun has just risen to cast an afterglow on the things that have been done by night. It has also been said that, if a person is going to die, the circumstances are irrelevant.

On this Paleday morning in Lystourel, capital city of the Republic of Lescoray, the twenty-fifth day of Shepherd’s month, three days before the Equinoctial holiday and six until the autumn Equinox itself, a legal duel was scheduled for seven o’clock in the morning: by seven thirty at the latest, a man whose beliefs ran one way about death and morning was going to kill one of the other persuasion.

It was a foul morning anyway, cold a month too early, the wind off the Grand Estuary hard as a slap across the cheek. The sky was lumpy and curdled, and sooty as well, because the weather had forced fires lit before the flues had been properly cleaned: there was creosote in the air, there would be chimney fires tonight, and the price of dusted coal on the City Exchange was over two gold marks the wagonload for the first time in years.

The gilded dome of the Lystourel Cathedral looked dull and sullen as old copper; the copper dome of the National Gallery looked green and moldy; the glass sheds of the Grand Ironway Terminus were clouded, vapors thick beneath them, like infected blisters. It was the kind of day that made people in the streets long for a King over Lescoray, to heal the aerial sickness, blow away miasma with a royal word. None of the people in the streets was old enough to remember when Lescoray actually had a King over it, which made the longings perfect.

The time was now twelve minimi before seven, and the duel was organizing itself in Willowpark Square, in the western part of Lystourel, just south of the fashionable Silverthread District. The square was four rows of high houses, including the Consulate of a tiny island republic, facing on a small green plot surrounded by an iron fence. There were drooping willow trees, just turning yellow, miscellaneous bushes and benches, a neglected rose arbor. On the outside of the fence were the uninvited spectators: some coatless boys with schoolbooks, some curious tradesmen. The residents were discreetly in their upstairs windows. Inside the fence was the crowd for the matter at hand.

It took rather a lot of people to conduct a legal duel. There were the two duelists’ seconds, young women with their hair tucked under their tall hats and long winter capes over their morning coats; one was in blue, one in green. They were looking rather sadly at one another, but did not speak. The one in the blue coat carried a long, narrow leather case and had a black cheroot between her teeth, chewing more than smoking it. The dueling proctor wore a dark green belted coat, with a silver chain of office crookedly over his shoulders, and a white weeper tied around his silk hat. It fluttered dismally in the wet wind. He tapped an ivory-hilted cane on the ground, looking bored, or impatient, or both. At his side was a boy in a jacket and cap, with a badge pinned to his chest and a wooden box under his arm.

Behind the proctor was a bailiff in the uniform red-and-silver livery, silver buttons on his jacket and black leather cap and boots, silver rope over one shoulder balancing the sling of the magazine carbine on the other. Everyone looked with distaste at the bailiff’s rifle, and the bailiff returned the looks in kind.

A little distance away, leaning against a tree, was the surgeon, in a wine-red, swallow-tailed morning coat and crimson cravat, a white fur hat rakishly on her head. Dangling from her waistcoat pocket was a golden sunburst watch fob, indicating that she was also an accredited sorcerer. It had become fashionable for the observing magicians at affairs like this to fade into the background. The sorcerers’ guild had created the fashion, trying to discourage the idea that a sorcerer would help anyone cheat in the first place.

There were two reporters, rather less well dressed than the rest, one in a short wool coat, cotton cravat, and round-crowned hat, the other in a leather engine driver’s jacket and cap, a soiled silk scarf around his neck, and no cravat at all. One was from the Evening Observer, the one in the jacket from the Northern Star. The Star man would be hitching a ride on the next freight train home with his story as soon as the duel was over, saving the cost of magnostyle and the indignity of having his words rewritten at the office. He had a hip flask of whisky out and open, and was sharing it with his comrade of the press. This was not the usual duel, which they could write up beforehand and insert the names in the appropriate spots after; one of the parties was a Coron in Parliament, and if he died, it would be actual news, at least in the North where his Coronage was.

The duelists were the last to arrive, as was customary. One, a young cavalry officer named Chase, was crossing the square, whirling his cloak off as he shoved through the gate; he tossed the cloak to his second and stretched, his tied-back brown hair bouncing as he moved. The wind fluttered the linen ruffles of his white shirt.

The other man, the Coron Varic, took a step away from one of the willows. He was rather tall, dark haired, severely thin, in a steel-blue frock coat and gray trousers. He took off the coat, folding it lengthwise and over, and handed it to his second; he adjusted his braces slightly, loosened his dark blue cravat but did not remove it.

The breeze rose slightly, shaking the willow trees. The Goddess Coris, it was said, must have been in a terrible melancholy when She made willows. From a few blocks away, a tower clock began striking seven.

The dueling proctor said, “There is still time, honoreds, to conclude these differences without violence, or to lessen their extremity. I remind you both that the insult has been deemed mortal, yet lesser strokes have satisfied greater men. Will you accede?” The law required that the proctor say the words; it could not demand any feeling or concern in them.

Lieutenant Chase said, “The insult remains, honored: no pretense that it is less can make it any less. I do not accede.”

Varic nodded without speaking.

The proctor said, “Then I am required to remind you that the matter, being so begun, may only be so concluded.” He waved to his assistant. The boy held up the wooden case, and the proctor took from it a large, heavy pistol, an antique, firing a single shot with a cap and hand-tamped powder. There was no legal requirement that he use such a thing. “I am the instrument of conclusion,” he said, as prescribed.

The duelists looked at the proctor, then at each other. Varic said suddenly, “How many people have you killed, Lieutenant? I’ve killed two, under just these circumstances. A young man in Trumpeters’ Park, and a very pretty young woman by the Estuary. She was a cavalry lieutenant as well.”

“Then I have more honor than my own to redeem,” Chase said.

“She’s dead,” Varic said, “and won’t ever notice.”

“You don’t begin to frighten me,” Chase said, thin patches showing in his voice. “I don’t care how red your lance may be.” He looked, expectantly, into Varic’s face.

The Coron’s expression did not change at all. “Frightening you was not my intention. I just thought you should know that this is an old business with me. I have no particular interest in killing you, Lieutenant.”

“Then you, honored, are at the disadvantage.” It was not a challenge, just a flat statement.

Varic said, “Just so. As the … injured party, you have choice of weapons.” He motioned toward his second, who rolled the cigar to a corner of her mouth and opened the long leather case. Four swords gleamed dully on velvet inside. “Sabers or rapiers, Lieutenant?” There was no mention of pistols. They were all gentlefolk here, except possibly for the reporters, and the well aspected did not shoot one another over honorable disputes. The proctor’s gun was another business entirely.

Chase inspected the swords. “These are excellent weapons, Coron.” Varic nodded meaninglessly. “Rapiers, then,” Chase said, and selected a sword, with a straight thin blade and a plain cross hilt, not ornamented at all. Chase tested the sword’s balance, then stepped back as Varic took out the matching weapon.

Varic said to his second, “If it goes against, you’re to report directly to Brook.” The woman nodded, closed the case, dropped the stub of her cigar, and ground it under her boot.

The proctor held up his cane. Varic and Chase took up positions to either side, crossing their points above the stick.

The cane fell. The swords, the duelists, the whole square held still in the cold, bad air for a few instanti, half a heartbeat, and then steel flashed down like a thunderclap.

They stayed close for the first minima or so, Lieutenant Chase parrying brilliantly, thrusting very near his opponent, stepping lightly from side to side. Varic stood nearly still, moving his blade in simple straight lines, easy for the eye to follow, for the hand to predict. Click, ring, step, scrape, the two of them matching moves as if this were an open-air production of King Zargo. Wherever Varic put his sword, Chase’s blade was there first.

And then, suddenly, it was not. The very tip of Varic’s sword was in the meat of Chase’s upper left arm, and there was blood on the white linen. Varic pulled out, held his sword at high guard. Chase did the same. They fell to again, both walking now, stepping off the narrow garden path as they circled one another, steel whipping across the space between. The lieutenant was not content to fence now, he was fighting, trying to find an opening in his enemy’s guard, cut a way into Varic’s flesh. He leaped to the top of a stone bench, slashed, leaped down again.

Varic recoiled, executed a circular disengaging parry, seemed to stumble. Chase lunged into the gap, with a perfect deadly geometry. Steel cut air, whistling.

And then there was a sharp, bright note as Chase’s rapier hit the pavement. There was a gash the width of his right arm, a sheet of blood running from it. Varic was standing entirely away from Chase; if not for the blood dripping from his sword, he might have had nothing at all to do with the wound.

Chase looked at Varic, at Varic’s sword, at his own on the ground. He took an uncertain step, his boot squeaking in his own blood. Varic simply waited.

The lieutenant turned and ran.

The dueling proctor leveled his pistol at the fleeing man’s back. Varic took a long step, and his sword flicked out, knocking the barrel of the gun upward even as it snapped and fired; the bullet rustled the boughs of a willow, and there was an explosion of sparrows.

“Your pardon, honored,” Varic said softly. “I’ve spoiled your aim.”

“No matter,” the proctor said, examining his pistol for damage. “I believe the affair is now concluded?”

“To my satisfaction, certainly.”

“Indeed.” The proctor’s assistant held out the gun case; the proctor put away the weapon, adjusted his cloak and white-sashed hat. “You will of course excuse me, ladies, gentlemen. I have another of these matters to attend at eight. Find Goddess in your ways.”

“In your way,” the others said—though Varic only nodded, and the leather-jacketed reporter was already running to find his train—and the proctor left Willowpark Square, his assistant and the bailiff following behind him. The surgeon stood still for a moment more, then tipped her hat and departed after them.

Varic was sitting on a park bench, cleaning the sword blades with a lemon and a cloth. Lieutenant Chase’s second said to him, “Well and fairly done, honored.” Her face was a bit flushed, perhaps with the cold. Varic said, “Thank you,” and the woman went away.

The Observer man came up, his notebook and fountain pen out. “That was quite a fight, milord, quite a fight. Tell me, Coron, were you ever in the army?”

“No,” Varic said, wiping a rapier and replacing it in the case. “I’ve spent most of my career in Parliament.” He looked at the reporter, smiled faintly. “That’s a sort of fencing practice, you know.”

It took the man a moment to get the joke. Then he laughed, said, “Oh, yes! Very good, milord, very good indeed. Thank you.” He scribbled in his book and departed.

Varic’s second had lit a fresh cigar. She said, “Why did you say that, milord Varic?”

Varic put the other sword away, closed the case. The woman was only an acquaintance of his, a retired foot soldier; Brook had suggested her for this morning’s duty. “Because he’s a reporter,” Varic said pleasantly, “and he wanted something to report. I gave him a line he can use, and now he won’t have to make something up.” He sat back, feeling the sweat on his shirt go cold, and looked at the park fence: the spectators, perhaps twenty of them, were starting to drift away from the iron bars. A small blond boy kept staring. Varic gave him a small salute, and the boy turned and ran away. “What’s the time?”

The woman checked her pocket watch. “Twenty-five past seven.”

“Ninety-five minimi to the session bell.… Best see if you can find a cab for me. And, Rose?”

“Milord Coron?”

“If I ever have to do this again, I’d be pleased to have you as second. But I hope we never have to.”

“Of course, honored,” she said, sounding somewhat puzzled.

Varic thought, though there was no way to explain it to Rose, that this probably would be his last duel. Those responsible had now failed three times; time to try something new.

Rose had probably been in duels, at least seconded often, since Brook had recommended her. But she was a soldier of Lescoray and therefore had no personal experience of war.

She hailed a two-wheeler with military authority. Carrying his coat over his arm, Varic thanked her again; she would take the swords back to Varic’s house in Healstone Court. After that, barring a fourth duel, they would meet only at sociable functions, Infantry Balls, and charity teas. They would smile at one another, and say, “Yes, we’ve met,” sharing the secret: and let the world confound itself trying to guess at it.

“Parliament House,” Varic told the cab driver as he stepped aboard. He sat down, added through the trapdoor, “West entrance.” The driver nodded, snapped his whip once smartly, and they were off through the gray and hazy streets.

They turned south, out of the residence blocks, and soon were in the heavy morning traffic along the Fresh, the smaller river that branched to the west from the Grand. A bit of Varic’s mind registered the route, making sure the cabby stayed direct, while his main thoughts ticked over the schedule of motions before the Lords today. There were seven on the calendar. Things had piled up, as they always did before a recess. It had the small advantage of shortening the debates.

Four days to the Equinox, he thought. Four days and he would be forty marches away from the City, a guest at Strange House surrounded by friends and fellow guests, a long way from Parliaments and political duels and polluted air. They would play games and argue philosophy and take tea in the autumn twilight—and Varic would spend the whole time with one ear listening for the click of the magnostyle, and when finally the train brought him back to the Grand Terminus, he would feel an inexplicable relief.

The cab turned right, crossing the Fresh on the New Castle Bridge, an ironwork only a few years old; its bright green paint was beginning to turn dingy, and Varic supposed that next spring there would be a motion to repaint it. He filed a thought to check the price for red lead. Just to the right was the Old Bridge, now closed to all but foot traffic. On it, people were strolling or admiring the view, poor as it was today. A coal barge was passing under the central stone arch. The arches were sound after five hundred years. The pilings had been laid by the Quercians, six centuries earlier still. Varic wondered if the New Bridge would be anything more than rust in a century. Even with the red lead.

He looked out the left-side window. Receding behind them, on the point of land where the Fresh branched from the Grand River, was the Castle, a confused but certainly impressive jumble of towers, subfortresses, arches, and buttresses, ringed by the remnants of three different wall systems. Its foundations were Quercian, too, as was the innermost wall. Every ruler since the Empire departed had considered it a personal duty to build something onto the Castle, and usually to tear something else down. Quercia was like that: dismantled, overbuilt, plowed up, quarried, exploded, still the Luminous Empire ended up under your feet, in the walls around you.

The cab reached the South Corner, a fringe of parkland and middle-cost houses around the water, holding back the sprawl of industries farther south. They turned smartly east around Greengage Circle and crossed the Grand River on a stone-and-iron bridge high enough to pass a sloop’s topmast. The haze was lifting a bit, and away to the south a forest of masts and rigging was just visible, lining the Estuary. The road came down again into the measured and formal street grid of the East Bank.

Measured and formal when it was laid out, at least. Now the streets were full of flower carts, beer wagons, two-wheel cabs, and four-wheel coaches—Varic heard his driver snort, and saw where some idiot had tried to take a four-horse rig down a side street, blocking it hopelessly—vendors of groundnuts and fresh fish and sausage rolls and eel pies, jaunty signboard-men and tired prostitutes, doctors on rounds and fiddlers playing for copper aces, dawn-service priests tipping their hats to highday-service priests, those who had worked all night passing those who would work all day passing those who were too wealthy to work at all and were exhausted with their efforts. The streets smelled of starch and urine, mountain flowers and fried pork and cheap beer; they sounded of trade calls and children’s verses, outraged horses and human pain. They were all walled in with many-windowed building fronts, roofed over with coal smoke and magnostyle wires, and packed so solid you could cut slices from the mass.

How could human beings live in this place, Varic thought; how could anyone feel entirely alive until he had lived here?

The streets broadened. Trees appeared, and geometric plots of grass, unbelievably green against the gray City. The cab passed the Park of the Clarity Kings, still hung with fog that made its monuments look sepulchral. To the other side, fronting on Vineyard Avenue (where the last live grape had grown six hundred years ago; now there were iron vines climbing the streetlamps) was Parliament House, twenty columns on its south face, forty broad marble steps down to the avenue. When there was sun, it was very white, and quite beautiful.

The cab passed it by, as instructed, and stopped at the western side, where there was a small walled courtyard and a modest door.

“Fare?” Varic said, gathering his coat and his thoughts.

“Three plates four, honored.”

Varic gave him four silver plates, said, “No change.” The cabby saluted with his whip and drove on. Varic went through the garden, which was empty, pulled the bell cord at the door. The porter admitted him, with only a slight off glance at his shirt and undone cravat. The foyer within was simply decorated, the walls painted a cool pastel green meant to be soothing to red-rimmed eyes. The glass-cased clock showed six minima to eight. He should have given the cabby a larger tip, Varic thought, or at least taken his license number. He went two floors up the oak stairway, to the floor of offices one below his own. From behind the other doors along the corridor there were small sounds, of teacups rattling, newspapers rustling, the crunch of toasted muffins.

He knocked on a door. “Yes,” came the answer. Varic went in.

The Chief Parliamentarian’s office was large, three ordinary members’ offices combined, but crowded. The walls of the front room were completely covered with plaques, scrolls, awards, an enormous globe standing next to an enormous desk. The library was visible through a door at the rear, and the door to the conference room. They had spent a lot of time in the conference room, around the green table, taking apart Lescoray’s wheezing patchwork Constitution like surgeons over a dying patient, trying to stitch together something that would heal, be strong, stand on its own. Surgeons, of course, could summon, or themselves be, sorcerers, thought-work a raddled blood stew back into organs and whole bones. Laws and articles broke more easily and mended harder.

Brook was sitting on a green plush davenport by the window, in the pale north light, reading a book. A cart with the remnants of a breakfast and all the morning papers stood a little way from him.

Brook’s hair was gray with a touch of silver, swept immaculately from his high forehead and temples; he had long and feathery mustaches and a neatly pointed beard. Steel-rimmed reading glasses sat low on his broad nose. His morning coat was of a gray just less than black, his trousers dove gray. A linen napkin rested on one knee, and half a buttered muffin on the napkin.

He closed the book and considered the muffin. “You look like you’ve spent the evening in a joy house.”

“It would have been pleasanter,” Varic said.

“So you killed the lieutenant?”

“No. I cut him, and he ran.”

“Then the proctor…”

“Missed. I must change my shirt.”

“There’s time. Have some tea. And one of those.” He ate some more of his own muffin.

Varic looked at the breakfast service and was instantly hungry; he had drunk a cup of strong black tea before the fight, but that was all. He poured tea, not commenting that there was a second clean cup, and lifted a silver cover. There were two kippers underneath it. Brook hated kippers. But he knew about duels; he had fought his share once.

Brook said, “You never told me why this young man wanted so particularly to kill you.”

The salt fish stung Varic’s mouth; he swallowed some tea, said, “The speech I gave on the eighteenth, about the value of cavalry. Civilian idler impugning the honor of the service, and so on.”

“Ah. Of course. Honor of the service.”

Varic raised an eyebrow. Surely Brook didn’t believe that.

Brook said, “Your friend Winterhill brought me a copy of a letter last night, concerning Lieutenant Chase and a large gambling debt. Honor of the service, you know.” He looked over his glasses at Varic. “I’d ask you how Winterhill comes by such things, but I’m afraid you’d tell me.”

“Just as well Chase is a cavalryman,” Varic said. “I doubt he’d ever seen so much blood in one place before. If he’d been a real fencer, like the others, I’d have had to kill him.”

Brook said, “I have not known many souls who could keep weighing the need to kill a man after the swordplay had begun.” He finished the muffin, put the book aside, stood up. Brook was a large man, taller than Varic and half again as broad. “And I know this is useless, but you might be more careful in public speaking of the Lescorial Forces of Defense.”

“I’ve shown you the papers on Sarmanjai; you were there when I spoke,” Varic said. “The Imperial Horse were the equal of anyone’s—certainly ours, who haven’t seen a fight in ninety years—and in one charge against a rather ordinary bunch of emplaced riflemen, they lost seven in ten dead and the rest too badly hit to reach the enemy.” He put his cup down. “It’s nothing to do with bravery. War isn’t, not these days. I can’t help it if the word hasn’t reached here.”

“Well, hurrah for peace,” Brook said quietly.

Varic paused and chuckled.

Brook said, “So your humor lived through it as well. Good. Good.”

Varic said, “I don’t suppose the gambling letter mentions any interesting names.”

“No. Did you expect it to?”

“Chase made a joke about ‘reddening my lance.’ I don’t think it was original with him.”

“Ah,” Brook said thoughtfully. Two centuries earlier, when the Parliament was new, the Coron Redlance had been the driving wheel within it. Brook was occasionally called the second Redlance, a title he detested. Whoever had bought Lieutenant Chase’s debts had probably given him the comment to deliver as well. But of course there was nothing provable in that, and Brook said so.

Then he said, “Speaking of the letter, Winterhill brought it to me because you were out last night. Were you in Cold Street?”

“No. I was at home. But I’d sent Midden home early, and I must not have heard the bell.”

“Winterhill thought you’d gone to Cold Street.”

“Winterhill has a fascination with Cold Street. Something to do with his name, I imagine.”

“When were you there last?”

“Some weeks, I think.”

Brook said, “Some months, I think.”

“As you say. I must change my shirt before the session.”

“They ask about you. They like you, Varic.”

“I pay my bills on time.”

“I said,” Brook said, very softly and firmly, “they like you.”

“I’m pleased. I haven’t felt the need.”

“Congratulations.”

“Brook, as you very well know, we’ve had six major votes in that time, a seventh today, and another in three weeks. Are you suggesting that my intimate activities are an essential part of our strategy?” He smiled again. “If you are, I shan’t disagree, of course.”

“We are a long way from completing the Revision,” Brook said. “We have a battle today, and then a hundred more, small and great. And you will be no use at all if you’re so intent on the battles that you forget to breathe.”

“One doesn’t go to Cold Street to breathe. At least, I don’t.”

Brook said, “You are going to Strange House for the Equinoctial?”

“Certainly. My train is tomorrow.”

“Very well.” He sorted papers on his desk. “And you’d better get to your office. You really do need a clean shirt.”

Varic went out and up a flight to his own floor. They had not spoken of the day’s schedule. It was not necessary.

He went into his office: one room with a large closet and a lavatory alcove. He rang for the porter, pulled off his cravat and shirt, poured water into the basin, and began washing up, untying, smoothing, and retying his hair at the back, pausing to soak his eyes. He took a fresh white shirt from the closet drawer, had it on but unbuttoned when the knock came.

Leyva, the third-floor day porter (since the Quercians, the saying went), was there with her brass cart and her long white coat. She didn’t even blink to see him with his braces down and his undershirt showing. “Good day, milord.”

“Good morning, Leyva.” He handed her the used shirt. “Wash and light starch, please?” One could get meals here, washing and mending, have a bed rolled in, bathe or shower down the hall. The office wing was everything a hotel was, except comfortable.

“Of course, milord.”

There was a firm click of heels from down the hall. “Porter, what’s the time?” a woman’s voice said. “How long until the Assembly?” The voice had a touch of Western throatiness. It was vaguely familiar.

Varic leaned out the door. The woman was wearing a black velvet tunic brocaded with silver, a sword-and-sunset emblem on the left breast, riding trousers tucked into boots. There was early white in her black hair, which was held back with a silver mesh band. The costume was only, Varic guessed, a hundred and twenty years behind City fashion. Her face was a bit flat, her nose a bit broken, but quite pleasing, he thought. “Nine minimi,” he said. “There’s a single bell at three before. Plenty of time to reach the Chamber.”

She looked hard at him, at his open shirt, then said, “Thank you.”

“Of course. You’re Lady Longlight, correct? From the Far West.”

“I’m glad to see someone here knows me.”

“Now, you’ll hurt Leyva’s feelings,” Varic said, buttoning up. “I’m sure she recalls you.”

The porter said, “The lady Coron was last here on the tenth day of the Spear, just after the last Evenday. She had number 319 then, as well, and salt beef and eggs for breakfast, as she did this morning.” Leyva smiled fit to break one’s heart.

“You see,” Varic said, “The Coron of the Third Floor remembers you very well. You’re here with a private motion, I believe. Number seven on the calendar.”

Longlight said coolly, “I’m here with the same motion you’ve ignored five times now, thank you very much.”

That turned the page in Varic’s memory. “Longlight, daughter of the Palion Chesdonay, Coron of the Great Rogue Hills. You have an outlaw problem.”

“Ay—yes,” she said, startled. Far Western dialect, yes, Varic thought. She said, “And you are—”

“Varic, Coron of Corvaric.” He bowed slightly as he fastened his cuffs. He was weighing the situation. She had inherited the Coronage three years ago. The Assembly had voted down her motion for assistance against the outlaws five times since then. There was no more support for it today. And he had Motion Five to deal with.

Longlight said, not too harshly, “If you know I have a problem, do you propose to do anything about it?”

Perhaps Motion Five was already safely dealt with—was on rails, as Winterhill liked to say. Well. He would know by highday. “There’s no time to discuss it now, if I’m to make Assembly fully clothed. Would you—tentatively—be pleased to talk it over at lunch?”

“Certainly,” she said.

“Then I’ll speak with you at the highday break. Good morning, Coron.”

“Good morning … Coron.”

Varic shut the door and began tying on a cravat. He had just buttoned his waistcoat and was shrugging into his blue coat when the first bell rang.

He made it, as he had said, in plenty of time and was pleased to see as he looked around the Chamber that Longlight had as well.

The Chamber of Lords had four hundred seats in eight tiers, forming slightly more than half a circle around the speaker’s platform and the President’s bench. High at the back was a visitors’ gallery, with two bailiffs in red and silver at the corners. They carried maces and had never in memory had to use them for more than traffic control. At least the House had managed to keep the Justiciar from giving them guns.

The room had light-colored, golden-veined marble walls, only a little sooted from the two gas chandeliers; the tier seats were of dark oak and wrought iron, and around the walls were armorial banners, from the wonderful old days when Palions on horseback beat each other’s brains out for glory’s sake, and the national flag of West Mountain silver quartered with Grand River blue. It had taken twenty years after the Abdication to move the royal banner from the Chamber to the National Gallery, where every day, Varic knew, people went to sigh their hearts out over its lonely exile.

The nine o’clock bell rang. The chaplain asked Goddess in all Her aspects to bless the Assembly, and the President—this year it was Saltworthy, one of the Lords Sorcerous—proclaimed the session begun. Then it fell to Brook, as Chief Parliamentarian, to read the calendar of motions.

The Chamber was nearly half full, Varic saw. That was an excellent attendance. There were, according to the roster, two hundred seventy-eight Coronage seats (the Lords Temporal), another eighty for the Lords Sorcerous, and thirty-six Lords Spiritual. Of that, only about a third were usually present. That is, someone was present: the Corons and magicians were allowed to send proxies to observe, argue, and vote for them, and most did. Not that the proxies always troubled to appear for sessions.

Over the years, the size of a voting quorum had been steadily reduced, until now it stood at seventy Corons, twenty sorcerers, and no priests at all. Even that number were only required for binding votes. There had been a memorable session, just after the winter recess two years ago, that had opened with Brook, Varic, the current President, six other Corons, two sorcerers, and a priest present at the bell. They thought for a bit about what to do, and then decided to work.

The following morning, a quorum was seated, unsteadily, and found that fifty-three motions were through debate and ready to be voted on. Attendance had been poor on occasions since then, but never again so destitute.

Varic’s count was just over two hundred fifty present. There were only a dozen priests; there had been a Church election two days ago, and they would be returning from the four Imageries. Varic knew the new Archimage well. He would be seeing him at Strange House in two days more.

And all but a dozen of the magicians or their proxies were here. The news of Motion Five had spread. Well.

Varic looked for the Coron Bowenshield. Present. That could only mean one thing. Varic looked at the visitors’ balcony. There, seated behind one of the bailiffs, with an extra next to him for good measure, sat Cable, Chief Justiciar of Lescoray, in a bloodred coat with a silver shoulder sash. Cable was a little past forty, still hawkishly handsome, though the hawk had eaten a few too many mice for his figure.

The Constitution, in one of its rare clear articles, forbade the Justiciar from speaking or presenting motions before Parliament. So Cable could not, but Bowenshield could. Together they had gotten through the motion allowing Cable to give his bailiffs rifles. After all, the bailiffs were provided for explicitly in the Constitution, Article Twelve, Section Three. The army itself had no such mandate to exist. And the town bosses and merchants in the Commons thought it was a wonderful idea.

Cable was smiling today. So was Bowenshield. Something about Bowenshield’s face made a smile look ugly there. And seven-eighths of the Lords Sorcerous were present and voting.

Motion Five might be on rails, Varic thought, but trains did jump the tracks. He looked at Brook, who was composed as always in the Chamber. Brook would have registered the situation, would have seen Bowenshield, the crowd of magicians, could hardly help but see Cable in the front of the gallery.

The first motion came up, presented by one of the priests. It was a request for an official day of recognition for the retiring Archimage of Capel Storrow, one of the four principal priests of the country, the one Shadowday’s election was replacing. There was no debate; it was immediately seconded and passed unopposed by acclamation vote. A messenger ran it to the Commons Chamber for approval.

Motions Two and Three had come up from Commons. They were both requests from the town of Coombe Strait to demolish historical structures. The first was a five-century-old bridge that was a crumbling menace to navigation, but the other was a Quercian building, a noble’s house above the town. Varic suspected that the house’s “wreckage”—ornamental stonework, pottery, and iron, perhaps even some sculpture or frescoes or an inlaid floor—was worth considerably more than the property it was so rudely occupying. But there really wasn’t anything to be done. If the motion failed, the town would present it again, less politely. Or there would be a terrible incident of vandalism that would never be solved.

Parliament could Preserve property for the state. They did it with forests, and parks, and the Ironway trackbeds. But Preserved land produced no taxes. And it was seizure, no matter how lawful. Motions to Preserve were to be kept for the most important cases. At least, Varic thought, they did have the law requiring approval to demolish.

Both motions passed, the bridge by acclamation, the house by a voice vote, three to one.

It was ten thirty. The President called a quarter-hour recess. Varic went into the hall; the Chamberlain had tea and biscuits out. Varic gathered two cups and returned to the Chamber, handing one of the teas to Brook.

“I just had a word with Whetstone,” Brook said. “He said he would like to meet you. You’ve not met?”

Lord Sorcerer Whetstone was returning to his seat in the front tier of the sorcerers’ section, a hairless, heavyset, wrinkled man, wearing a dark blue suit and an ascot with a sunburst stickpin. He had an addled look, which was illusory. Whetstone was the best-respected sorcerer in Lescoray, six times Master of the National Guild. He was rarely in Parliament, and erratically so: his presence did not of itself mean that something important was on the calendar. Though today it did.

“No, that’s true, never formally,” Varic said. “Of course I’d be delighted to meet the Guildmaster. But at some more appropriate time, don’t you think?”

Pitched so that to anyone else it would sound like idle conversation, Brook said, “What in the name of dear Mother Wolf have you done, my lord Coron?”

“I hope I haven’t done anything at all,” Varic said. “As you haven’t done anything but put a motion on the calendar.” He looked up at the gallery; Cable and his personal guard had gone out. “It’s all up to what other people do, and when they do it.”

“Yes,” Brook said distantly. “Thank you for the tea.”

Varic went back to his seat. There was no difficulty—at least, none with Brook. They could not work together on every detail of every plan; for many details it was much better that they did not.

Last night, Varic had spent an interesting and somewhat tense evening with three society sorcerers. Midway through he developed a headache, which he ignored until he was fairly certain the thoughts he wanted to communicate were gotten across. Then he went home, dismissed his butler, and stared at the wall, so intent that he hadn’t heard Winterhill’s ring.

But the headache was gone, Whetstone was here, and Brook had spoken to him in front of two hundred members. It was on rails.

The recess ended. Motion Four was a petition, read by one of the middle-plains Corons, for a grant of Household to one of the merchants in his holding. It was an old form, older than Coronage. A Householder could fortify his property and arm his servants. Since there had been no new Coronages created in a hundred and fifty years (and under the Revised Constitution, there never would be any more), it was a popular petition among the newly wealthy. And since the Householder paid taxes on the fortifications, guards, and weapons, it was popular in Parliament as well.

The Coron spoke for a few minimi about what a nice, unwarlike chap this fellow who wanted guns and revetments was, and the motion passed by acclamation. The Commons might well kill it, Varic thought. They had a rather clearer idea than the Lords about potential Householders’ character, and those who had grants of their own didn’t want to see the honor handed to just any Smith or Midwife with a friend in Lystourel.

It was eight minimi past eleven. Brook passed the calendar to the President, who made the announcement of Motion Five, since Brook would be presenting it.

Motion Five was a test case. In Brook’s Revised Constitution, it would be a full Article. It said that “as Sorcery is given to be an Art practiced by Willing Artisans, knowing its Limits and Risks, so shall all fruits of that Art be considered Willful Acts of the Artisan, and subject to all the Rights and Liabilities as shall appertain to such Acts under the Law.”

It meant that if a sorcerer made it rain on your dry fields, you could not deny payment by claiming that the rain fell by Goddess’s will. The Lords Sorcerous could be expected to like that. It also meant that if the rain drowned livestock or washed the crops away—and the nature of magic made that entirely likely—the magician could be dragged into court for damages, and the sorcerers could be expected not to like that at all.

No, they did not. They murmured until the President tapped his rod, and then one of them stood to request the floor. The man’s name was Deriano. He was a thin man of middling height, with thin dark mustaches and a neat square beard. His long coat was black, plain but of expensive stuff, his waistcoat embroidered with golden sunbursts, and there were matching thumbnail-sized rubies on his watch chain and his ring. He was, down to his assumed Quercian name, the perfect newspaper-engraving image of a society sorcerer. He was a little pale this morning, a little gray below the eyes; he would have been up late last night.

Varic knew he had been up late, because it had been late when Varic left Deriano’s assistant and his companions, and it would have taken the assistant at least half an hour by cab to reach his master and tell him what the sick-drunk Coron had said.

Brook yielded the floor to Deriano. The magician thanked him, giving him a look somewhat sad and somewhat malicious, and faced the Assembly.

Deriano said, “I begin by saying that I appreciate, I admire, the Coron Brook’s impulse toward justice. Are there any of us here who do not share that impulse? I think not.” He looked up, at Cable in the gallery. Cable smiled.

Varic didn’t smile, but he was pleased. Acknowledging Cable in front of the House was a bad move. It implied that the Justiciar had some kind of authority here, which would offend even Bowenshield (perhaps especially Bowenshield). And everyone with any experience of Cable knew that his impulse, his passion, was for the law. Cable didn’t give a rat’s turd for justice. Deriano, an absentee member, didn’t know any of that. He had only heard that Cable was opposed to Motion Five, and to Brook. So he played to Cable and Cable’s faction.

“But justice,” Deriano went on, completely unaware of what he was doing, “is not simply a matter of drawing a line and measuring all humanity against it. Some of us grow up tall, and some of us grow up short. And some of us grow up with the sorcerer’s talent.

“You are all intelligent, educated people. You know that we do not choose to have the talent; it chooses us. And, just as with any other art, it does not always do what we wish it to do. But do we prosecute a singer for being off-key? Do we fine a painter for an ugly picture?”

Cable was interested now, the hawk looking hungry. That was, Varic knew, exactly what the Justiciar wanted to do. It was why he opposed Brook’s law: it put sorcery’s effects into a legal framework; it was not a system for regulating the act of magic itself.

Deriano went on in that vein for a little longer. He was an easy, informal speaker, well rehearsed, the centerpiece of any social event. His Archanum, the method that organized his magic, was in the cut stones he wore, and he glittered. Winding down, he gave a direct look to Bowenshield, who adjusted his coat to rise for the floor.

Whetstone stood up.

“Will the Lord Deriano yield to the Lord Whetstone?” the President said with a note in his voice that said he knew it was a silly question.

Brook looked carefully at several people, including Whetstone, Varic, and the President. Varic did not move. He knew entirely well that people were watching, noting, where Brook’s gaze went and what happened there. No one was looking at Deriano.

“Gladly,” Deriano said, and took his seat.

Whetstone walked to the podium. “I thank my colleague for yielding,” he said, “and I will not speak long. I merely wish to raise my voice in approval of this intelligent, important, and, may I say it, long-overdue measure.”

The other sorcerers were silent, of course, but some of them looked startled, some angry, some quite pleased. The proxy voters just stared at Whetstone blankly, as apprentices ought to look on masters. Deriano pressed his fingertips together and looked rapt.

Whetstone took no formal notice of any of them. He continued, “For entirely too many years, this nation has treated the practitioners of my ancient Art as children, less than responsible for our actions. Perhaps worse, a few less-than-competent, less-than-scrupulous workers have hidden their own faults behind this legal convenience.”

After that, it was on rails, greased, downhill, with the wind at its back. Bowenshield rose after all, to say something elaborate and meaningless about justice and freedom and self-control, fulsome as a month-old bouquet. There were only thirteen votes against, though more than forty abstentions. A passage was, however, a passage.

The President called the highday recess. Longlight came over to Varic’s seat. Varic looked at Brook: the Parliamentarian was giving him an intense look, difficult for even Varic to interpret. Then Brook turned away. Varic and Longlight left the Chamber.

They went to lunch at the Golden Sconce, a small restaurant a block from Parliament. The sky had lifted slightly, but the outdoor terrace was closed against the cold; they sat near a high arched window with a view of Clarity Park. Varic had chicken and thin pancakes, with cream and mushroom sauce; Longlight had a large rare steak.

“What does Varic mean?” she said.

“‘A difficult place to land.’ My home country has a very inhospitable coast.”

“Alch mine,” she said, delight bringing the West back into her voice. “We call it the Rogue’s Teeth.”

There was a pause, and they ate. She looked around at the other diners, most of them in frock coats and trousers, said, “I dress oddly, don’t I? I don’t think about Lystourel when I’m not here, and we never hear about your fashions.”

“By the time you had, they would have changed. They know you’re from the frontiers, and they may look a bit long at you, but it’s only curiosity. The City doesn’t think about the rest of the country, either.”

“You seem to do so.”

“As I say, I’m from the edges myself.” Which was literally true, though he had not entered his Coronage in years. She was trying to make social conversation, not understanding that the essence of City social conversation was that it should mean nothing.

Varic said, “You know that you have the last motion scheduled for today.”

“Yes.”

“I wonder if you’d consider postponing it until tomorrow. It doesn’t require a formal vote, only a request, a second, and an acclamation vote. I can assure you of a second, and almost assure you of the acclamation. After six motions today, a postponement will probably be unanimous.”

“That would put me first tomorrow?”

“No, last again. But there are only three motions on tomorrow’s calendar. Four, with yours. It’s the last day of sessions before the holiday, and there’ll probably be an early adjournment as soon as they’re read and voted.”

“I had planned to start for home tomorrow.”

“There’s an evening train west. I’ll be on it myself.” She gave him the hard look again, and he added, “With friends. We’re holidaying together.” He knew that the sleeping cars would probably be booked full by now, but this wasn’t the moment to offer her his compartment.

“I have a very long trip home. Eighty hours on the train, and then another twenty on horseback. The Ironways don’t reach very far into my country.”

“Then would you consider giving your motion today for a vote tomorrow? You don’t have to be present. We could magnostyle the results ahead of your train.”

“Why? Do I genuinely have a better chance of winning a vote tomorrow than today?”

“I believe you might. Certainly no worse chance.”

“Would you tell me why?”

“Because most of the members will be gone. Just as you plan to be. There will be fewer votes to balance against votes. There will probably be barely a quorum.”

“What if there isn’t a quorum?”

“Then there will be no vote,” he said automatically. There was no use in fencing with her: if she wanted to be direct, he could be direct. “That would not, however, necessarily be a bad thing. Look. You have no faction. No support. It takes time and effort to assemble those things.”

“I’m not interested in City politics.”

“I know that,” he said evenly. “But what if those politics are the only way to get the votes you want?”

“Allsen the Demons gobble the Parliament whole-breathed,” she said, and slashed a piece from her bleeding steak.

“There is a possibility,” Varic said. “Not secure at all, but here it is. Did you notice the reactions while milord Brook’s motion was being debated? When they discussed law and justice?”

“Yes. And the ferrety Coron got the last word.”

Varic couldn’t help grinning. “Bowenshield. Yes. May it do him good. All right. The Assembly is thinking about law and order. The ferrety one in particular. You have to get your problem across to them in those terms, that these are outlaws, criminals, not a lot of noble Blackwood Jacks defending the oppressed, or romantics in lace who kiss all the pretty boys and never shoot anybody for real. Understand?”

“You’re telling me they’re ignorant fools,” she said, staring at him.

We should stand you for President of the House, Varic came to within a hairsbreadth of saying aloud. What he did say was, “It’s not the worst strategy to treat them that way. But without letting on, please.” He checked his pocket watch. “We just have time for tea, if you’d like.”

“If you won’t think it rude, I would like to go back to my office. Think for a few minutes before the Assembly begins again.”

“Of course. I believe I’ll stay for a cup. Will you allow me to pay?”

“No. I feel I should pay you, for your advice.”

“My colleague Brook has a saying: advice only costs after it’s taken.”

She laughed and bowed, left him her share of the bill, and went out. He ordered his tea with Northern whisky, watched Longlight through the arched window, framed against the Park.

There were three things a Coron could do in the modern world. One could stay on the holding and send a proxy to Parliament, as more than half of them did. One could leave the holding in the hands of a manager and move to Lystourel, as Brook and Varic had. Or one could pretend that nothing had changed in two hundred years: live at home and rule as one pleased, and when times were dire, ride to the Royal Court with one’s petition to the Crown.

Two hundred years ago, Redlance had built a Parliament; eighty years ago Queen Beryl the Fourteenth had abdicated; but the word just did not seem to have reached everyone.

The Assembly resumed, exactly as before except that Cable was gone from the Gallery and Deriano from the floor.

The sixth motion, from one of the priests, was to borrow a moderate quantity of coal from the Naval Reserve to heat the National Hospitals. It was an easy pass, with the recommendation added from the floor that a committee study the allocation of state coal stockpiles.

It had been, of course, more complicated than that. The original thought had been to force the emergency purchase of commercial coal at an artificial low rate. The mine-owning Corons threatened to tie such a motion up forever. The Superintendent of Hospitals (who told Brook he was “breathing fog in his office of mornings”) was aimed toward Coron Deerleap, the strongest advocate for rails in the House, with the suggestion that the coal would have to be borrowed from the Ironways. Deerleap’s interests were too well known for him to propose the navy transfer, but he had no difficulty persuading the Reverend Intercessor Essence to move the idea.

Brook introduced the seventh and last motion of the day. Longlight came down to the platform.

“You all know who I am, I think, unless your memories are very short. And you should all remember why I’m here, since I was here for it six months ago, and six before that, and in all five times in the last three years for the same reason. Well, here I am again.

“My Coronage, in case you’ve forgotten, is on the west coast, in the mountains. We have a bandit problem. Going to sleep already?” She was looking at the Reverend Mother Orchard, which was unfair, since Orchard always looked seven-eighths asleep, and poorly done, since Orchard had no enemies in the Chamber.

Longlight said, “Well, yes, this is old news, old before I was born. The Great Rogue Hills, as their name implies, have always had bandits, and up to now we’ve managed them ourselves. But up to now they haven’t had repeating rifles or Ironway coaches to attack.”

That got Coron Deerleap’s interest, Varic noticed. Deerleap took attacks on the Ironways personally. That would be useful.

“We’re not large, I grant you. We don’t have any great cities, or trade roads, and only the one Ironway.” Deerleap still looked interested. “But we’re as much a part of Lescoray as this city is, and I’m telling you that without some kind of help we’re not going to be a part of it much longer—we’re going to be a bandit kingdom.”

Stop now, Varic thought. Don’t say anything more, this isn’t a feudal court any longer.

But she did go on, exactly as he was afraid she would. “And if that’s what my family’s land is going to become, then I suppose I’ll have to go along with it.”

There was a ripple of talk from the Corons. Deerleap looked bewildered, Bowenshield appalled. At least Cable was gone.

The President tapped his baton for quiet. Longlight looked around the Chamber. She seemed to understand, now, what she had done. It was no shortage of intelligence, Varic thought; she couldn’t help believing what all her ancestors had believed.

He weighed the possibilities. Deerleap was not going to speak. This was of no importance to the magicians, and the priests wouldn’t enter the debate. There had been no time to win over the frontier Corons’ representatives, and even those that might sympathize could hardly be expected to second a threat of rebellion.

What Varic could do was move for a delay of vote, until tomorrow—if they were lucky, there would be no quorum tomorrow, and the vote would come after the holiday. With a little time, the case could be made that the bandits were the real rebels against the state. That was a magnet for a coalition. The hopeless cavalry might even be sent on an expedition, and they would forget all about their grudge with Varic.

He stood up. Bowenshield was standing as well.

The President said, “Milady, other members are requesting the floor. To whom will you pass it?”

Varic could read Longlight’s thoughts. Assuming that she trusted Varic, should she let him speak next? Or would it be better to let him have the last word? In her position, he wouldn’t know the answer either. What Longlight didn’t know was that the debate was already over.

What she did was what Varic supposed he might have done, not knowing better. She turned to the Parliamentarian and spoke to him directly, too quietly for the Chamber to hear.

She was, Varic knew perfectly well, only asking him the correct procedure. To prevent what was about to happen, Brook should have announced that to the House: though he did not have the floor, no one would have protested the technicality. But Brook, the master proceduralist, would of course not do that.

And—as Brook would know—if she went from a private conference with Brook to pass the platform to Brook’s chief associate, the whole thing would stink of collusion, and she was finished. There was only one thing to do. Varic sat down, leaving Bowenshield uncontested for the floor.

Bowenshield got it. He asked for an immediate vote on Motion Seven. He got that.

Longlight’s Motion was defeated one hundred sixty-two votes to one hundred two, which was far from a disaster. But still a defeat.

All calendar business being completed, President Saltworthy asked for opposition to adjournment. There was none, and the session officially ended at twenty-two minimi past fifteen. The Lords began leaving the Chamber. Varic watched as Longlight went down the tiers to Brook’s seat. Brook was talking to her, making calm gestures. Then Brook turned to look at Varic, waved his hand. Varic went down.

Longlight said, “Milord Brook has been explaining things to me. I seem to have done almost everything wrong.”

“No, no,” Brook said kindly, “you didn’t do anything wrong. It’s simply the nature of politics that they tend to become about politics, rather than issues. Varic, the Coron says she’s leaving tomorrow. We ought to give her some pleasant experience of the City. You’re not yet accompanied for the Embassy cotillion tonight, are you?”

Longlight said, “Which Embassy?”

Brook said lightly, “Oh, never ask which Embassy. People might think it made a difference to you. It could lead to war.”

Varic said, “It’s at the Ferangarder Embassy. Their new Ambassador has just arrived. And of course I’d be delighted to accompany you.”

Longlight said, “But this will be formal dress, won’t it?” She swept her hands down her tunic. “Whatever formal is in Lystourel, I’m sure this isn’t it.”

Brook said, “Varic. Have the porter find you a cab, and get the lady to Ivory’s, before the evening traffic starts. And for Shyira’s sake, have them fit you, too: you’ve worn that blue coat to the last four parties. Go on now, and I’ll see you there.”

As they left the Chamber, Longlight said, “I have some things in my office.…”

“Papers? The porter will have them sent along. If Leyva can’t be trusted with it, none of humanity can. And if they’re clothes, forget them. We’re going to Ivory’s.”

Ivory, Ivory & Co. was in Watercourse Street, some twenty blocks south of Parliament House. It was too near the Estuary Docks to still be an exclusive address; the clothiers did not care and would not move. As the eldest living Ivory put it, “Anyone who says that Ivory’s is unfashionably located knows neither Ivory’s nor fashion.”

The company covered three glass-and-iron shop fronts. On the right was the Accessories Shop, selling cravats, collars, stockings, and other ready-mades. (Not that they could and did not make such things to order, but that was considered a bit above and beyond.) On the left was the Seamstry Hall; through the high front windows strollers could watch twenty or more employees cutting, pinning, stitching. One could touch fingertips to the glass and sense the whir of the sewing machines, or raise a hand and feel the draft of exhausted air.

The doorman tipped his high hat and ushered Varic and Longlight through the center door, into a long high-ceilinged hall lined with boxes, bolts of fabric, mirrors, valet racks, and hatstands. In an alcove were the armorial patents of the last six monarchs of Lescoray. Longlight paused at the display. “My grandmother was created Palion by the last Beryl,” she said, “and my great-grandfather by Lionstone.”

“Indeed?” said a voice from behind them. It was March, the youngest working Ivory, in shirt and pockets-vest stuffed with scissors, pincushions, tapes and notions. “Milord Coron. It’s been some time.”

“So I’ve been told,” Varic said pleasantly. He introduced Longlight and explained the situation. “The difficulty is that the ball starts at nineteen tonight. A little less than three hours.”

“One hour is a difficulty,” March Ivory said, the tape already in her hands. “Three is merely a challenge. And we’ll be dressing yourself as well, Lord Varic? Please say yourself as well.”

“Myself as well.”

Longlight and Ivory began a discussion of styles—they would be fitting an existing outfit for her, as even Ivory’s could not do a full custom construction in three hours—and disappeared into a consultation room. Another fitter checked Varic’s measurements against those on file, asking if his habits had changed since the last record: Did he carry a stick now? That called for adjustments to the sleeve length. Or should they cut room for a revolver? Varic demurred with a little unease, and asked if that was becoming popular. The fitter smiled and said, “I wouldn’t know that, honored,” which meant that it was not. Ivorys never gossiped, but they would not deny a fashion, either.

Varic was shown the book of garments available for alteration. He selected a tailcoat in blue-gray broadcloth with black satin facings, a shirt of silver-shot silk. The fitter approved. Varic knew very well that, while unfailingly polite, Ivory’s employees would not do work they did not approve of. The coat was brought out, and Varic put it on, standing entirely still while the fitter chalked it for alterations.

The marked coat went to Seamstry Hall. Varic followed. All twenty machines were in use: the holiday rush was on, celebratory clothes due tomorrow for the Equinoctials. The workers, in shirtsleeves and canvas aprons, hair netted or tied back, all with the silver or golden scissors badge of the Needlecrafters’ Guild, were slashing and stitching their way through stretch after stretch of silks and satins and velvets in pale greens and golds and mad autumn reds.

From each machine, a leather belt half a span wide went up to the ceiling, where two drive shafts ran the length of the hall. Wooden fans mounted on the shafts pulled hot air out to the street. The ceiling was skylighted, but dim with the persistent clouds; the workspaces below were brightly lit by flickerless gasmantles.

At the back of the hall, behind a wall with double glass windows, was the stationary steam engine that spun the drive shafts. Brass fittings and gauges gleamed in half darkness, and an iron flywheel twice a man’s height interrupted the light from beyond. There was a muffled squeal and a rain of sparks as the machinist ground needles and scissors back to sharpness.

As Varic walked along the double rank of machines, he could hear that most of them were humming, none loud enough to be heard by the next in line, all different tunes but all in the rhythm of the driveshafts, “Love’s a Labor” merging into “Whisky, No Water” into “Silver Over Gold.”

“Milord Coron,” said the fitter, and led him out again to try the coat pinned into shape before stitching it. It fit perfectly, at least as far as Varic could tell.

When the coat had gone again into the hall for work, Longlight reappeared. With a promise to Ivory to be back by eighteen exactly, they went a few doors up the street for a light supper. “Don’t stint,” Varic said. “For embassy banquets, you’re best off not eating for two days beforehand, but for cotillions there seems to be an attempt to produce the smallest savories possible. And Ferangarder punches—”

“Ferangarder punches have a reputation even on my coast,” Longlight said. “But do they actually serve Beast-Slayer or Old Skull Blast? At an Embassy ball?”

“Yes,” Varic said, lightly but meaning it. “And when the War Government is in power, they even use those names.” He turned to the puzzled-looking waiter and ordered an omelet with spinach and bacon. Longlight asked about the rabbit stew, but caught Varic’s look and asked instead for braised lamb kidneys. When the waiter had gone, Varic said, “Never order rabbit stew in the City unless you’ve seen the rabbit. And made sure that it is a rabbit.”

“Oh, you’re joking.”

“Mind you, I’ve seen rabbits in Clarity Park. But these days most of them are carrying revolvers.”

“You are joking.”

“Always, just a little, I hope,” Varic said, and wished at once he had not said it, and that he had some excuse to look somewhere, anywhere, but at Longlight. She looked back, questioning. He didn’t have any answer. And it had been a horribly long day.

Why had Brook done this to him?

“We mustn’t be late,” he said, to shift her mind, and his own, from conversation to food. “Or at eighteen and five instanti, Ivory will be at the door to drag us back.”

They ate, and did not talk, and returned on time. Ivory sent them to their separate fitting rooms.

Varic was met by his fitter and an apprentice, and a large mustached fellow with little hands who brushed and retied Varic’s hair, and did what little he could with Varic’s chewed nails. Varic put on his shirt and narrow cravat, a black waistcoat with his watch chain correctly hung, then the tailcoat; the fitter adjusted the silk ruffs at Varic’s chest and cuffs. March Ivory came in: she was comfortable with the look, and Varic was comfortable with the fit—“So that’s that, I think,” Varic said.

“Well, then,” Ivory said, and Longlight came out of the back.

Ivory had dressed her in a long, narrow-waisted coat of lozenge-quilted black velvet, sewn with little white crystals at the intersections. The collar was deeply cut, the lapels very broad, and a wide black cravat wrapped her bare throat. They had buffed the silver headband, and shone her boots to black glass, and done something with makeup that made her planar face seem gentler but no less strong. Varic wanted very much to know how they had done that.

“One minima,” Ivory said, and went into the Accessories Shop. Longlight looked at Varic with an expression of radiant bewilderment.

Ivory returned with a black kidskin sabretache on a fine silver chain. She displayed the bag to Longlight: it had her Coronage armorial, a horizontal sword above a setting sun. Ivory hung it on Longlight’s shoulder, adjusting it like someone hanging a picture.

“Yes,” Ivory said finally, “I think that is that. And you have twenty-four minimi yet. I love challenges.” She turned to Varic. “Milord will, I suppose, want his old clothes sent home?”

“Milord will,” Varic said. “And would you have the runner tell my butler that he won’t be needed any further tonight, and the best of the holiday?” He took out a five-plate coin. “And the same to the runner.”

Ivory accepted the coin with a nod. “And the lady Coron?”

“My hotel is the Bronze Door,” Longlight said, rather hurriedly.

“Of course,” Ivory said, and stepped back to survey her work again. “Oh, dear, the chill, I’d forgotten,” she said, and had cloaks brought out, draping Longlight’s herself.

The doorman summoned a cab, and Longlight and Varic headed north and west.

As they crossed the Grand River, the sun was going down behind the Castle, turning it amber and gold, rippling down one side with light bounced from the Fresh. Longlight watched the beautiful, confused building from the cab window, her face warm in the light, her eyes golden, like opals.

Or agates, Varic thought, for a variety of reasons, not all pleasant. He did not want to think about Agate just now; he would see her in just a few days, but she was not here. She would never be here. Not in the City. “Have you ever been in the Castle?” he asked Longlight, who was here, in the City, now.

“No. My grandmother told me stories. She was the Palion Moraine, have I said?” She turned toward him. “Your holding is … Corvaric?”

“On the north coast. Beyond Bryna Kóly.”

“And your family…”

“We never dwelt much on history. I think one of my grandfathers was a sorcerer, and died of it. My parents were killed when I was sixteen. In a bandit attack.”

“Oh,” she said. “And I’ve talked about nothing but bandits since I met you. As if no one else knew anything about them.”

“We only met this morning,” he said, and that suddenly seemed a very meaningful statement. “And as for knowledge, that’s a perfectly correct attitude, for what you came here to do. I can’t really say I ‘know’ anything. I was half the country away when it happened, visiting … friends.” He hoped she would let it lie there. There had never been any good explanation of what had happened on the Coast Road. Suspicions—hinderknowns aplenty, as they would say in the North—but no answers. He supposed, when he thought about it at all, that such an answer would require that he take some kind of action, some sort of revenge. Varic understood that vengeance, like religion, could give a life shape and direction. He had to pay attention to anything that powerful. But his life already had a shape and a direction.

“When you next visit, and have a little time,” he said, “you should see the Castle. The University has charge of it. Do you have any particular period of interest? The Middle Reigns? The Preregnum? The Quercians?”

“The Middle.”

“You should talk with Preceptor Falconer, then. Spend a day just walking around the place with him. I guarantee you’ll learn a hundred things you didn’t know and several you won’t believe.”

“That sounds wonderful.”

“Yes, just that,” Varic said, and stopped for a moment. “Send me word of your next visit, and I’ll arrange it.”

“You’re interested in the Midreigns, too, then?”

“I’m interested in everything,” he said vaguely. The usual Middle history, a catalog of Palions and tournaments and greedy illiterate kings, bored him, though Falconer’s accounts of towns forming, roads being built, the granary system, never did.

He was not being fair to her. He was assuming that the heraldry and armored noise, her Palion grandmother’s stories, were what interested Longlight. He was always too ready to assume that, as if Falconer had never taught him anything. Longlight was a Coron, a resident and successful one, which of necessity meant successful at more than holding entertaining courts and sitting on a horse properly: she would have to have experience of the complexities, the mine production and high road maintenance and flood control that Varic himself had left to others ever since he’d inherited the blasted title. He looked closely at her, wondering if she could guess how much he wanted to take her home, and sit alone over tea, and talk about dry grain storage.

“You don’t really want to go to this party, do you?” she said abruptly.

“I hadn’t planned to go,” he said honestly, and thought hard about what to say next. I don’t mind, now wasn’t adequate. How, precisely and politely, did he tell her about the turns his attitude had taken in the last few hours? From a mild annoyance at Brook for sending him to another Demon-damned diplomatic dance, to a greater annoyance that he would have to lose Longlight’s company and conversation to the empty social forms—to this sudden outrageous pleasure that he was accompanying her to this unworthy event, exactly because it was unworthy, and someone might be forced to notice the fact—

His head hurt.

“These things have their pleasures,” he said finally. “Sometimes I lose track of that. You will promise me that if you get bored, you’ll tell me so?”

“If you’ll promise me the same.” She smiled. “Mutual defense policy.”

He laughed out loud, wondering why he had doubted Brook’s perception.

The Ferangarder Embassy was on the east edge of the Silverthread District, not very far from the site of the duel that morning. The building, three stories high in white cut stone, had been designed to resemble a frontier lord’s defensible manor (from an era not quite so far in Ferangard’s past as in Lescoray’s) while in fact incorporating large windows, sun porches, and other more peaceable developments. The façade, shining with candles and gaslight in the early dark, was set some distance back from an immense stone-and-iron fence that, while not unattractive, was definitely there for defense.

The cab pulled through the gates, joining a line of cabs and coaches in the driveway. Varic looked at Longlight in the glow from the house. “You’re not worried,” he said.

She put her hands to the pinch waist of her coat. “They stitched this very quickly.”

“Nothing to fear on that account. You’re wearing a family’s reputation. If anything embarrassing happened, March would take dull scissors to her wrist. And then come back to spook whoever had done such an unfashionable job on her shroud.”

He wanted her smiling when they went in; he wanted her luminous. If he could not reflect the glow, at least he could hide in it.

They went through the arched, ironbound front doors, into a long copper-tiled hall hung with swords and portraits. The weapons were all heavily draped and knotted with the gold and green of the Ferangarder Peace Government’s flag. Another set of doors was opened, and they stood at the head of the sweeping staircase down to the floor of the two-story ballroom, behind a white-coated butler who cracked his rod on the floor and announced them. He knew Longlight’s name and full titles without prompting; Varic saw Brook’s hand in that.

There were perhaps a hundred people in the ballroom, making it seem practically empty. Some of them turned at the announcement of new guests, and of those, most kept looking. Varic knew they were not looking at him. He smiled within.

Then he saw Brook, standing at the bottom of the stairs, dressed in his usual deep grays, with a violet shoulder sash. He looked positively huge, like a heroic statue someone had carelessly invited to dinner. As they descended, Varic saw that Brook’s sash carried a large medal, of iron and gold set with small gems and an enameled boss. It was the Ferangarder War Government’s Order of the Ringed Citadel, given to him three shifts of regime ago. Varic wasn’t sure which was the greater gesture: wearing it to meet the Peace Ambassador, or wearing it in Lescoray at all.

Standing next to Brook was a woman in a white military tunic and blue trousers with gold stripes; her coat had a gold shoulder rope and several iron decorations, and the triple rank bars of a decenion. A short, straight infantry sword hung at her side. Her hair was short, straight, and dark; she looked small next to Brook, but only because she was next to Brook. On her sleeve was a silk flash of gold and black, the War Government’s colors.

Brook said, “Ah, Longlight, splendid to see you. I would have you meet Tephar Diante, decenion commanding the Second Citadel Guards Regiment, and Ambassador to Lescoray of the Ferangarder War Government. Varic, you know the decenion, of course.”

“Of course,” Varic said, and there was an exchange of bows. Brook made excuses and moved off to meet someone else. Tephar Diante said, “Your presence, Varic, is a sight to gladden. The both of you, most glad to see. This evening for me, I do fear, won’t come smooth.”

“They don’t plan to recall you?” Varic said, not loudly.

“Oh, little enough do I eat. And the Ironway fare they’ll save when I do go home, think of that.” She turned to Longlight, said in a much lighter voice, “You have a military problem, Brook tells. Mountain warfare is in my knowledge, and to talk it over with you would delight.” A pause. “If it is no interference.”

“That might be very interesting,” Longlight said.

“Then we must so arrange. Corons, until later, your pardon?”

Tephar Diante moved away. Longlight looked around, said quietly, “Was that a serious offer?”

“Offer of what?” Varic said, making sure they were adequately isolated. He thought that she did understand, however; this, she might understand better than Brook did.

“She’s from Ferangard,” Longlight said. “In the army! I can’t make a plan of defense with a Ferangarder officer.”

“No, that’s right, you can’t,” Varic said offhandedly. “There might still be an act somewhere making it treason. But don’t misunderstand. Tephar Diante was sincere enough, she has reason enough. Did you catch the wind of her comment about saving railcoach fare?”

Longlight thought a moment. “Going as freight,” she said. “In a coffin.”

“Exactly. The Peace Government doesn’t want the commander of the Second Guards anywhere near the Second Guards just now—though she’s here, where she can be found if needed. They’ve decapitated most of their elite units the same way. Tightly led military units often vote as blocs, you see.”

“But I didn’t think they needed a War Government to go to war.”

“They’ve been separate functions for a long time. ‘Peace’ and ‘War’ are just factional names now. No, this is purely politics, not military policy.”

Longlight said, “I should say it’s not.”

Varic showed her a small grin, then looked at a hunting mural, spears and boars and dogs. “If we wanted to have a war with Ferangard, this would probably be an excellent time for it. That’s a secret, of course.”

“What about Bryna Kóly? Don’t they control all the passes between here and there?”

“That’s no secret. Would you give me some technical advice?”

“What?”

“How do you defend a mountain pass? Against an army that wants to just march through.”

“It’s not hard. You barricade the path and attack from the heights. It’s like shooting staked goats.”

Varic nodded, chewed his lip. “That sounds somehow very familiar. Who else attacks like that?”

“Mountain—” She stopped, the light breaking through, and said slowly and softly, “Mountain bandits.”

“You see,” Varic said, “why a lot of people would like a general solution to the problem.”

He looked at her, reading her mind, and knew too well what he had done: he had led her, much too suddenly, away from the hearth fire, introduced her to the outer darkness.

He hated himself for it, but that was nothing new.

They turned back to the crowd, a hundred fifty or so now, Corons, members in Commons, the Grand Terminus Manager, several prominent sorcerers (though not Master Whetstone). A fat, merry-eyed man with side whiskers was Pinner, publisher of the Lystourel Morning Clarion; none of his reporters were here, of course, though the lucivitor in the corner, juggling his glass plates and flash powder, was probably Pinner’s doing. There were at least two dozen other Ambassadors and Consuls, their frock coats weighed down with extravagant decorations from each other’s governments.

A couple approached Varic and Longlight. The man was young, not tall, in a long brown coat with elaborate frogging and cuffs, a rapier on a gold silk sash. He had curly brown hair, carefully tied with gold ribbon, and his eyes were almost feverishly bright. The woman was about the same height, considerably older, her gray hair in a green lace caul. She wore a fan-skirted gown of sea-green satin foamed with white lace, and carried a cane she certainly did not need for support.

“Varic!” the man said. “You’ve finally done it, brother. You have finally nearly outdone me in companions.”

“That’s an amazing statement,” said the woman, then to Longlight, “You’ll forgive him, my dear? Even if it is a bone-bald lie?”

Longlight said, “Well, of course—I mean—hello.”

Varic said, “Milady, this is Winterhill, a friend and associate. Winterhill, please meet Longlight, Coron of the Great Rogue Hills.”

“Delighted,” Winterhill said. “This must be a very formal occasion; Varic’s sheathed his wit. Else he’d never have been able to resist introducing me as a Great Rogue.”

Varic said, “I’m chastened.”

“And I should be, but it’s much too early. Would you both please meet Malis Ainee, the Dowager Duchess of Davesque Isle? My dear Malis, these are Varic and Longlight, both landed Lords of Lescoray. And I think that’s enough alliteration for one evening.” There was a screech of strings from the center of the room. “They’re tuning, if that’s what you want to call it. Shall we dance?”

“Oh, Goddess,” the Duchess said, “it’s a linearegia. Couldn’t they have waited until we’d had a few drinks?”

“Best time to play it,” Winterhill said, taking her arm. “When we’re all sober and strong. Could be hazardous, later.”

The linearegia was a group dance that dated from the Preregnum centuries ago. While rigidly formal in its steps and movements, it steadily increased in tempo until dancers were shifting and whirling past one another like gears in an overwound clockwork. It was impossible to keep track of where one’s original partner had gone, difficult enough to remember one’s own place in the shuffle. Finally there was a drumroll and cymbal crash, and the dance stopped, this time as usual only instanti short of an overall collision.

Varic found Longlight as quickly as he could; Winterhill and the Duchess Malis found them.

“You both do that absurd dance very well,” the Duchess said.

Longlight said, “My mother taught me. She said it was invented for the old Lords of Tarse, so they could have a look at every eligible person in the hall without anyone’s companion getting suspicious.”

“Really?” the Duchess said, laughing.

“In Tarse,” Longlight went on, “if you hold your hand so during the crossing step”—she held her left palm out, tips of the fingers bent slightly—“it means, ‘No, thank you, I’m staying with the person I came in with.’”

“I see I must visit Tarse someday,” the Duchess said.

Winterhill said, “I must unburden the latest gossip upon Varic now. We’ll return bearing drinks.” He bowed; Varic did the same, a little less certainly, and followed him.

“Gossip?” Varic said.

“You’ll never guess who died this highday,” Winterhill said, almost merrily.

“No, I won’t. You’ll just have to tell me.”

“Fellow named Chase. Lieutenant of cavalry. He was run down by a coach in Cutsail Lane. Positively mangled, by reports.”

“Cutsail … by the Estuary?”

“Not nearly so noble a place to die as Willowpark Square, I grant you.” He paused. “Willowpark’s where the Duchess’s Embassy is. She saw the duel this morning—but don’t mention it to her, it’s one of the very few things I think might embarrass the lady.”

“I take it this has something to do with how you met her.”

“The Embassy, yes. But it was some time ago. And I found out later the shotgun wasn’t even loaded.… Ah. This looks like dangerous stuff.” He began filling stemmed glasses with sparkling pink punch. “Would you pick me up two or three of those chocolate whatever-they-are, brother? I haven’t had any dinner.”

When they returned, Malis and Longlight were on a settee, the Duchess gesturing as she spoke: “… but my third husband, the Forty-Seventh Duke, was a pirate. He had a letter of marque from Lescoray, of course, and two or three from Alinsea—they’ve always been very generous about that sort of thing. I couldn’t let him go on with it, of course, even though he always insisted he had nothing to do with the demise of the Forty-Sixth Duke.” She sighed. “But Forty-Seven was never entirely happy. He took to sailing model ships in the Ducal Residence duck pond.” She turned. “Here are the young men now. Milord Varic, do you know when this magnificent new Ambassador is to appear? Or have I missed him already? I’m terrible about Ambassadors, you know. If they don’t show up demanding something or wanting to start a war, I tend not to notice them at all.”

“I would expect him at twenty, honored. Another ten minimi.”

They clicked punch glasses, Winterhill balancing his against a plateful of pastry. After sips all around—the pink stuff was potent—Longlight said, “What’s the group over there?”

“I don’t know,” Varic said. “Shall we look?” They left Winterhill and the Duchess on the couch, and crossed the ballroom. A small crowd was gathered around a table.

At the table, an Archreader had the Book spread out, in a layout Varic had not seen before, an arc of seven cards above a triangle of three. No one sat across from the sorcerer. Two or three of the onlookers had Books of their own out, packs discreetly palmed, and were drawing doubles, examining the two cards and then slipping them back.

Varic looked at the cards, assuming the three below must represent the subject of the reading: they were the Six of Stones (this one showing a six-arched viaduct), the Sky reversed, and Justice. Above were the City, Ace of Springs, the Gateway reversed, Five of Steels reversed, Prince of Springs, King of Staves, and Solitude reversed. Without a knowledge of the layout, he could make very little of it, except that there were a lot of power signs displayed.

One of the Embassy guards, accompanied by an underbutler, had moved to the side of the Archreader. The guard wore a decorative gold gorget and a long sword, nothing very dramatic, and said quite calmly and politely, and even in Lescorial syntax, “Honored, pardon, but I am required to ask if you bear a license to practice sorcery in Ferangarder territories.”

The Reader showed his sunburst medallion. “I’m an accredited member of the Lystourel Guild.”

“Yes, honored. But this building is not Lescorial ground. I must ask you to display a license, or cease your practice.”

The Archreader tapped his hand lightly on the Book, then said pleasantly, “Of course. No harm was intended.”

“Surely not, honored.”

The sorcerer gathered and squared the cards, slipped the Book into an enameled gold case. He said to the guard, still pleasantly, “You’ll personally express my regrets to the Ambassador, when he arrives?”

The guard paused a moment, turned to the butler next to him. The butler said, “Honored, by our honor, done.”

The Archreader looked at them both, as if about to press the point, but did not. He stood up, and walked up the staircase, out of the room.

“This should be interesting,” Varic said to Longlight, “but from a little distance.” They returned to the corner of the room.

The Duchess of Davesque Isle was saying, “… but the ducks weren’t laughing, as they say. We invested the Forty-Eighth Duke that day, before the wedding, and had the pond turned into a Hanasish garden.” She looked up. “You’re back. Is another dance starting?”

“In a manner of speaking,” Varic said, and described the incident. They watched as five more sorcerers made polite little scenes and left the cotillion.

Winterhill said to Varic, “Want to find Brook?”

“Brook will have noticed. And he won’t say anything. Not here—”

Two butlers and four guards appeared at the top of the curved staircase.

“—and certainly not now,” Varic finished.

A butler, somewhat mellower-voiced than the first, announced, “His Honor from the sovereign state of Ferangard under Peace rule, to the Republic of Lescoray Ambassador, Rocha Serestor.”

The Ambassador appeared, in a sparely cut dark green suit with gold embroidery slashed on the sleeves and trousers. Rocha Serestor was a big man who moved in a crouch, coiled as if he were about to leap. His hair was dark, a little wavy, and his face was fiercely intense. There was polite applause as he came down the stairs.

He reached the floor, said, “Guests most in our esteem.” His voice was smooth and well projected without being beautiful. “That you have come to greet my arrival tonight, to me is joy and gratification. And I am sure that many of you, persons in your country grave and dear, questions grave and dear wait me to ask: What policies his? What attitudes? Most plainly, who this man is, and what wants he, this is to be known?

“Time will be—many years, I hope—for the difficult discussions. Let me herewith say that to speak for Peace is my cause, a message all of you are pleased to hear certainly. Now—a party in being, stand still allow us no more.”

The musicians began a standanza, slow, comfortable rhythm, and the guests formed into eights to dance it. Afterward, Longlight drifted off with the Duchess, who was starting to describe the demise of the Forty-Eighth Duke, and Varic found Brook.

“Are you enjoying yourself, Varic? In spite of yourself?”

“It’s been pleasant.”

“Well, perhaps you can do even better. If you try a bit. You’re not attending the Assembly tomorrow, are you?”

“Is that a question?”

“So far.”

“My train isn’t until eighteen.”

“All the more reason to get adequate sleep. Can you actually sleep in those little rolling closets? I certainly can’t.” He crouched his broad shoulders in pantomime discomfort.

Varic said, “There are three motions on the calendar.”

“A petition of Household the Commons won’t pass, a permission to demolish a Midreign grain bin that’s pitfalled four cows and nearly a child, and the Proclamation of Equinoctial, which I believe will arrive whether we ratify it or not. Sleep late, Varic.”

“Brook—”

“Do come to the office when you are up, though. I’ll be closing for the recess, and we’ll have lunch before you go.”

Varic realized that he was not pursuing an arguable point. “Tomorrow about highday, then.”

“Good night, Varic. And I mean good night.”

When he got back to her, Longlight said, “If you’re going to travel in a fog, you should ring bells.”

“I’m … sorry.” It wasn’t fog, he thought, it was a spinning compass. He looked at her, absolutely poised in her dazzling dress, and felt himself about to say something he might seriously come to regret in a day, or a month, or never.

The louder butler banged his staff for attention. “Guests all: the Ambassador’s wish it is to announce an interesting and amusing demonstration of art and science, in the South Garden about to begin. If you will follow me?”

“Sounds like a spectacle show,” Varic said. “Do you like the specs, my lady Coron?” He offered his arm.

She took it, whispered, “Do you think there’ll be clowns?”

Overhead, a Paleday gibbous moon struggled with the clouds. There were lanterns all over the garden, not all of them placed with concern for the plants. A light rope blocked off an area around a stone-flagged walkway. At one end of the path, on a table, was a breech-loading repeating rifle; at the other, perhaps thirty stretches away, was a big concentric target, more like a mark for archers than riflemen.

The butler said, “Honoreds, lords and ladies, the Centurion Ardel Tenati!” An infantry officer in full dress uniform stepped out of the shadows. He bowed, removed his coat, stretched his braces. Varic sighed. Had it only been this morning?

Ardel Tenati picked up the rifle, checked its breech, then aimed at the target and fired. He hit the center ring, with a puff of pulverized straw. The audience applauded, having no idea what else to do.

Ardel Tenati pumped the ring-lever on the bottom of the rifle and fired again. Another palpable hit. He pumped, fired again.

Then he began jacking the lever and firing rapidly, a solid fifteen rounds a minima, one long ripple of thunder. Smoke wrapped him.

“I’d never have him in my guard,” Longlight whispered to Varic.

Varic said, “It’s not his accuracy we’re here to see.”

She looked again. Ardel Tenati was still pumping out bullets like a machine. Then she understood. “Where are they coming from?”

After fifty shots, the Centurion stopped, spun the rifle to shoulder arms, saluted. Varic saw him wince as the hot breech stung his shoulder, but he didn’t flinch.

“Honored guests,” said the butler, pointing across the audience, “the scientific part of tonight’s entertainment is now displayed. The Art herewith: Master Emed Erekel.”

A tubby, plain man stepped out of the crowd. Varic doubted that anyone had noticed his presence even before the shooting started. He wore a brown coat, a maladjusted cravat, droopy trousers, and a leather shoulder bag. He reached into the bag, produced a box of fifty rifle cartridges. Emed Erekel pulled one of the bullets from the box, made a snapping hand gesture; light blinked between his fingers.

Across the garden, Ardel Tenati brought his rifle back to ready and fired.

Applause.

Varic looked carefully at Emed Erekel. The magician’s shoulder bag was very finely worked. His buttons were of knotted leather as well, and braided bands showed from his cuffs. He would be an Archovane, then, structuring his spells through leatherwork. Would this particular magic be in the cartridge bag, Varic wondered, or a bracelet, or elsewhere?

Varic had just turned back toward Ardel Tenati, intending to examine the sling on the rifleman’s weapon, when the air shook.

A thunderbolt struck at the far end of the garden, light and furious sound. Guards quick-marched, and everyone turned, except Varic, who saw the sorcerer stare at his hands, and the Centurion nearly throw his rifle. Both of them recovered nicely. A moment later, the guard captain returned with the announcement that all was well, it was apparently a juvenile prank.

“Are there insufficient prisons?” Pinner the publisher muttered—though he was grinning through his side whiskers—and the guests began moving inside, suddenly remembering that it was cold out.

“I think that’s probably the high point of the evening’s entertainment,” Varic said. “Would you like another dance?”

“Yes, I’d very much like another dance,” she said, and her tone made his palms damp.

The musicians finally played a single-partner dance, wavelike music for a ricolette, couples revolving elegantly around the floor. As it concluded, Longlight said, “When does it become polite to leave one of these things?”

“Depends on whether you’re a magician or not,” Varic said, or rather felt the punch saying, and caught himself firmly. “Come with me.”

They found the Ferangarder Ambassador with Brook, talking amiably enough, though there was something intimidating about the two big men facing one another, and Rocha Serestor kept glancing at the opposition party’s medal on Brook’s chest.

“… but many of the things indispensable in the population’s naming,” Rocha Serestor was saying, “are actually only things they are used to having. Live without them for a while and why they were ever considered necessary is forgotten.” Varic noticed that the Ambassador’s speech had become markedly more Lescorial in style.

“Communion is an important ritual,” Brook said.

“Divisive, though. Confusing. The priests say it is an appearance of Deity, but could they be wrong?”

“Naturally, I don’t condemn your government’s actions. You have your ways. But I’m forced, if only for your information, to say that banning Communion will not be popular with Lescorials, at least not in your life or mine.”

“Yet you banned Crown Communion, which was a clear danger to policy.”

“We did not ban Goddess possessing our Kings. We eliminated Kings.” Brook turned as if cued. “Ah. Varic.” He made introductions.

Rocha Serestor said to Varic, “I knew your father somewhat. We hunted together a few times. I think you must have been away—at school?”

“Very likely, Your Honor.”

“We must converse soon. And perhaps hunt. The hunting on your lands is very good. Though, forgive me, not as good as in our Wyrowne Woods.”

“I’ll be pleased to visit you.” Varic had always heard that the hunting in Corvaric was terrible, but apart from a few rides after tethered deer before he was ten, he had never hunted and really didn’t know.

The Ambassador said, “And a Coron from the Far West. We have a great admiration for your people. You have the strength that bends not.”

Varic said, “You must excuse us both, but my lady Coron has an early train tomorrow, and I should see her back to her hotel.”

“Of course,” the Ambassador said. “Good night to both of you, and do visit me. Here to meet and serve I ever am.”

“Good night,” Brook said, and twisted the tip of his mustache in what Varic seriously hoped was a meaningless gesture.

They made a few more farewells around the floor—the Duchess gave Longlight a head-turning hug—retrieved their cloaks, and boarded a cab.

As Varic leaned up to give the driver instructions, Longlight said, “Which is closer, my hotel or your house?”

“My house, considerably. But—”

“And where’s your house?”

“Healstone Court.”

“Driver,” she called through the trap, “Healstone Court.” She sat back, pointed out the windows, at the streetlamps bouncing by. “You know the City. Tell me what we’re passing, I want to know.”

So he did, naming the lanes, the parks, Butterbread Square and Hobnail Row, Crossways Park and Heighday Street, the river bridges and the monuments, the Quercian survivals and the steam-driven factories.

She interrupted him once, to say, “The excessively dashing young man with the Duchess—Winters?”

“Winterhill.”

“He called you ‘brother.’ He isn’t, is he?”

“No. He finds it funny. I suppose I do, too. But my family’s gone. All gone.”

And then they stopped, right in front of Varic’s town house, and he knew that it was over. He put his hand on the door handle. “Good night, my lady Coron.”

She stared at him. “Is that what you want to say?”

“I believe it’s what is said.”

“Birdlime.”

“Pardon?”

“Crowcrap willat say up hills”—she stopped, recovered her City speech—“but you had me in a polite mood. Are you going to leave me here? Are you actually, honestly going to do that? You’re not married; I asked Brook that. You’re not even involved, he said. Or was he wrong?”

“No,” Varic said, “not wrong,” and that was true, because Agate was something else again. “And you?”

“There’s a wonderful young Palion. We like each other, and it’s very pleasant, and it’ll die in a year or so, from lack of sunlight.” She inclined her head. “He wouldn’t respect you for this. He’d call you an idiot. I certainly make no claims, but I trust his judgment.”

It was too perfect: so spontaneous and authentic that it froze his blood, so honest that he knew nothing but evil could come of it. Varic had a sudden, breath-stopping desire for her, so entirely physical that it rallied his senses and saved the moment from itself.

“In fact, honored,” he said, no air in his lungs, “I cannot think of a single reason why we should not have one another’s entertainment tonight. And because there is always at least one contrary reason to everything, I must perforce be missing what this one is: and that doubt prevents me.”

“You said you were sure I’d never been terrified,” she said. “I think now—”

“Milady Coron,” he said, knowing that any instanta now he would agree to what he wanted, “in Lystourel nothing worth knowing is secret. No one cares what is done on Cold Street, because that after all is what those establishments are for. But if you come into my rooms, it will be known. And it will be remembered the next time you speak to the Parliament. Some of them will think that I influenced you, some that you influenced me, most that we conspired together—and I cannot say that this would entirely harm your cause. I don’t, honestly, know what effect it might have in the Chamber. But you must make your decision knowing that it does mean something beyond the hour.”

“If I had not thought it would mean more than the hour,” Longlight said with maddening calm, “I would not have proposed the hour at all. But your point is well taken.…” She laughed, and Varic caught the joke and laughed, too, and the tension was gone.

Longlight said, “I haven’t had a night like this in … No. I’ve never had a night like this. Thank you, Varic.”

“Thank you, Longlight.”

He got down from the cab, watched it drive on, just caught the driver’s glance back and headshake. Varic shook his own head and unlocked his door, turned up the gas to light the hall.

There was a ribbon-tied package on the hall table. It was a small summer fruitcake, smelling of plump sultanas and oat flour, an Equinoctial gift from his butler’s wife. Midden’s wife was a splendid cook, who made the meals the one or two times a year Varic had guests. The cake was just the right size for two. But there weren’t two people in the house.

Varic overwrapped it in brown paper and tucked it into his larger satchel, packed and waiting in the hall for tomorrow. Agate would enjoy the fruitcake. He would share it with Agate, and be happy that he had come home alone tonight.

No, he thought, as he went upstairs to bed. Agate would be pleased to see him, and he would be happy at that. But tonight had been something else entirely.

---

The doorbell woke Varic from cloudy dreams at a little past ten. He pulled on a dressing gown and stumbled down the stairs, light hurting his eyes. The door opened on what seemed pure and intolerable whiteness, though in fact the sky had closed in gray again, the sun shrouded invisible.

“You look a splendid fright,” Winterhill said softly, slipping inside. “Trust you earned those stripes under your eyes?” He glanced toward the stairway.

“This is the second morning running that people have told me I look slept under,” Varic said sourly. “Forgive me if I misremember, but I recall dissipation as being more fun than this.”

“You mean, she’s not—she left? Or did you send her away?”

“We came to an agreement, not that it’s any of your business, and she went home as any weary soul might. What is all this sudden concern with my bedroom habits?”

“I told Brook. Never with another Coron. Not if she’d been Communed with Shyira Herself.”

“I am going to make some tea now, Winterhill. Perhaps after I’ve had a strong cup or two you’ll begin to make some sense.”

“My dear brilliant idiot friend, haven’t you noticed that the Lord Chief Parliamentarian has been trying to keep you accompanied, last night and this morning?”

Varic pushed through the kitchen door. The indispensable Midden had laid out the tea preparations the night before; Varic could have found them by touch alone. “If Brook has decided to turn procurer, he can certainly—” Varic stopped short. He put his hands on the tea table, leaned hard on them. “Chase,” he said.

“Comes the dawn,” Winterhill said. “You see, the prime movers in the recent business don’t care that much about killing you. All we had to do was make it inconvenient for a while, and they’d lose interest. Certainly they wouldn’t risk an incident at a foreign embassy, or while you had a guest of some consequence. I wouldn’t count, a rental companion might be bribed, but a Coron, ah.” He sighed. “I suppose we should be happy that they were even less determined than we’d thought.”

“I see,” Varic said.

“Don’t sound so blessed disappointed, brother.” Winterhill yawned elaborately. “Are you still going to make that tea? I m’self was very thoroughly occupied last night, and now I’m caught between utter exhaustion and the feeling I could kill tigers with a butter knife.” He snatched a butter knife from the sideboard and illustrated.

“The Duchess.… Oh, you didn’t. And if you did, I don’t want to hear about it.”

“No one ever wants to hear my best stories,” Winterhill said wistfully. He took a small paper sack from his coat pocket. “Here, have a biscuit.” He accepted a cup of tea in return, then said, “Oh, and there’s this.” He dove in the pocket again, handed Varic a small, shiny, cold object. It was a brass-cased rifle cartridge.

“Mirit Oprana .30 caliber,” Winterhill said.

“Yes?”

“That’s what the magical marksman was using last night.”

Varic looked closely at the cartridge. It seemed very ordinary. “And where did you get this one?”

“From the courtyard bushes, a little past where the Centurion was standing. On a line, in fact, from the sorcerer and past the shooter.”

“So they missed a few.”

“Several. I got three in the couple of instanti I had. From what I saw, I’d guess at least one in four appeared somewhere other than in the rifle breech.”

“The noise was yours?”

Winterhill smiled, held out his empty hand, and snapped his fingers. Another of the rifle shells appeared between them. “The luciver sold me a handful of flash powder.”

Varic put the bullet down, drank tea, and chewed a biscuit. “One in four doesn’t seem so bad.”

“Depends on the circumstances. But there’s something else. Did you notice the Embassy guards?”

“Only the one who insulted the Archreader.…” He thought a moment. “But that’s the way the Peace side is toward magicians.”

“Not what I meant. The outside guards usually carry carbines. But not last night. Now, it could be that the Peace Government is conducting a program of disarmament—”

“Thank you, Winterhill.”

“—or it could be that Emed Erekel’s Craft Archain can’t tell one gun breech from another. In the heat of battle, that could be very awkward.”

Varic contemplated the cartridge. “So was it all just a stage performance? Or were we supposed to take it for one?”

“Oh, no, brother,” Winterhill said, “the depths are not for my sounding. Especially since the Feranpactar are, as you say, that way toward sorcery. You and the Parliamentarian decide what it means—only do me one favor: If it means a war with Ferangard, give me some notice? Davesque Isle needs a Fiftieth Duke.”

“And just how—”

“You said you didn’t want to hear that story. I can tell you that it involves draining a duck pond.”

“All right, all right. When will I see you at Strange House?”

“I’ll likely be a day late. My apologies and best to everyone.”

“Of course. What’s the time?”

“Just before eleven.”

“Then I’d better get dressed and moving. We’ll see you on Shineday.”

“If Her humor holds,” Winterhill said, tucked away his bag of biscuits, and went out, whistling.

Varic shaved (cautiously), dressed, examined the weather. It was still cool, but the sky had begun to crack blue, and the north wind was clean. He selected a hat, a light topcoat, and a stick—not his swordstick, but nicely weighted—and began walking the two milae to Parliament House.

It was half past highday when he arrived. The building was nearly deserted, the short session concluded. Brook was in his office.

“Varic. Good to see you. You look well.”

“Yes. I’m well.”

“You’ll have to excuse me for a few moments longer. It was a very hurried morning—of course everyone wanted to have business finished before highday recess, and we did, but, well, my. Shall I ring for some tea?”

“Brook, has Ferangard actually outlawed Communion?”

Brook put down the papers he was holding, looked over his reading glasses. His mustaches were drooping slightly. “As a formal, public ceremony, yes.”

“You don’t find that significant?”

“I shall be interested to see how well they enforce the law.”

“I’m sure Cable will be, too.”

“You can’t think that Cable has anything to do with Rocha Serestor.”

“No, of course not,” Varic said. “He couldn’t. If there’s a saving grace to Cable at all, it’s that he can’t treat anyone as an equal.” Varic smiled a little. “The Ambassador won’t like him at all.”

Brook sat back, nodded. “Yes. That’s exactly right.”

“Cable isn’t the point. If the Peace faction can pass something like this—”

“Varic,” Brook said calmly, firmly, “have you ever been present when an Archimage bore Communion? Here, never mind Ferangard?”

“No.”

“No. You can only be called an Anticonist because ‘Atheist’ is still a legal slander. And your father was far from a pious man. Varic, Communion is Goddess possessing the Archimage’s body—”

“I know that. Birch is just about to be made Archimage of Capel—”

“—possessing the priest’s body, literally. Magic is done there, prayers are answered, on the spot, in Her own voice. Do you know what people do, when She descends? They bring handfuls of desiccated earth and ask that it be made to bloom. They bring their deformed children and their mad aunts and their barren wives and say, ‘Please, Goddess, mend thy handiwork.’ They bring the dead on carts, Varic, and ask for them back.” He leaned over the desk. “And sometimes … they come back. And it is not a blessing.”

Brook put his hands on the papers, the draft laws, the Revised Constitution in eggshell. “They can’t legislate it out of existence. I think they’re fools even to try. It’s bound to end up in repression and disaster. But I don’t see how I can fault them for wanting some kind of control.” He waved a hand. “Rocha Serestor was right about Crown Communion. Even when the ruler survived the process, it was drastic for policy.”

“Very well,” Varic said. “And the insult to the sorcerers?”

“You’re under a strange cloud this morning,” Brook said. “You don’t believe in Goddess and you’ve no use for magic, and here you are wanting to interfere with a friendly government over both of them.”

“I don’t want to interfere,” Varic said slowly, “and I’m not certain how friendly the government is.”

“Well, finally. Sit down, Varic.”

He did. Brook reached under the half-scattered papers, handed over a heavy paper folder. Varic knew what file the folder was destined for, and it was not kept in Parliament House. The name on the label was enciphered, as were the notes within. Varic said, “Whose?”

“Rocha Serestor’s. You see, I’m not so old and blind as you think. I do not like the Ambassador either; like our own much-maligned Justiciar, he’s blind and calls it clear-sightedness.”

Varic flipped through the pages. He had the cipher key memorized, but he could not read the file without going through the decoding process. “What do we have?”

“Not a great deal. Real fanatics are hard to blackmail, unlike hypocrites. However, whatever we think of the Ambassador, he is the lawful representative of a sovereign nation, as old and civilized as our own. And what happens in Ferangard, as long as it stays inside Ferangard, is not our business … except as it provides examples, good or evil, for the reform of our own country’s Constitutional document.” His tone was even, never scolding: a teacher’s, not a lecturer’s.

When he was done, Varic nodded.

“Is that all you give me? A placid nod?”

“Did you want an argument?”

“I want to hear what you have to say.”

“I haven’t anything to say. You’re right. I’m sorry.”

“Varic.…” Brook stood up, walked around the desk, his hands locked together. “Yesterday, the maneuver with Master Whetstone—how on earth did you make it happen, while staying so completely out of it?”

“There’s a lot of leverage in the relationship between apprentices and masters,” Varic said, trying to make it a joke.

Brook said, not smiling, “I should thank you for it. And I do.” He spread his hands. “Varic, the Revision is the most important thing I shall ever do. It is also the last important thing I shall ever do.” He paused for a moment, said, “Anyone else would have answered that with, ‘But, honored, you must live forever.’ Not you, of course.”

“Are you sorry?”

“Let’s say that your constancy is reassuring. Just as I am sure in the knowledge that when I am gone, you will claim no particle of credit for the Revision, not even your considerable proper share. Not because you’re modest—that you might hope to outgrow—but because it isn’t wholly and entirely yours. And so, eventually, you’ll have to make something that is.”

Varic said, “Possibly. But as you said yesterday, we have a long distance to cover. I haven’t time to consider it now.”

“And you won’t do when you have the time. It’s your flaw, Varic. You’re not selfish, and I have never met a soul to whom greed meant less, but you can’t share.”

“Well.”

“Now you’re missing the point. You’ve put your reputation and fortune and body on the block for this project that isn’t yours.” He paused, watching Varic, then said much more quietly, “You see the difficulty, don’t you? Anyone else—an ordinary clerk, blast it, never mind a landed Lord—would be calling me an ingrate now, at least with his eyes, with his mind. But you’re content.”

“Do you want me not to be content?”

“I might be more comfortable. And you know that’s not my meaning. I’m telling you that someday you’ll be standing where I am, watching your life’s work come to its peak, and looking at the person who helped you reach that point. And, because Goddess makes only one snowflake of a kind, that person, unlike you, will want a piece of the glory, and will have earned it. And you won’t give it up.”

There was another silence. Varic knew what the next question in logical sequence was: he should ask if Brook was actually afraid of this in Varic’s hypothetical future or his own immediate one. Fortunately, Brook also knew that this was the next question, and they both also knew the answer (such as it was), and thus all the difficulty of speaking either was avoided.

Varic said, again trying for humor, again not quite succeeding, “This great thing of my very own—you’re not afraid it will be a war with Ferangard?”

“No,” Brook said. “You’re not mad. You’re hiding an awful rage, hiding it even from yourself, I think. But you’re sane, and calm, and wise for your age. And I have listened to your stories of cavalry charges in distant lands: you have a good idea of what war means these days. You won’t start a war.”

Both of them lived on the margin between what people said they would do and what they actually did, like merchants on a percentage; and in time, as with the merchants, one grew unable to see anything without that margin framing it.

And they understood each other so well that Brook’s next words were an awful shock. “Not like this, Varic,” he said, as if he were bleeding. “Don’t go away on a note like this.”

Varic could not find his voice for perhaps half a minima. “I’m only visiting the House for holidays,” he said finally. “Two Paledays and I’ll be back. And Strange has a magnostyle, you know that.”

“Of course I know that.”

“It’s Equinoctials, Brook. See a play, or a concert … or you could always come to the House. How long has it been since you’ve seen Strange?”

“Much too long,” Brook said, and his tone was a relief. “And please tell Strange that I hope it will not be much longer. But not this trip.” He looked up, as if a haze were lifting. “Tell him to keep me a room for the Solstice. And to uncase the cards and lock up his money.”

“I’ll tell him. I think he’ll be delighted.”

“As will I. Now. Shall we have some late lunch, before your train?”