The thakur didn’t stay long, but Rodrick had more than an hour with Dhyana and Lais, the latter doing most of the talking, excited about her plans and hopes and goals. Dhyana spoke little—after everything, she still didn’t like him much—and Hrym mostly complained about them leaving nearly as poor as they’d been when they arrived, but after a week of not hearing Hrym’s voice at all, his complaints were like music. Eventually Lais and Dhyana had to go, and a guard led Rodrick, with Hrym on his hip again—though with no jeweled scabbard, alas—toward their private rooms.
These quarters were lavish, even more so than the apartments he’d been given earlier, and included a gold-rimmed bathtub with magically warmed water. He took a long soak, Hrym propped against the wall and complaining about the steam. “We didn’t do badly,” Rodrick said. “We’re getting out of here alive. We don’t have to swim to Absalom. Not as rich as we could have been, no, but I looked in the purse the thakur gave me, and it’s all gold, and good weight. We won’t have to work again for a little while, and you can sleep on a bed of gleaming.”
“The last time you got me into a mess like this, we ended up saving the world from a demon lord,” Hrym said. “This time, we merely saved an island nation from a murderous cult. Perhaps next time we can do something even smaller, and just save a city, or a village.”
“I don’t want to save anything. No more grand excursions. Next time a supernatural creature appears before me with an invitation, I will politely decline.”
“It’s good to be back with you,” Hrym said. “I spent a week in the company of Dhyana, who wouldn’t lie even if doing so would save her life, and with Lais, who’s so sweet and earnest she would make my teeth ache, if I had teeth. I’m sick of the company of the noble and upright. Though I was touched that you spoke up in court to try to save me. As if I could be taken anywhere or destroyed without my consent. If the thakur had tried to give me away like a piece of silverware I would have wrapped his whole palace in ice.”
Rodrick laughed. He suspected the thakur had access to magics that could overwhelm Hrym given sufficient time, but was glad it hadn’t come to that. “I will try not to be earnest in your presence. Except in my insults. Those will be as earnest and heartfelt as ever.”
After his bath, Rodrick toweled and dried off, then wrapped himself in a robe, picked up Hrym, and went into the bedroom. He’d be hustled out of the palace before dawn, and he’d hardly slept well last night in the dungeon. A long nap, then a hot meal, then a full night’s sleep before the journey. Maybe he’d end up on Saraswati’s ship again. She had made the voyage over more enjoyable, and maybe she’d forgotten about the cracks in her hull.
A tall woman was standing by the bed, her back turned to him, seemingly examining a tapestry. Her hair was long and black, her clothing rich and embroidered with gold.
Rodrick frowned. Was this woman meant as a gift from the thakur? He didn’t like the company of women he didn’t win with his own charms. “Sorry, miss, but I think you have the wrong room.”
The woman turned toward him. His eyes blurred when he looked at her. Did she have four arms, or six, or two—or only one, with the other a ragged, bleeding stump? Was she beautiful, or was her face a skull, and why did it seem to flicker from one to the other, her eyes sublime and placid pools in one moment, and empty sockets writhing with worms the next? Rodrick fell to his knees, his head pounding, and stared at the designs on the carpet. It was easier to think when he wasn’t looking at her. A little.
“You broke up my conclave,” she said, and how was her voice both sweet music and the buzzing of flies? “I was going to appear there, this year, and watch my servants turn on one another, snapping and tearing, as they tried to please me. I thought I might dance among them. Sometimes I like to dance. But you were there, in the deep jungle, pretending to be one of mine—an imposter among those skilled at imposture. You played three sides against each another, and brought down disaster, to get what you wanted: to go free with a bag of gold. All this, and you managed to defeat and expose my most powerful follower in the palace, who was also my archaka. This you did in mere days. Undoing the work of years, in days.”
This had to be a trick. A wizard, casting an illusion. It couldn’t be—it couldn’t really be—
“I am not angry.” The voice was, if anything, amused. “Nagesh allowed himself to be exposed, so he failed me by definition, and deserves the death he has already received at my hands. He bleeds out even now, deep in a black cell, as yet undiscovered, and the palace will think he was killed by a member of the Knife in the Dark, and know fear again. I could not let him live, you see, to give away my secrets—he would betray me as rapidly as any other. Such is the nature of all my followers, and Nagesh even more so. But you. You have done my work for years, haven’t you?”
He knew she was standing before him, over him, reaching down with long fingers to touch the top of his head. Her touch was warm and comforting; her touch was repellent and foul. “You have wormed your way into hearts and homes and minds, only to betray them, to slip off into the night and leave those who considered you friend or mentor or partner penniless, bereft, and confused. You have served me by your actions, showing the world a smile that hides a lie. You never served in my name, and you acted without hope of gaining my favor—which makes your actions more pure, in a way.”
He struggled to speak. “I’m not … I’m not like Nagesh … I don’t…”
“Oh, you have some similarities. He did not wish to serve me in his heart, either—rakshasas do not willingly serve any god—but he did my work just the same. And now I have no champion in the Inner Sea. I have enough to occupy me in the Impossible Kingdoms, but … I may look upon you, from time to time, Rodrick of Andoran. You are not so different from many men, I think. Doing whatever you wish, to enrich yourself, though with great élan. But you have passed before my eyes, into my sphere, and so called my attention down on you. That is all some men need, to become great—the attention, however glancing, of someone like me. Perhaps I will have work for you, in the future. And rewards, of course, for work well done. I know how you like your rewards.”
Her fingers reached down again and touched his chin, trying to tip his head back. He resisted, but just for an instant. Then she was irresistible. He gazed up at her face, and it was not blurry, now: half beautiful woman, half grinning skull, the edge between them ragged and bleeding. “I feel what you are. You have loyalty to no one, except your sword … it’s unfortunate that you have even that much. But perhaps something may be done about that. My followers are often called upon to betray those closest to them. Sometimes they are even brought to betray themselves.”
She leaned forward and kissed his forehead with her bloody half a mouth.
Everything went black.
* * *
“Rodrick!” Hrym said. “Rodrick, what’s wrong with you? Are you all right?”
He opened his eyes. He was on the floor, carpet rough against his cheek. He sat up, blinking. “Is she gone? Hrym? Is she?”
“Who?”
“Vas … a woman. There was a woman…”
“Rodrick, what’s wrong with you? We came into the room, and you started talking to yourself, and then you knelt, and then you just fell over. I was shouting at you, but you didn’t seem to hear. If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were tainted by a demon.”
Rodrick laughed, but it was almost a sob. He struggled to his feet. “We’re leaving, Hrym. Right now. We have gold, we have my pack and cloak, we can get to the docks, they won’t try to stop us—”
“Are you mad? You want to try to escape again? Why? We’re being sent away as heroes, at least by our standards, in a few hours. If the wrong people see you walking around before then you’ll be killed on sight. Calm down, man.”
Rodrick took deep breaths. All right. Calm. Calm. If that woman had been … who he feared, running wouldn’t help. She could be anywhere, couldn’t she? The only way to defeat her … Could he root her out of his heart? Make it an unwelcome habitation for her? “Hrym. We … we have to make some changes.”
“What are you talking about?”
“The way we live. The … the cheating. The lies. I don’t know…”
Hrym’s voice was concerned. “Don’t tell me you meant what you told the thakur, about your thieving days being over. I know you saved yourself this one time by telling the truth, or at least large parts of it, but if you intend to do honest work, by which I mean anything that resembles work, I may have to take back my decision to travel with you. We are what we are, Rodrick. Why try to change it now?”
“The Knife in the Dark,” he said. “They lie. They trick. Are we like them?”
“No. Of course not. We just want gold, and a pleasant time, not chaos and destruction. When pushed, we’ve even been known to do good. We avenged Jayin. We are different than Nagesh, Rodrick.”
“In kind, though? Or degree?” He was starting to think more clearly, but the thoughts were still not easy.
“What do you want to do, then?” Hrym said. “Pledge yourself to Iomedae and become a paladin? Don’t think you’re carrying me into battle at the Worldwound. I’ve turned down that opportunity before.”
“I … No. No.” He scrubbed a hand through his hair. Could there be a middle path? Somewhere between honesty and treachery? “But I’m going to be a lot more careful about who we try to swindle. They say you can’t cheat an honest person, but we both know you can, and we often have. It’s just a little harder. You can exploit goodwill almost as easily as ill. I think, going forward, I’ll try to focus on stealing from those who deserve to be stolen from instead. I … I’d like to see if it’s possible to use the things we can do against those who deserve it.”
“There should be no shortage of targets, then,” Hrym said. “But I’m not signing on for charity work. You always pick the targets, you make the plans, that’s your strength. But our goal must remain the same: a pile of coins as big as a mountain, for me to slumber on.”
“The wicked are often rich,” Rodrick said. “I think we’ll be fine.”
He went to the bed and pulled back the bedspread. There was a medallion there, black metal, marked with a circle full of inward-pointing triangles. He tore the sheet from the bed, sending the medallion spinning across the floor, then snatched up Hrym and brought the blade down hard on the medallion, freezing and shattering it on impact.
He heard laughter in his head. Laughter that was somehow half sweet music, and half the buzz of flies.