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The sounds of shouting that would have contained nothing but curse words in most languages diminished as Kaylin made her way out of her room.
* * *
The halls in her new home were in far finer repair than the halls in her first home had been. Doors lined the walls—doors behind which some of her friends now lived. Those friends were seldom in their own rooms, with a single notable exception: Bellusdeo. Her sole guard, Maggaron, had spent two weeks standing in the hall outside of the Dragon’s doors; he took breaks for food, but they were short and silent.
Mandoran and Annarion spent their days—and nights—in what Helen referred to as the training room. It wasn’t, as far as Kaylin could tell, actually a room in the strictest sense of the word. Teela—the reason that Kaylin had attempted to even find it—didn’t consider it a room in the loosest sense of the word, either. Kaylin pointed out that it had a door.
Teela in turn pointed out that Helen—whose voice was present—had had trouble giving the two Hawks necessary directions to reach it; in Teela’s opinion, the door had only been created as a visible marker. Helen confirmed this.
Regardless, although the two not-quite-Barrani boys had rooms of their own, they’d been holed up in a part of the mansion that couldn’t be considered home, Maggaron had been standing or slumping against a wall in the hall, and Bellusdeo had treated her room like an impregnable fortress. As housewarmings went—and Kaylin had only attended one, at Caitlin’s insistence—it was unsuccessful.
Kaylin, however, had felt at home in her room from the moment she crossed its threshold.
She felt at home in the dining room, even though it was large; she felt at home entering the front door, even though it opened to a foyer with multiple levels and too much light; she was even becoming more comfortable with Helen’s habit of treating her thoughts as questions, and answering them out loud. Tara, the Avatar of Tiamaris’s Tower, did the same. It was hard to feel lonely in this house. If it was also hard to be alone—and it was—Kaylin didn’t mind. Helen didn’t judge her thoughts, her moods or her achievements—or, more specifically, their lack.
“I would,” Helen said, as Kaylin made her way to the dining room. “But thoughts are not actions; they’re not plans. If you were planning something unwise, I would tell you.” This was demonstrably true. “If you were planning something unethical, I would also tell you. I have lived with tenants who have chosen to act against their own beliefs—and the results were not pleasant.”
“They messed up?”
“Ah, no, dear. I have had a number of tenants since Hazielle. It is almost universally true that what you cannot bring yourself to do—or perhaps to avoid doing—you cannot believe anyone else would avoid. For instance: if you decry lying, but then do it yourself—and not in the way manners might dictate—you quickly assume that no one is honest. If you betray a trust for your own benefit, you assume that no one is trustworthy.
“This eventually causes a spiral of ugliness and loathing. The reason I would stop you from doing something you despise is not necessarily because I would despise it. It is because of the effect it would have, in the end, on the way you view and interact with the important parts of your world. If you have no self-respect, your ability to respect anything or anyone else is in peril.”
Kaylin thought about this as she ate.
Mandoran soon joined her, looking glum and exhausted. Had he been mortal, she would have attempted to send him back to bed. Since he wasn’t, and given that he was up against the wall of Annarion’s frantic fear for his brother’s safety, she decided against it.
“He’s going to be the definition of anti-fun until we find his brother. I’ve taken quite a personal dislike to Lord Nightshade.” He pushed food around his plate as if the eggs were unappetizing. “If it weren’t for his brother, we could try to learn to be ‘quiet’ at a reasonable pace. The way things stand now, Annarion might as well be mortal.”
“And you mean that in the nicest possible way, of course,” Kaylin replied.
“Not really.” Being on the receiving end of Kaylin’s glare, he glanced at Helen; her Avatar had been waiting, more or less patiently, in the dining room. She appeared entirely unruffled by his comment.
“Look, I understand why mortals are in a rush about everything—they get old and weak so quickly that they can’t afford to take their time. We’re not mortal. We have time.”
“We don’t know what happened to Nightshade.”
“We know he isn’t dead.”
“There are worse things than death.”
“One of which would be practicing with Annarion,” Mandoran replied. Wincing, he added, “Great. Now he’s angry.”
Kaylin was on Annarion’s side this time, but said nothing; the Hawks had taught her to leave Barrani arguments between the Barrani who were having them.
* * *
Thanks to Annarion and Mandoran’s not exactly silent disagreement, Kaylin was in no danger of being late for work. The midwives had called her out twice during the past three weeks; they’d sent a runner to the house each time. So far, Helen seemed unwilling to install active mirrors in the manse. Mirrors were modern necessities. Anyone of import used them to communicate, especially in emergencies. Since Kaylin was feeling surprisingly awake despite the hour, she turned to Helen to tackle the subject for a third time.
“I need some sort of working mirror connection somewhere in the house. It doesn’t have to be everywhere. It could be in one room. Or even only in mine. Marcus mirrors whenever he needs someone to shout at, and the midwives’ guild mirrors when there’s an emergency. So does the Foundling Hall. I can’t ask the midwives’ guild to send a runner between the endangered mother and this house and expect me to make it there in time. So far I’ve been lucky, but I doubt that will last.”
Helen’s expression flattened. There was a reason this was the third attempt at discussion. “I have made some inquiries about the mirror network; they are incomplete thus far. I am perhaps remiss; I do not wish to insult either you or the people for whom you work. But the mirror network is not secure. I am almost certain such forms of communication would not have been allowed in my youth.”
“Almost everyone has some sort of mirror access.” Everyone, Kaylin thought, who could afford it. She hadn’t had a mirror when she’d lived in the fiefs. She hadn’t daydreamed about having one, either—she hadn’t really been aware of their existence until she’d crossed the bridge. “Some people—mostly Barrani—have even set the mirror network to follow them when they move from place to place. And if the Barrani are willing to use it, how dangerous can it be?”
“There are many things the Barrani do—and have done in the past—that you would consider neither safe nor respectable.” Helen sighed. “Understand that the mirror network is a magical lattice that underlays the city.”
Kaylin nodded.
“At the moment, it is a magic that I do not permit across my boundaries. It appears to have been designed to travel around areas of non-cooperation; it therefore skirts the edge of my containments. I have not disrupted it in any fashion—it did not seem to be directly harmful. If you wish to have access to your mirror network, I would have to alter my protections to allow the grid’s magic to overlap my own, at least in part. I do not know who, or what, is responsible for the stability of the grid; I do not know who, or what, created the spells that contain it; nor do I fully understand the magic that sustains it.”
“Don’t do it,” Mandoran said.
Kaylin glared at him. “Why not?”
“You don’t let stray magic into the heart of your home.”
“Everyone else does.”
“So I’d gathered.” He winced. “Teela’s in a mood, by the way.”
Great.
“I don’t know what kind of power your people have—I have to assume it’s not significant.”
Big surprise.
“But someone with significant power could transmit or feed an entirely different kind of magic through the lattice on which the mirror network is built.”
“I’d think the Emperor would have something to say about that—mirrors function in the Palace.”
“Dragons aren’t as fragile as mortals, for one. Look—I’m not an Arcanist. There are no doubt some protections built into the mirror network to prevent its use as a weapon. I can imagine those protections being successful in most cases—but not all. Magic is not precise; it’s not entirely predictable—as you should well know.
“But the possibility of being used as a weapon is not the only threat the mirrors might pose. It’s highly likely that they could transmit private information to outside observers.” His expression darkening, he added, “I mean—Teela lets the damn network follow her.”
Not for the first time, Kaylin wished she could be part of that internal dialogue. “The communication—the flow of information—is bound to mirrors. Teela can’t just speak to me whenever she wants unless I carry a portable mirror on my person—and those are way too expensive to give to a private. I can mirror Teela—and she’ll pick up if she’s near a functioning mirror. Break the mirror, and you break the communication. And the mirrors aren’t any sturdier than regular glass.”
“If you were better at magic,” Mandoran told her, “you could easily do what Teela does. It wouldn’t be expensive.”
Kaylin’s magic lessons had been severely disrupted for the past two months, but the implication that she was incompetent was clear. She tried to swallow her defensive words because, blunt or not, he was only speaking the truth. She even managed to succeed, although swallowing food was easier. She focused on that instead.
“If you allow your network access to this house, as opposed to the hovel you purportedly lived in before the Palace,” Mandoran continued, “the information to be gained could be a danger—to Helen. No one was interested in your previous home until Bellusdeo arrived. They might have had a great deal of interest in your palace residence, but Teela tells me the Palace is practically a magical stronghold.” His expression made it clear that he didn’t agree. And also made clear, after a moment, that Teela didn’t think much of his disagreement and was letting him know.
The thought of Teela in lecture mode made Kaylin appreciate being left out. “People mirror me when they need me. And when they need me, it’s an emergency. They don’t have time to run halfway across the city to hand-deliver a message.” She turned to Helen and added, “Even Tiamaris—the Tower of Tiamaris—has mirror access.”
Helen frowned. “Let me see, dear.”
Kaylin was already thinking about mirrors made of water in the large, glyphed stone room of that Tower, Tara standing beside them, her eyes not quite human.
“Is it only in that room that you have access to your network?”
Kaylin frowned. “No. Tara can create a mirror out of nothing if we need one.”
“Understood. I will look into this further. I am no longer—as you know—what I was when I was first created. Information I once possessed has now been lost, and I must work the way you do.” This was not in any way accurate, but Kaylin didn’t quibble. “It would be useful to have some contact with at least one of the Seven Towers; the Seven do not take unnecessary risks.” She glanced at Mandoran. “Perhaps you can be of aid in this regard.”
“I’d like to be a guest, if it’s all the same to you.” Mandoran’s answer—which didn’t appear to line up with Helen’s comment—caused Kaylin obvious confusion. “Guests aren’t asked to do necessary work—in large part because they can’t be trusted with it.” Mandoran’s smile was sharp, lean.
“I am not Barrani,” Helen replied, an edge of disapproval in her otherwise correct voice. “Believe that I would know if you were misbehaving anywhere it was likely to cause damage.” Her expression softening, she added, “We would not have survived without your intervention—and to intervene, you stood almost at the heart of my power. As such, there is now very little with which I would not trust you.”
“It doesn’t seem like an adequate reward for good behavior,” Mandoran replied. He was grinning unrepentantly; it made his entire face both younger and more compelling. “I am, on the other hand, willing to entertain the prospect—if helping out around the house gets me out of other duties.”
“I don’t know why you say these things; you are just going to annoy your brother.” Helen’s voice was now reproving.
“Too late.” Mandoran had apparently had enough of the breakfast he’d hardly touched. He stood, turned to Kaylin and added, “Sorry if we woke you up.”
“I had to go in to work today anyway.”
“That’s what I said, but Helen didn’t agree.”
* * *
As Kaylin left the dining room and headed toward the grandly lit front doors, there was another surprise waiting for her. The wide, curving stairs had a person on them. Bellusdeo.
Kaylin almost didn’t recognize her. Gone was the fancy court dress that marked so much of her life in public; she was wearing pants and a tunic. The shirt beneath the tunic was beige, and if the cloth was a much more expensive weave than Kaylin could afford, it wasn’t immediately obvious. Her hair had been pulled up off her shoulders; she wore no obvious jewelry.
“Do I have something unpleasant on my face?” Bellusdeo asked, her eyes a steady bronze.
Kaylin remembered to close her mouth. “No—it just feels like it’s been so long since I’ve seen it.”
“And absence has made your heart grow fonder?”
Kaylin blinked.
“It’s a mortal phrase, I believe.”
“Mortal covers a lot of cultural territory.”
“True. I admit that I don’t completely understand the usage. I’m using it incorrectly?”
“I wouldn’t say that, exactly. Are you coming with me to the office?”
“I’m not dressed like this for Diamart’s abominable, condescending lessons, no.” Her smile deepened in exactly the wrong way. “When he is recovered enough that apoplexy won’t kill him, I think I will be, though.”
The small dragon, having resumed his ownership of Kaylin’s shoulder, snickered.
“Get it out of your system now,” Kaylin told him. “I’d like to be taken seriously by the rest of the Hawks once we get to work.”
He hissed laughter.
* * *
“You’re going to find the office a lot quieter,” Kaylin told Bellusdeo as they walked.
“Why?”
“We lost four Barrani Hawks and a dozen Aerians; the Swords lost at least that many men and women. The office is still functioning; the duty roster is still being filled in all divisions that require one. It’s not that no one dies in the line of duty—they do. But this is the first time we’ve lost Barrani.”
“Is it the first time the Barrani have been injured?”
“What? No, of course not. Barrani arrogance doesn’t lend itself to caution. But nothing we run into on a regular walking beat is capable of taking down a Barrani.” Kaylin exhaled. “But we lost four in the battle with the ancestor. Four. We don’t get a lot of Barrani applying for the force. They’re culturally willing to swear to protect the city—but the ‘serve’ part of our oath really gets stuck in their throats.”
Bellusdeo chuckled. “Some things never change.”
“No. The Barrani weren’t given funerals that the rank and file in the Halls could attend. The Aerians were—but half of the Aerian funeral service takes place in the air or in the Aerie, and not all of us could get there or participate in those. Grammayre asked the Aerie if they could hold the parts that take place inside the Aerie somewhere the wingless could reach, and they agreed.” Most of them, anyway. One or two Aerians, raw with grief and anger at the loss, wanted their beloved departed to have nothing to do with the office that had indirectly ended their lives.
Kaylin hoped that the respect and grief of the Halls of Law would at least make them understand that their loss was felt, and felt keenly; that the lives of the lost had been respected and valued. She wasn’t certain, though. Funerals hadn’t been part of her childhood. A gathering of the living around the dead had usually had more to do with desperation than respect or comfort.
“Why do you think they serve?”
“The Barrani probably do it because they’re bored.”
Bellusdeo nodded. As an immortal, her thoughts on boredom resembled the Barrani opinion with which Kaylin was so familiar.
“The rest of us?” Kaylin shrugged. “I can’t speak for the others. But me? I wanted to be involved with something I could respect. I wanted—and maybe this is stupid—to be the good guy or the hero.”
“And now? I take it from your self-deprecating tone that you think the desire was naive.”
“A little. When I first met the Hawklord, I didn’t feel naive. I felt that everyone else was—I mean, everyone who lived on this side of the Ablayne’s bridge. Because they’d had it so easy. I still think that sometimes.” She shrugged again. “I wanted to be part of something bigger than me, in the end. I like the sense that we’re working on something together. That if justice and the law isn’t perfect, it’s better than the alternative. Someone is always going to be at the top. That’s just a law of power.
“But if the law can sometimes be used to protect those who don’t have that power, it’s better than nothing. Do you think I’m stupid?”
“Frequently,” Bellusdeo replied, but her voice was gentle. “But not in this. I wanted to be perfect, when I ruled. I wanted to be a queen who could be admired and followed; I wanted to make no mistakes. In that, I failed. But I considered the alternative worse: to not try. I learned from my mistakes. I made new ones. As I gained power, the cost of my mistakes grew—because it wasn’t just me who would pay for them. It’s the one silver lining to the cloud of being powerless, here.”
“You could join the Hawks.”
“Given your Sergeant’s attitude toward Dragons, I highly doubt it.”
“He’s not in charge. If Lord Grammayre gives you permission...” Kaylin trailed off.
“He would require Imperial permission first, and I highly doubt he would receive it. Not in my case. And yes, I am aware that Lord Tiamaris has been, in the past, considered a member of the Hawks. I am content, however, to be allowed to accompany you on your patrols. If,” she added, “you have no objections.”
Right at this very moment, Kaylin didn’t.
* * *
If anyone else was surprised to see Bellusdeo approaching the Halls in regular clothing, they were better at containing their shock than Kaylin was.
Clint and Tanner were on door duty, and therefore had the first opportunity. They nodded to Bellusdeo; they were not required to be more formal while on duty. Not that any of the Hawks were great at formality, except those in the upper echelons.
