Текст книги "Point of Dreams"

Автор книги: Melissa Scott

Соавторы: Lisa Barnett
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Текущая страница: 1 (всего у книги 26 страниц)

Melissa Scott and Lisa A. Barnett

" Point Of Dreams: the second pointsman book ."

Points of Dreams

1

Philip Eslingen settled himself more comfortably on the padded stool, watching as the woman seated opposite made the final adjustments to her orrery. It was a standing orrery, tiny bronze planets moving on bronze orbits against a silver‑washed zodiac, and in spite of himself he shivered at the memory of another similar machine. But that one had been gold, the peculiarly vivid gold of aurichalcum, not solid, reputable bronze, and in any case, it was long gone, consumed by the power it had contained. This was just another astrologer’s tool, though no one would be foolish enough to call Sibilla Meening just another astrologer. She had a name in Point of Dreams, was revered by those actors rich enough to consult her, and feared by the ones who were poor enough to believe that she advised sharers on casting. Caiazzo’s household knew of her, too, and spoke well of her, even Denizard, which was what had finally induced him to part with five seillings–half a week’s wages–when he was about to lose his place and should be saving every demming. At second glance, he was less sure he’d been wise–the consulting room was a little too lavish, too much like a stage set of an astrologer’s room, lined with books and leather cylinders that could only hold scrolls, preferably rotting and mysterious, and Meening herself was portentous in the most formal of university robes, the enormous sleeves held back with gold pins in the shape of a scallop shell, a pearl poised carefully in each fan. Not the symbol Eslingen would have expected–the Starsmith was the usual patron of astrologers, not Oriane–but probably reassuring for the players and musicians and occasional slumming nobles who were her patrons.

“So, Lieutenant Eslingen,” Meening said, and Eslingen jerked himself back to the present.

“Magist.” He had no idea if she was actually a magist as well as an astrologer, but from the look of the room, it would do him no harm to assume the higher rank.

Meening smiled, and shook her head. “I’m only an astrologer, Lieutenant.”

“ ‘Only’?” Eslingen repeated. “I’ve never heard that word applied to you, madame.”

Meening blinked once, and then, unexpectedly, grinned. “Gavi warned me about you.”

Eslingen blinked in his turn, and allowed himself a rueful smile. “Of course you know Gavi.”

“And, forgive me,” Meening said, “but there’s not an astrologer in the city who doesn’t remember the names of the men who rescued the children not six months past. There’s no need to flatter me like some stumbling bit player who wants a lower fee.”

“My apologies.”

Meening nodded. “Now, are you familiar with astrological terms?”

“I read the broadsheets,” Eslingen said. Beneath the paint and the elaborate gown, he saw, too late, that she was sharply amused. “I’ve even read some of yours.”

Deliberately, he added nothing more, and Meening dipped her head, acknowledging the hit. “Then you’re aware of the current circumstances.”

“It’s ghost‑tide,” Eslingen said, and suppressed a shudder that he was sure she recognized. No soldier liked to think of his ghosts coming back to haunt him, no matter how benign.

“That certainly. The sun is in the Mother, and the moon is in opposition. That is the ghost‑tide.” She paused. “Anything more?”

Eslingen spread his hands. “Madame, I’ve come to you for guidance.”

“And you say you read my broadsheets.” The mockery was back in her voice, but only briefly. “Very well. In general, then, and then particulars.” She reached out, tapped the orrery gently, making the planets shiver in their courses. “In general, Lieutenant, there are only two planets in a day house, the moon and Seidos, both in the Maiden–the planet of the private person and the planet of tradition both in the house of finance, liberty, and the individual household. That’s good so far as it goes, but all the other planets are in the night houses, the interior world, impulse and intuition, largely unbridled, and their aspects drown this good influence. The sun is largely unaspected, and the aspects that do exist, a triple conjunction and a powerful opposition, tend to cancel each other out. The individual is without direction, particularly in regard to public, everyday affairs. And there is a four‑way conjunction”–she reached across the narrow table to turn the orrery on its carved stone base, so that the tangle of planets was obvious–“here, with the Winter‑Sun, Tyrseis, Sofia, and Oriane, that overbalances everything. That places the Winter‑Sun, planet of transitions and changes, together with the heedless fortune and fertility of Oriane, Tyrseis the trickster, and a retrograde Sofia–justice unblinded, seeing all too clearly–in the Sea‑bull, one of its exaltations, the sign of fertile chaos: this is an overwhelming desire to take chances, to gamble, to find a cause to back, a passion to pursue to the point of obsession. It’s also in sextile with Heira– the planet of contracts in the house of secrets and hidden treasures– which just encourages this folly. More, it’s in quincunx with Metenere, which suggests that these gambles and passions will be fruitless, but that’s the only negative aspect to the Winter‑Sun. It’s not usually this unaspected.”

She paused, considering, then turned the orrery again. “This also. The Homestar is in the Dolphin, the house of divine discontent, and it squares Oriane, which is in its exaltation. Again, the individual is without direction. Areton squares the moon: action will be difficult. In general, Lieutenant, Astreiant is primed for folly.”

“What sort of folly?” Eslingen asked.

“Ah.” Meening gave her thin smile again. “I thought you wanted a personal reading.”

“I should think it would have some bearing on my personal follies,” Eslingen answered, and Meening laughed.

“True enough. Have you seen The Drowned Island?”

Eslingen blinked, thinking for a second that it was a change of subject–that play had held the interest of almost everyone in Astreiant, from apprentice to merchants resident to the nobles in the Western Reach for almost two months now, unprecedented time, and he had not been able to understand the cause–then tipped his head to one side, considering. “You’re a critic, madame.”

“I’ve lived in Point of Dreams all my life, Lieutenant. The stars would have to be in a unique configuration before that piece of tripe could catch the imagination of the city. No offense to Gavi, of course.”

“Of course,” Eslingen echoed. Gavi Jhirassi played the lead, and was making a tidy profit from it, by all accounts. I’ll have to tell Nico, he thought. Maybe it would make him feel better about the play.

“And that’s only the beginning,” Meening said. “I’ll tell you that for free. There’s a folly coming that will make The Drowned Islandand its followers look like the wisest of women.”

I’ve read that broadsheet, Eslingen thought, suddenly. He’d bought it only a few days ago, and, yes, it had borne Meening’s name, though he’d been told often enough that mere names meant nothing to the printers, that it was common practice to attach a more popular name to an unknown work. The writer–Meening in truth, it seemed–had predicted foolishness to end all foolishness, and warned the wise to lock up their purses and their hearts until the storm had passed. In retrospect, it didn’t seem to be a good omen.

“And now the personal,” Meening said. She reached for a flat orrery, already set to mimic the stars of Eslingen’s birth. “It’s a pity you don’t know your time more closely.”

“Yes.” Eslingen felt the stab of a familiar pain. His mother had had too many children by the time she’d borne him, and been too poor to pay a real midwife; she’d given birth with the help of a neighbor and her own oldest daughter, and no one had thought to check the nearest clock until the baby had been cleaned and swaddled.

Meening went on as though it hardly mattered. “Still, there’s enough for me to work with. In short, Lieutenant, you think you’ve been through some changes lately, personal and professional, but the greatest of them is yet to come. Your world is about to be turned sideways, and with Seidos still in the Maiden, you’ll be without your usual armor until it returns to the Horse. You’re not immune to the urge to gamble, but you’ll have less to lose than usual, so you would be well advised to be very wary.”

Eslingen drew a shaken breath–there were very few astrologers who’d give so blunt a reading–and Meening smiled as though she’d guessed his thought.

“I don’t see disaster, though there is always the potential for it, but a mistake now will waste time you will someday regret.”

“Is this my private life or my profession, madame?” Eslingen asked.

Meening glanced up, then bent her head to the orrery again, “Are you in love?”

What a very good question, particularly since I’m about to lose my job over it. “Honestly, madame, I–”

“You’d better decide then,” Meening said. She straightened in her chair, her eyes suddenly hard, and Eslingen knew then why the actors worshiped her. “Great changes are coming for you, Lieutenant. And great chances, too.”

Wonderful, Eslingen thought, but couldn’t muster his usual distance. “I have reason to believe that I’m about to lose my position,” he began, and Meening smiled.

“You will.”

“And then?”

“I told you. Your life will be turned sideways. I also see the threat of delays. So you will find another position, probably of comparable worth. I do warn you, you have less to lose right now, so I wouldn’t take any unnecessary chances. And don’t gamble. You will lose there.”

Eslingen hesitated, knowing he shouldn’t ask, but couldn’t stop himself. “This position that I’m going to find–”

“You expect much for five seillings,” Meening said.

“Madame–”

Meening held up her hand. “My apologies, Lieutenant, truly. I simply don’t know more than I’ve told you. Without better times, there’s nothing more I can do.”

Eslingen bowed his head in acknowledgment, swallowing an older anger, less at Meening than at his own careless mother. “Then I thank you for what you have done, madame.”

Meening lifted a hand in casual, infuriating dismissal, and Eslingen was reminded again of the actors who were her most avid patrons. “The best I could, Lieutenant. And remember, beware of folly.”

It was a long walk back to Customs Point, where Caiazzo kept his house, and the wind off the Sier carried a definite edge. Eslingen drew his coat tighter around his shoulders, glanced at the nearest clock tower, its face bright against the dull pewter clouds. Plenty of time, he thought, he wasn’t due until the evening meal, or it would be if he didn’t dawdle, but in spite of himself, in spite of knowing better, he found his steps slowing. He didn’t really want to go back to Caiazzo’s house, where everyone knew he was on sufferance, Caiazzo only waiting for the right moment to be rid of him. The streets in their own way were warmer, particularly in the pocket markets where candy‑sellers vied with the hot‑nuts women outside the doors of the more settled stores. Shop‑girls and respectable matrons stood in line for both, and the air was heavy with wood smoke and the sharp smell of the roasting nuts. There would be hot cider in the taverns, better than warmed beer on an autumn evening, and he wished, suddenly, that Rathe was there to share a glass with him. It would have been nice to talk over Meening’s reading with the pointsman, let him turn his southriver common sense loose on it, and hopefully talk him out of the mood that was settling into his bones. Not a bad mood, Eslingen thought, and not a bad feeling, just a melancholy as tart as the smoke‑tinged air, and he hesitated for an instant, almost ready to turn on his heel and walk back to Point of Dreams. Then his own common sense reasserted itself–it was too far, too impractical, and besides, it was still wise to be discreet, to give Caiazzo time to bring about whatever it was he was planning–and he joined the line in front of the nearest sweet‑seller instead. They sold soft sugar candies this time of year, molded in the shapes of castles and horses and–this year– The Drowned Island;he bought four running horses, honoring his birth sign, and paused to nibble one in the doorway of the nearest tavern. The sugar melted on his tongue, sweet with the faintest undertone of bitterness, the taste of autumn itself, and he glanced sideways to see the tavern suddenly crammed with figures. He blinked, startled–he would have sworn there had been only a pair of old men, drinking by the fire–and then recognized at least some few of the faces. Dead men, all of them, old friends and one or two old enemies, and even the winter lover he hadn’t thought of in at least ten years, lounging long‑legged against the mantelpiece, laughing with Contemine Laduri, handsome as he’d ever been before a ball smashed his face in some nameless town ten leagues from Altheim. Eslingen caught his breath, turning fully to the door, and the shades vanished again. It was just the ghost‑tide, he told himself, nothing more, but in spite of himself he stepped into the cool shadows, and was disappointed when they didn’t reappear. He made his way to the bar anyway, feeling the ghosts gathering again behind him, and the barmaid came to meet him with the faint lines of a frown between her brows. She was no maid, more likely a grandmother, and Eslingen forced a smile.

“Is there hot whiskey, dame?”

She nodded, slowly, her eyes fixed on the room behind him, and it was all Eslingen could do to keep from turning. “Ay, soldier. Three demmings.”

Eslingen produced the coins, laid them carefully on the knife‑scarred counter. “How’d you know I’d been a soldier?”

The old woman laughed, a cackle that stirred the old men at the fire to look curiously at them. “You brought your company with you.”

And so I did. Eslingen nodded, seeing them again at the edges of his sight–companionable, really, a company on the verge of going into winter quarters–and slowly felt himself relax a little. It was the ghost‑tide, that was all, the ghosts and his melancholy and maybe even his fears, just the stars turning, opening a brief door, letting the ghosts of the timely dead walk where usually only the untimely could, or did. And the violence of the deaths around him had nothing to do with untimeliness. They had accepted the possibility when they signed on. None of these shades meant ill.

He watched the old woman pour a thrifty dram from the stone bottle warming in its simmering pot, wrapped his long fingers around the thick clay as it warmed to his touch. The liquor smelled of cloves and allspice, and he lifted the glass to the empty room before he drained it. The old woman nodded, grim approval, and he set the glass back on the bar, feeling oddly better. He’d been dreading seeing his ghosts, he realized; at least these weren’t the ones he feared.

Nicolas Rathe hesitated at the top of the stair that led down to the main room of the station at Point of Dreams, ready to offer a hand to the tiny woman at his side. She smiled abstractedly, recognizing the thought, but made her own way down without hesitation, her heeled shoes tapping on the wood. Even with them, her head barely reached his shoulder, and he was merely of middling height himself. In the room below, he could see the duty points watching them sidelong, with barely concealed amusement, and he frowned down at them, willing them to keep silent. Every ghost‑tide–when the shades of the timely as well as the untimely dead made their presence felt, from the greatest to the least–brought people to the points, afraid that their mothers or rich aunts or neighbors had been murdered after all, and most of those could be dismissed as either honest error or hopeful greed. But this one… He suppressed the desire to shake his head, schooled his face to careful neutrality. Sohier, the duty point, had warned him when she escorted the woman up to his workroom: Every ghost‑tide, she said, every ghost‑tide Mistress Evaly comes to say she fears her sister who died last spring might have been murdered after all, and every year for all the four years I’ve been here, it’s been last spring the sister died. They had had the same thing in Point of Hopes, a seamstress whose daughter died in childbed still convinced the girl’s lover had murdered her and the baby, and all any pointsman could do was listen to the tale and send her home again as kindly as possible. He frowned at Leenderts, who seemed inclined to say something, and the younger man swallowed the words unspoken. At least that had been the policy in Point of Hopes; he would make sure it was followed in Point of Dreams as well.

He opened the station door, miming surprise at finding it fully dark outside. “Mistress, do you need company home?”

As he spoke, he let his eyes roam across the waiting points. He was still getting used to Point of Dreams, a lateral promotion if ever there was one, but he’d already learned whom he couldn’t trust with such a delicate task. Leenderts, for one, the man had the sensitivity of a cargo barge; but Sohier was clever, could handle it, and Amireau as well. Voillemin, the other adjunct point, would probably make a decent job of it, had learned his manners from a merchant‑resident mother, but the door to his workroom was closed.

Evaly looked startled by the offer, and pleased, but then flushed faintly, and shook her head. “Bless you, Adjunct Point, no, I know these streets well. I was born here, just three streets over, my sister and I, and grew up here. But it was a kind offer.”

Rathe nodded, stepped out into the darkness with her, intending at least to see her to the station gate, and she made no protest, her shoes loud on the cobbles. At the gate, she put her hand on his arm and looked up into his face, and Rathe could see that she must have been something like beautiful when she was younger, not breathtaking, but what his mother would call heart‑lovely. “My sister. She wasn’t murdered, was she, Adjunct Point?”

Rathe took a careful breath, not knowing quite what to make of the suddenly lucid question. “I don’t believe so, mistress, no. But I will look into it for you.”

“After all this time.” Evaly shook her head, not a hair out of place under her neat cap. “Six years, come spring. It’s just lovely to have her back, but I can’t talk to her. I need to talk to someone.”

“I understand.”

Her hand tightened briefly, and then she was gone. Rathe watched her to the corner, a grey shadow quickly lost in the growing dark, then shook his head, and went back into the main room. The air was warmer than it had been: someone, Sohier probably, had built up the fire in the third stove, and he was grateful for it.

“That was kind, Nico,” Sohier said with a glance at Leenderts, and Rathe shrugged.

“It wasn’t much. Not if it brings her comfort.”

From the skeptical look on Leenderts’s face, the younger man didn’t accept the lesson–didn’t see the point, probably, didn’t think it was the points’ job to bring comfort, only law, if that–and Rathe sighed. No man, no leman, no child, just the ghost of a beloved sister: no one should be left so utterly alone. And she probably wasn’t totally alone, probably had staff and servants, but he couldn’t shake the chill of it completely. The clock whirred and struck the quarter hour, and he turned to collect his coat from its hook between the stoves. Sohier held the daybook open for him, and he glanced quickly over the entries before initialing them.

“Oh, Adjunct Point.” Voillemin’s door had opened, and the other adjunct made his way to the worktable, turning the daybook so that he could read the entries.

Rathe bit back a frown–that was really the duty point’s job, not Voillemin’s, particularly when Voillemin had been so quick to hide himself when Mistress Evaly appeared–but swallowed his automatic reproof. He and Voillemin were technically equal in rank, and it was no secret that Voillemin thought he should have had Rathe’s job when the former Chief Point DeChaix retired. It behooved them both to tread warily until the station had gotten used to the change of regime. “What’s up?”

“Well, sir.” Voillemin’s tone was stiff, and Rathe sighed. Voillemin was young, that was all, he told himself, young to be even a junior adjunct–his mother’s properties in Dreams had earned him quick promotion under DeChaix–and both his youth and his connections meant he should have been stationed elsewhere. It wasn’t that he was a bad pointsman, or even merely, ordinarily, corrupt, it was just that he hadn’t ever had the chance to find his own feet, instead behaved as though points’ service was some great game, the rules of which he hadn’t quite learned yet. And he was equally uncertain about Rathe himself: he knew the story of the stolen children, knew that Rathe had been one of the heroes of the summer, but also knew that the man was commoner than most, southriver born and bred and a leveller like most of that sort, and the two did not sit well together in Voillemin’s eyes. Or at least not until The Drowned Islandhad opened, Rathe amended, and admitted to himself that this was one of his greatest grievances against the miserable play. He didn’t know which was worse, watching Voillemin deplore his background, or seeing him look at him wide‑eyed, like the apprentices clogging the Tyrseia’s pit.

“There are people to see you. They came while you were with Mistress Evaly. I had them wait in my workroom.”

From the tone, he was on the verge of making a grievance of it, too. Rathe waited, but nothing more seemed to be forthcoming. “And?”

Voillemin shifted. “It’s the necromancer, b’Estorr. With another man.”

“His proper title is magist,” Rathe said. “Or master. As in fellow of the university.”

Voillemin ignored the rebuke. “He said he needed to see you, even if it was the end of your day. So I said he could wait. I know you’re close.”

Not the way you mean it. Rathe bit back the words, said, “You may have need of his services someday yourself, Voillemin.”

The younger man’s eyes widened in something almost like horror, and Rathe wondered if the boy’s father was Chadroni or a Leaguer, that he was so nervous about necromancers. More likely his nurse filled him with tales, he thought, and managed to smile as he initialed the daybook. “Send the boy to fetch some tea,” he said aloud, and moved toward the door of Voillemin’s workroom.

Istre b’Estorr was waiting as promised, together with a slim, plain man in an advocat’s scarlet robe that hung open over a plain brown suit. He looked vaguely familiar, and Rathe hid a frown, trying to place the stranger. Nothing came, and he nodded to the magist.

“Evening, Istre. Hope you weren’t waiting long.”

b’Estorr gave him a preoccupied smile. “Not too long. I’m sorry we’re here so late. I hate to catch you just at the end of your day.”

“It’s not a problem,” Rathe answered. In spite of himself, he glanced at the stranger, and b’Estorr picked up smoothly on the cue.

“Nico, you know Advocat Holles?”

Of course. Rathe nodded, gave a bow. “By reputation, and through the intendant, of course.” Kurin Holles was an advocat in the court of Point of Hearts, and a good one, by rumor, but he was also the leman of the late intendant Bourtrou Leussi, one of the better judges that Rathe appeared before–and one of the chamberlains, too, though he had died before the masque could be chosen, and Rathe didn’t envy the intendant who inherited the task. He sighed, remembering the last time he had seen Leussi–after hours, at the intendant’s comfortable, unlavish house, discussing the proper response to a case of forged licenses. Holles had been there, too, he remembered, a shadow in warm amber, formal robes discarded for a dressing gown, glancing through a door to find his leman busy, and withdrawing as quietly as he’d appeared. Rathe doubted Leussi had known he’d been there, so intent had the other man been on the problem at hand.

“I was very sorry to hear about the intendant,” he said aloud. “I had the pleasure of working with him a number of times–one of the fairest I’ve ever known. I’ll miss him.”

Holles inclined his head, the gesture not hiding the pain in his eyes, and Rathe wondered if it would have been better not to mention the man. But it was ghost‑tide, and Leussi must be all too present to his grieving friend.

“Thank you, Adjunct Point–and my compliments on the promotion. Bourtrou was pleased to hear of it, he always felt you would advance…” Holles paused, took a breath. “Which is why I presumed on Magist b’Estorr for the introduction.”

Rathe looked at b’Estorr, a chill settling in the pit of his stomach, not helped by the crackling stove. “Let’s go upstairs,” he said, and the necromancer nodded.

Rathe led the way back up the stairs to his narrow workroom. The stove was banked for the night, but the runner who had refilled the teapot was already stirring the coals to new life. Rathe nodded his thanks, and waved the others to a seat as the runner shut the door again behind him. “I take it there’s a problem?”

“Yes.” b’Estorr glanced at Holles as though seeking permission, and the older man nodded.

“Better he hear it from you, Istre. You know the–ramifications– even better than I.”

b’Estorr nodded, his arms folded across his chest as though the cold had reached him, too, and Rathe didn’t bother to hide his frown. Chadron was a cold place; winter never seemed to bother b’Estorr, so this was something more.

“Nico, I know you get a lot of people coming to you during ghost‑tide, telling tales of murder where there’s no such thing.”

Rathe nodded, warily. “We just had such a one.”

“Whereas the presence of a ghost during ghost‑tide is a likelier confirmation of timely death, rather than untimely. Though it has been known.” b’Estorr’s voice was momentarily tutorial, but then he shook the story away. “What would you say the absence of a ghost would mean?”

“During ghost‑tide?”

“During ghost‑tide,” b’Estorr agreed.

Rathe shook his head in turn. “Advocat–you’ve not touched Leussi’s ghost?”

Holles shook his head once, his eyes closing briefly over some sorrow too private to share. “And the ghost‑tide is more than a week old, Adjunct Point. And we had been lemen for almost twenty years.”

“Dis Aidones.” Rathe paused, imagining the other’s pain–gods, if he were to lose Eslingen, without even that much comfort–then forced himself to think rationally. There were a few other explanations than the obvious, and he took a breath. “Forgive me, Advocat, but there are a few questions–”

“I understand.” Holles managed a brief smile. “But I can tell you that we had not quarreled, nor was he expecting or looking forward to his death. It was–very sudden.”

And I will find out the details, Rathe thought, but not from you. The alchemists would have the records he needed, no need to cause the man further pain. “Those were my questions,” he said aloud, and didn’t add what they all knew. There were no reasons for Leussi’s ghost not to return. “Istre. You said the ghosts of the untimely dead walk at ghost‑tide, too, that it’s been known. Then why… ?”

“Because his ghost has been bound,” b’Estorr said flatly.

Rathe shuddered. He had seen b’Estorr bind a ghost once, tying it to the spot where the man had fallen–the magist who had orchestrated the theft of the children, mad and powerful–and it had not been a pleasant sight. Or, not sight, but feeling, like the sour smell of a house fire, a reminder of loss. The landame’s successor had had to build a stone cairn over the spot, to keep the horses from shying at it.

b’Estorr went on, “I can’t find it, whispers only. The only ghost that doesn’t make its presence felt during the ghost‑tide is an untimely ghost that has been bound–yes, I know, the points have to ask about either desire for death or some quarrel that would keep the ghost away, but that’s really not what’s happening. In those cases, the ghosts are there, but withholding themselves, and if that were the case, I’d have touched him. There is no other explanation. Especially not in a case like this, where the ties of lemanry were so strong.”

“All right,” Rathe said, “I’ll accept that. Was he bound at death, or could it have been malice after death, instead of murder?”

It was the first time the word had been spoken, even though they had all known it was lurking, and he saw Holles wince. b’Estorr shook his head. “Timing wouldn’t work. You’d have to be by pretty much at the moment of death in order to bind the ghost.”

“He was still warm when I found him that night,” Holles said, raw‑voiced.

Rathe scoured his face with his hands, as though he could wipe away the image Holles created for him. “I’m sorry,” he said again. “What do you want of me?”

The words came out as more of a challenge than he’d meant, but Holles seemed not to hear anything but the offer of help. “I want you to go to the regents with me. The death has already been signed as natural, he’s in the ground, and the matter’s closed. But I want it investigated. I want his murderer found and punished. So I need the regents’ warrant to reopen the matter and refer it back to the points. I thought if I brought a pointsman, particularly one of your reputation, plus a necromancer and anyone else who’d support me–well, I thought it could only help.”

“Am I your best choice?” Rathe asked, exchanging a quick look with b’Estorr. “Don’t mistake me, I consider–my professional opinion is–that you have grave cause for concern.” He used the judicial phrase deliberately, and was pleased to surprise a faint smile from the advocat. “And I want to help however I can, but…” He paused, wondering how to explain the situation, settled for, “I’m not best regarded by the regents.”

Holles frowned, and b’Estorr gave a thin smile. “The metropolitan took the points’ side against the regents last summer, largely on Nico’s say‑so.”

“And was proved right,” Holles said. He shook his head, suddenly obstinate. “I don’t care. Bourtrou held you in high regard, and you’re not afraid of necromancers and alchemists, not like some of your fellows–not like the one we were dealing with just now, to name names. I would take it as a great favor if you would stand with me in this. But I will go to the metropolitan herself if necessary.”