He shrugged, glanced behind him-nothing but darkness-and devoted himself to following his cautiously striding hirelings. There’d be time enough later to ponder old legends …
“Later” as in after he was dead, most likely. A demise Marlin Stormserpent fervently hoped would occur in his sleep in some gigantic bed with gold-glister sheets and dozens of beautiful, willing, bare bedmaids in a suitably opulent chamber atop whatever palace he was then ruling most of the Realms from. About a century or so from now.
CHAPTER TEN
Arclath smiled his customary easy smile.
Both of his two unlikely friends were nervous and tired. It must be the upcoming council and their superiors shouting at them about this particular exacting preparation and that specific niggling detail. As the days dwindled down to that grand gathering, the tension behind the palace doors would rise to shrieking heights that would need far more than a mere knife to cut. These days, it always did.
Wherefore Lord Arclath Argustagus Delcastle, who prided himself on being a benevolent, enlightened noble who was considerate of his lessers-as well as being the airily outrageous, flamboyant flame of Suzailan fashion, though he knew some folk described him far more bluntly, “an utter fop” being one of the politer descriptions-had conducted them that evening to the Dragonriders’ Club, an establishment they’d otherwise never have spent coins enough to enter, for it was both exclusive and very expensive.
These were factors he dismissed in less than an instant. His coins would be spent, not theirs, and his purse could easily cover the patronage of two hundred nervous and tired young men. Besides, those who hoarded their coins only lost them in the end to such perils as the Silent Shadow, without ever enjoying them.
“Come, Belnar! Ho, Halance!” he said merrily, turning in a whirl of his rich and splendid half cloak. “Come and stare at the best mask dancers in all Suzail!”
He reached to fling wide the doors and usher them in, but the club door guards, who knew him well, hastened to open up for the trio.
The revealed maw of revelry made Belnar and Halance both hesitate, so Arclath smilingly strode forward and led the way out of the night and into warm, welcoming hedonism. As he’d expected, they followed readily enough.
Lanterns of leaping flame were reflected from scores of polished copper wall adornments and artfully placed mirrors; a constant murmur of chatterings and chucklings washed over everything; and a thudding, piping tune was undulating and swirling sinuously from somewhere close behind the red-lit raised stage at the heart of the dimly lit sea of small-and crowded-round tables.
The Dragonriders’ had been open for only two summers but had established itself firmly at the social height of the “daring” private clubs that catered to the young and rebellious, rather than oldblood money, centuries-old heritage weighing in membership, and stiff courtesies. Anyone who had coin enough could roll into the Dragonriders’ to drink and talk, but no one would if they didn’t also want to watch mask dancers. Or even do more than watch them by paying steep extra fees and seeking out back rooms with doors decorated by painted masks to match those worn by the dancers they’d seen on the raised stages out front-wearing only masks.
Arclath was much of an age with his two palace friends and knew they might be stiffly mortified-or trying to seem so-for the first few drinks, but would be hungrily watching thereafter. By the Dragon, the dancers were beautiful and skilled enough that he loved to watch them, and he could hire his pick of lasses anywhere in the city or enjoy the company of many an ambitious beauty for free, purely on the strength of being Lord Delcastle. Yet he loved to watch here as hungrily as the next man.
Mask dancers had been the rage in Suzail for less than three summers, but it was a fury that, as far as Arclath was concerned, could last forever. Some began their dances clothed, and others didn’t bother, but always their faces were hidden behind grotesque, long-beaked, birdlike masks. These lasses danced on raised stages, almost-but never quite-touching the front-row patrons.
Tress was already smilingly showing the men to Arclath’s usual table, right in front of the club’s lone half-oval stage. She was the owner of the Dragonriders’ and more properly known as “Mistress,” but it had been two years since Arclath had heard even a Watch patrol address her thus. Just “Tress” she was, to everyone. She was tall, urbane, and always clad in leathers that made her resemble some bard’s fancy of what a sexy, wingless, humanoid dragon might look like. But she never danced on the stage, and there was no backroom door with any mark of a dragon on it. He’d looked.
She patted Arclath’s shoulder like an old friend, murmuring, “Your guests, Lord?”
“Of course,” he smilingly assured her. “And I do believe they’re as thirsty as you are strikingly beautiful, high lady!”
“Flatterer,” she purred fondly, gliding away to fetch some decanters herself, rather than signaling her maids.
The two uneasy, blushing young men sitting beside Arclath might have bolted from their seats right back out into the street if they’d had the slightest idea how much Tress knew about them at a glance, though they’d never darkened her doors before. She caught Arclath’s eye as she came back with the wine, interpreted his grin and slight shake of his head correctly, and did not address either of his companions by name.
Even as she smilingly called them “saers,” and bent over them to give them their choice of wine and a pleasant view of the dragon she’d painted sinuously arising from her cleavage, the owner of the Dragonriders’ knew the paler, thinner one in plain street tunic and breeches with the black curly hair was the young but dedicated Wizard of War Belnar Buckmantle. While the slightly larger, agile, and darkly handsome man in palace chamberjack’s livery was Halance Dustrin Tarandar, an amiable courtier of low rank but longtime, trusted service. It was the business of many club owners to know faces and names. For one thing, it prevented husbands and wives from encountering each other unexpectedly and unpleasantly when they were availing themselves of a club’s services to temporarily forget each other. For another, it kept inferiors and superiors in common service from seeing each other to the embarrassment-or worse-of both. It was also always handy to know when a senior courtier or a noble was in the house and not wanting to be recognized. It was even more useful to know when a wizard of war was visiting. Or several war wizards, especially if their faces warned that they might be ready for trouble and expecting it.
The style of Tarandar’s uniform sleeve told any Suzailan who cared about such things that he was a senior chamberjack, head of a duty of eight chamberjacks, the fetch-and-carry men who ran errands, delivered messages and small items about the palace, moved furniture as required, announced guests entering a chamber, and guided visitors through the chambers of state. The crook of the smile on Tress’s face told Arclath she regarded Tarandar as a fellow underappreciated and underpaid toiler in personal service to the too often ungrateful. If that smile had been a comment, it would have been “Poor lad.”
Seated beside Arclath Argustagus Delcastle-in his beribboned clothing, gilded wig, curl-toed boots, and all-his two court friends looked like two of his drab, timid servants. Who suddenly, despite their wide-eyed stares at the stage, were yawning. Tired little servants of the Crown, the both of them.
“So,” Arclath began, when Tress had poured each man his mumbled choice from the decanters and smilingly had withdrawn, “tell me about this Council of Dragons from the inside, as it were. Will there be wine? Dancing? And are we all going to have to put on fetching little dragon suits like the one Tress pours herself into?”