The other door opened, and a man came through. His facial features were hard to make out, but his dress was Teckla, except for a sort of beret pulled over his forehead that had the inevitable Vallista emblem. I concluded that he was a servant because I’m brilliant that way. I’d never seen a servant wearing a cap of any sort, and wondered if it indicated something about his job. He seemed to be considerably younger than his master, somewhere in that vague sort of middle age that’s over a thousand but less than three. He moved a bit stiffly, like his knees had had enough of this whole bending thing, but it was probably more his position than age that caused it. I won’t move that well either when I’m two thousand years old, but I’ll have been dead for one thousand nine hundred and some, so it isn’t a fair comparison.
“This person,” said Zhayin, “needs help with the front door. Would you see him out?”
“Yes, sir,” said the servant, and looked at me. I thought about how to play it. I wasn’t leaving, of course, but I was curious about whether the servant could succeed in getting the door open where I’d failed, and I thought he might be easier to interrogate than his master. So I shrugged and headed for the doorway. I stopped there for a moment, bowed, and smirked at Zhayin. “We’ll be talking again. My lord.”
The servant followed me out the door, I stopped and waited for him. I said, “I’m Vlad.”
It is hard, if you’re a servant, to figure out just where in the natural hierarchy to put a guy who acts like a nobleman, carries a sword, but is an Easterner. We just don’t fit into any of the niches. It’s always interesting to see how each one will handle it. This one didn’t even hesitate, though: he bowed slightly and said, “I am called Gormin, sir.” Then he resumed walking back toward the double doors.
“Don’t get many visitors here, I take it?”
“No, sir,” he said.
“You’ve been with Lord Zhayin for quite a while, I imagine?”
“Over a thousand years, sir.”
“A good guy to work for?”
“I have no complaints, sir.”
We reached the double doors. He pulled on them, and, when they failed to open, he frowned. He pulled a chain from around his neck and selected one of three large keys from it. It fit the lock, but failed to turn.
“Yeah,” I said.
“That is most peculiar,” he said. “I must look into the matter.” He bowed to me, turned on his heel, and started back down the hall. I went with him, of course.
He stopped. “Sir,” he said.
“Hmmm?”
He did his best not to look uncomfortable. “Perhaps I could show you to a sitting room, and have some wine sent to you while you wait?”
It sure seemed important to him.
“How long have you been here? I mean, this place?” I gestured around me.
“Precipice Manor, my lord? Since it was built.”
“When was that?” I’m not sure why I felt the need to verify what Tethia had said, but I did. No, I do know why: she was a ghost, or something like it, and I wanted to know how her perceptions matched those of someone who was actually alive.
“It’s hard to say, sir.”
“Hard to say? You don’t know how long you’ve been living here?”
“Sir, it became habitable over a hundred years ago. My lord took up residence gradually over that time. Of course, I followed him, wherever he lived.”
“Where else was he living?”
“The old castle, my lord.”
“The old castle?”
“Yes, my lord. The ancestral home, in Housetown.”
“I see.”
He coughed, and subtly indicated the direction he wanted me to go.
I shrugged. I guessed he told me enough to earn some cooperation. “Sure.”
He seemed relieved. I followed him past the room with the fireplace and into one on the same side that was similar—a little bigger, four chairs instead of two, a larger hearth, and more tables. The fire was already going. Rocza flapped on my shoulder, a sign of nervousness. She quieted down—I suppose Loiosh had said something reassuring. The servant told me that someone would be by with refreshment. I sat down and stared into the flames as if they might tell me something. They didn’t, but they made me wonder if someone just came through and lit all the fires every day; this one had obviously been going for a while.
Gormin left, shutting the door behind him. I listened for a “snick” of it locking, but didn’t hear one.
“Well, Loiosh? Any thoughts?”
“No thoughts, Boss. I’m too creeped out to think.”
“Yeah, there is something odd going—what was that?”
“That” was the sound of something heavy, like stone, sliding. It seemed to come from above, and farther down the hall, although I know that when you’re inside, the direction of sound can be deceptive. I continued watching the fire, knowing Loiosh was watching behind me. Nothing happened immediately and I relaxed a little.
“Think there are secret passages, Boss?”
“Of course there are secret passages, Loiosh. Who’d build a place like this and not put in secret passages?”
A door—the twin to the one from which Gormin had first appeared—opened. This was a man, younger than Gormin, with a stiff back and a tall forehead. He wore the colors of the Issola, but displayed an emblem of the Vallista, and was carrying a mug and a bottle on a tray.
“My lord,” he said, bowing. “I am Harro. Would you honor our home by permitting me to bring you a cup of a Newberry from the year thirty-one?”
“That sounds wonderful, Harro. I’m Vlad, Count of Szurke, at your service.” I mean, if he was going to be polite, I may as well give him the big title, the Imperial one, to reassure him that he was making the right choice.
He set the cup on the table, poured from the bottle, then set the bottle down. He bowed once more, and left before I could pump him for any information.
It was a white wine, dry and pleasant.
“How long are we going to sit here, Boss?”
“Until I finish this cup, and maybe one more. Or until Gormin gets back.”
He shifted impatiently on my shoulder, and Rocza gave a displeased hiss on my other. They were probably hungry; I know I was. But to the left, my shirt and trousers had mostly dried off.
“We could go find the kitchen,” Loiosh suggested.
I drank some more wine. “We could look for it, anyway. No doubt we’d find something interesting.”
I finished the wine and changed my mind about having more—as hungry as I was, I was afraid it would go to my head. I stood up. “All right, let’s see if we can find that kitchen.”
I stepped back into the main corridor and sniffed. There was, maybe, a very faint smell that I associate with the ferns of the jungles outside of Adrilankha. Other than that, nothing. Certainly nothing that smelled like food. What was wrong with these people, didn’t they eat?
I turned left and continued down the hall. It went for a long way with no doors, or anything else; I had to wonder what was behind the wall to my right. But then, of course, in this place, who knew? Maybe the cliff. Maybe Verra’s halls. Maybe Dzur Mountain.