‘What’s that?’ said Rix.
‘The only bottle that survived the fall of our house. I’ve been keeping it for a suitable occasion.’
‘Like the end of the world,’ Rix said grimly.
‘How better to celebrate it than with the finest port in existence, one hundred and twenty-seven years old.’ Tobry cleaned the bottle, eased out the blackened wooden stopper and sniffed it. A spark lit in his eyes. He poured Rix a generous measure.
They clinked goblets and sipped. ‘To friendship, and the world’s end,’ said Tobry.
Rix echoed him. The magnificent port glided down his throat like buttered gold leaf, but he could take no pleasure from it.
‘Betraying your mother, even for her high treason, is dire,’ said Tobry. ‘I can’t deny that, even done in defence of your country and your house. But you have to go on.’
‘I don’t think I can, old friend. I’ve poisoned my soul and there’s no antidote.’
‘No man is irredeemable. You can still make up for it. Indeed, you must.’
‘How?’ Rix said dully.
‘Finish the cellar painting. Then, when the war resumes, defend your city and your people with your life.’ Tobry leaned forwards and clasped Rix’s forearm. ‘The enemy are bound to come back, and when they do, they’ll be planning to finish the job.’
‘I’m sure they will.’
‘Maybe, maybe not. Tali is the one, remember? She’s bloodied Lyf’s nose several times, without magery. And twice you’ve driven him off through sheer strength — ’
‘And the enchanted blade.’
‘He has his weapons, we have ours. This is the moment you were made for, Rix. Don’t fail us now, or it really will be the end of our world.’
‘Even if I’m killed defending my house and my people, it can’t wipe away the taint.’
‘Death wipes all,’ said Tobry, leaning back with his nose in his goblet and sighing in pure pleasure.
Once that had irritated Rix, but he was beyond such trivial vexations now. ‘In a hundred years, they’ll still be talking about how I betrayed — ’
Tobry sprang up. ‘Will you stop talking crap? In a hundred years, if Hightspall still exists, history will portray you as a troubled man who gave his life defending his people. What more can anyone ask?’
Rix stared at the cellar sketch. ‘Changing the subject, if Tali recognised me when we first met, why didn’t she say so?’
‘She thought you were covering up for the killers.’
‘No wonder she was so afraid of me.’ Rix whited out the sketch and put the canvas back.
‘Are you still required to hand her over to the chancellor, to save your house?’
‘He didn’t mention it, but once Tali’s here, he’ll know. He’s got spies everywhere.’
‘Well,’ said Tobry, ‘I’m going down to get her and Rannilt. I expect I’ll be a while.’
Rix barely noticed his going. Lady Ricinus had committed high treason in defence of her house. Rix had betrayed her to the chancellor for the same reason. Which was worse? He knew the answer. A son owed a duty to his mother and, while her crime was monstrous, his was unforgiveable.
CHAPTER 88
Shortly after Tobry left, Lady Ricinus appeared. ‘They told me you’d come slinking back. Is it done?’
‘It’s done,’ Rix muttered. Shame burned him. He could not look her in the face.
‘It had better be perfect.’
He led her upstairs and she inspected the completed portrait, her small eyes darting.
‘It will do. Box it up. I’ll send for it in the morning.’ She went out without a word of thanks.
Good riddance! He never wanted to see it again. After he had crated up the portrait, Rix slumped on the couch, feeling oddly empty and not knowing what to do with himself.
The month-clock on the wall said ten-thirty p.m. Twenty-four hours until Lord Ricinus’s Honouring, which was to take place immediately after the Honouring Ball. Would Lord and Lady Ricinus lead the dancers onto the floor of the Great Hall? That would be a sight to see — his father and mother holding each other close, pretending that they had not despised each other for twenty years.
Distractedly, Rix re-sketched the cellar scene on the big canvas, then sat back with a goblet of wine, deliberately not looking at his work. Even the urgency to see the faces of the killers paled before the looming catastrophe if Lady Ricinus succeeded in her plot against the chancellor. Or if the chancellor had lied, and he planned to bring her down …
His head was spinning. He had drunk a bottle and a half on an empty stomach. Too damn bad. Rix filled another goblet, blinked at the canvas, then went to his palette to mix colours. As he was doing so, something began to nag at him about the sketch, something he had promised Tobry he would do, but it would not come to mind.
When he began to paint, Rix did not have to think about it, for he had all the colours in his inner eye: the dingy grey-greens of the streaked and oozing cellar walls; the slimy, brown-stained flagstones; the pearly lustre of the black bench; the stacks of crumbling crates, their grey timbers dotted with yellow mould and threaded with white dry rot; the piled barrels on the other side. The blonde of the young woman’s hair contrasting with the reflective gold of the tongs. The eerily beautiful ebony pearl highlighting the shiny beads of blood clinging to it.
Blood. A gloved hand was rubbing it into his wounds again, murmuring softly all the while. Rix shook off the nightmare, took another goblet and began to work. His eyesight was blurring now but that did not matter — his subconscious was guiding his hand.
Later, when he had to squint to stop seeing double, Rix was astonished to discover the canvas covered in paint. It was long after midnight; he had been working furiously for hours. He reached for the bottle but it was empty. He kicked it across the floor and it rang against the other two.
Had he really drunk three bottles? He could not remember finishing the second, much less opening a third. Rix looked around for another but there were no more up here.
At the top of the steep steps he had just enough wit to realise that his only way down was by falling. He staggered back to the painting, pressing on his eyes to fuse the two wavering images into one. There was something he had to see, though he could not remember what. A vital, urgent revelation -
Something dragged him out of unconsciousness. As Rix tried to sit up, his head spun sickeningly. It was still dark outside, and he was so drunk he could barely stand up.
His sword was propped against the wall. Using it as a walking stick, going with exaggerated care so he did not stab himself in the foot, he wavered to the painting and blinked at it. His head was slowly revolving though the blurred vision had gone.
The painting was complete, yet utterly different to the meticulous realism of his father’s portrait. The murder scene was an anguished work, done with furious strokes that made little sense up close. He backed away and the scene glided into focus, imagined as perfectly as memory.
There was the little girl, fist up to her mouth as she stifled a scream. Her blue eyes were huge, her hair not quite as golden as now, but there was no doubt who she was. He remembered her furious cry as he had scrambled up the stairs, ‘I’m going to get you.’
There was the young woman on the slab, freshly killed. It could almost have been Tali as an adult, save that the blonde hair was too pale.
And there were the killers.
‘No!’ Rix gasped. ‘No, no, no!’
The wine came up in a paroxysmic heave that splattered the floor for yards around. His brain was shrieking, his head splitting, and the one thing he could do, that he had to do, was get out of there.