Master of restless shado.., p.35
Master of Restless Shadows, page 35
part #1 of Master of Restless Shadows Series
“But, Father, them Salt Islanders turn men into women and such things. That ain’t in no way natural or godly.”
Father Timoteo gave a soft laugh and indulged the young man with an affectionate smile. “Have you visited the Salt Islands, Usto?”
“No, sir. But I heard stories . . .”
“Yes, I know what you mean. I was very nervous the first time I visited the islands myself, for much the same reason. I would make a rather homely nun, wouldn’t I?”
That won Father Timoteo a loud laugh from all the workmen. Even Querra snorted.
“But then I went to their Butterfly Temple and saw the truth for myself.” The admiration in Father Timoteo’s expression seemed to wipe away the heavy shadows of his face and reveal his youth. “The priestesses there only transform people who have come to them because they have been trapped in the wrong bodies in the first place. I met several young people undertaking the transformations and I saw with my own eyes how joyous they were when they were given their true forms. It was the exact opposite of what I’d feared. Not boys and girls being disfigured but being freed to grow up as they were meant to. It was truly moving.”
“You’ve been there and seen it?” The sunburned gardener, Usto, gaped at Father Timoteo. The Holy Father simply nodded and then returned his gaze to the sky, his expression still filled with happiness.
“Visiting the temple made me all the more awed by the Lord’s kindness in gifting the priestesses with the power to help those who came to them.”
For a few moments the rest of them in the garden, Narsi and Querra included, remained silent, considering Father Timoteo. Narsi had never been all that inclined to deep religious thought. As a boy he’d seen the holy texts as something to memorize alongside the Haldiim histories his mother taught him in the evenings. Even so, he wondered at the possibility of all religions arising from a single source. He frowned down at his own bruised hands.
How could the god who instructed Cadeleonians to punish men for their own sexual inclinations be the same as the radiant nameless first Bahiim who blessed all unions? Could cats and mice alike have been born—one to hunt and one to die—from the desire of a single god? If so, was that deity one deserving of worship?
His mother had always maintained that Cadeleonian priests and the Bahiim mystics drew their powers from different sources and served different causes. She moved between them as her needs dictated: Cadeleonian chapel to ease her grief, the White Tree of the Bahiim to bless her child.
But it seemed to him that at least half the groundsmen were taken with Father Timoteo’s idea. Usto appeared stunned. Querra nodded to herself once, then she straightened and clapped her hands, drawing everyone but Father Timoteo’s attention.
“Best get those roses in the dirt,” she directed.
At once the groundsmen sprang to action. Narsi managed to stand and join them. He observed as they transplanted the three rosebushes into the dark soil. The perfume of the blossoms rolled over him as he contemplated companion plants for the roses. Fleabane to keep insects at bay, but perhaps some thyme and lavender as well. The work hardly took a quarter of an hour to complete, but by the time Querra and the gardeners departed—with Narsi’s thanks—Narsi felt exhausted.
Once again he settled back down on the bench beside Father Timoteo and closed his eyes. The fountain continued its soothing murmur. He could feel his muscles relaxing in the warm sun. His thoughts wandered between careless whimsies as he drifted on the edge of sleep. He wondered where Lord Vediya roamed now. Had he ventured back across the bridge into the Theater District, or could he be up in his rooms, only yards away from Narsi even now? What proposition had he been about to offer Narsi, before Father Timoteo had come upon them?
“Did your mother show you any of what she wrote to me?” Father Timoteo’s voice drifted over. Narsi cracked his eyes open just a little. Father Timoteo didn’t look at him but leaned forward on the bench to pet the black cat at his feet.
“No, she didn’t,” Narsi admitted. “I thought that perhaps it was to do with my father . . .”
Father Timoteo nodded but still didn’t look at Narsi. He scratched the cat’s chin.
“Are you going to tell me?” Narsi asked.
Father Timoteo turned to face him at last, his expression so troubled that it sent a thrill of alarm through Narsi.
“Is it truly so bad?” Narsi asked. “Was he so horrible that you can’t even say his name?”
“No! He wasn’t. Your mother must have told you. He was a very good young man.” Father Timoteo’s gaze moved over Narsi’s face intently. Narsi felt certain that Father Timoteo sought aspects of that dead young man in Narsi’s flesh. “He was the best of us.”
“Then why keep his identity from me?” Narsi asked.
“Because matters are rarely simple. Good men can leave their sons terrible legacies.”
A terrible legacy? How was that supposed to serve as any kind of answer? That only added another layer of mystery for Narsi to speculate upon for hours on end. Narsi felt the familiar surge of frustrated anger, but today he didn’t have the strength to maintain it. He simply shook his head and studied the branches of the willow tree as they spun in the light breeze.
“You don’t think that by this point you’d just do me the kindness and offer me some random name to call father,” Narsi commented. “I always thought I looked like I could pass for Miralindo’s son.”
“Miralindo?” Father Timoteo sounded almost offended, though as far as Narsi knew the man was a distant cousin of Lord Grunito’s—an illegitimate and something of a rascal but generally harmless and good humored. “Lord, no! Your good mother would never have . . . never.”
Narsi shrugged and dropped back against the bench. The black cat wound around his feet, then settled a little distance away in a pool of sunlight on the fountain’s edge.
“And in any case, Miralindo’s still alive,” Father Timoteo went on. “If he were your father, don’t you think the Grunito family would have made him pay for your schooling and care?”
“This does nothing to ease my curiosity, you realize,” Narsi replied.
“I know.” Father Timoteo scowled. “It’s not my intention to toy with you. I just don’t want to lie to you—”
“But you don’t want to tell me the truth either,” Narsi commented.
“I . . . No. I don’t,” Father Timoteo admitted. “Truth isn’t always a kindness, and sometimes it only opens the way for greater harm.”
“Well, then you might consider lying.” Narsi offered the Holy Father a halfhearted smile.
“I’ve never lied to you, Narsi. Not once.”
Narsi believed him, and he supposed that he ought to have felt reassured to know that the Holy Father had never misled him. If he’d been even two years younger, he would have been delighted. But since he’d been practicing medicine he’d come to realize that there were times when a lie was a kindness. Certainly no grieving widower needed to learn that his beloved newborn was likely another man’s child. No one benefited from having all hope stripped from them after a diagnosis. Sometimes the only good a physician could offer was to allow a place for people to believe in rare possibilities and miracles.
Revealing the absolute truth in such cases only served the physician’s vanity and often came at the cost of breaking a patient’s spirit. Perhaps it seemed different from a priest’s perspective.
“Miralindo likely has a few other children, I can’t see the harm in adding myself to their number,” Narsi murmured. “He might even be pleased if I began sending him solstice gifts. He might teach me a few card tricks—”
“Oh, Narsi.” Father Timoteo shook his head. “You must not allow such a story to start up. It would sully your mother’s name and open the way for folk to deem you illegitimate.”
Narsi suspected that his mother had been well past caring about her reputation among Cadeleonians even before she died. And as for his own reputation, who didn’t think him the illegitimate offspring of some member of the Grunito family?
He almost said as much, but Father Timoteo reached out and gripped his knee with a gentle squeeze. He leaned in toward Narsi and whispered. “When the time comes—when it’s safe for you—I will do all I can to deliver your rightful inheritance to you. That was what your mother’s letter asked of me.”
“My inheritance?” Narsi’s thoughts had been so far from such matters that he couldn’t quite understand what Father Timoteo could possibly be referring to.
“She sent me the certificates and proofs of her marriage and your birth,” Father Timoteo went on, though his expression grew grim, as if just thinking on the matter exhausted him. “It will not be easily achieved nor without cost, but you are your father’s rightful heir.”
Was this the terrible legacy? Narsi wondered. He patted Father Timoteo’s cold, bony hand.
“I have a source of income of my own now. I don’t think that I need to demand any inheritance—certainly not one that comes at a cost to other people. I think that I’d be happy just to know my father’s name.”
Father Timoteo’s expression wavered.
“I’d like to be able to name him in my nightly prayers,” Narsi said, despite the fact that he’d not recited evening prayers since he’d turned ten. Father Timoteo’s amused expression and dry laugh assured Narsi that he knew as much.
“Isandro,” Father Timoteo whispered. “That was his name. But for your own safety you must not tell anyone. Certainly not now, with the royal bishop already so opposed to the growing Haldiim influence in Anacleto.”
Isandro. Narsi hardly heard the rest of Father Timoteo’s words. The name seemed to echo through his mind. Isandro . . . There had been a fruit seller who’d gone by that name—a tall, very tanned Cadeleonian who’d seemed to travel in a mist of lemon oil. But he’d been only a few years older than Narsi. He recollected a wiry, half-Mirogoth rat catcher who might have been called Isandro . . . But no, it had been the name of the man’s snarling little rat hound . . .
Isandro . . .
And then Narsi remembered. In the Grunito family chapel, a large window of brilliantly stained glass memorialized Lady and Lord Grunito’s firstborn son, Isandro Grunito. Before he’d been murdered by highwaymen, that Isandro had been heir to the earldom of Anacleto. Afterward, the title had been refused by Timoteo—who as a second son was already consecrated to the church—then the title was again abdicated by the infamous swordsman Elezar and at last settled upon the charming fourth son, Nestor.
Narsi stared at Father Timoteo. For one of the few times in his life he couldn’t think of anything to say. The shining figure from the stained glass window blazed up in his mind, looking so handsome and heroic, but nothing like the vague few memories he possessed of being held and rocked against a warm body. Dark hair and dark eyes defined a pale face, but nothing else came to him. He felt certain he would have remembered, even at the age of three, if his father had worn the blazing armor and shining helmet of the figure in the window.
“Isandro Grunito?” Narsi asked, and he half expected Father Timoteo to laugh and inform him of his mother’s marriage to some tinkerer or troubadour who’d shared the glorious Isandro Grunito’s given name. Instead, Father Timoteo nodded.
“My older brother, yes. You are my nephew.”
“But if I’m Isandro Grunito’s . . .” Narsi suddenly recalled Father Timoteo’s comment about the importance of his legitimacy, and then the full implication of that sank in. He was the firstborn son of a firstborn son. According to Cadeleonian law, that made him the heir to the earldom of Anacleto. “Who else knows?”
“The priest who performed your parents’ wedding passed away before your father did, and the physician who attended your birth moved to the Salt Islands fifteen years ago,” Father Timoteo replied.
“That’s rather convenient,” Narsi commented as a joke, but Father Timoteo cast him a guilty glance.
“Mistress Kir-Khu was always fascinated by the medical innovations of the Salt Island temples; I merely provided her with the funds to move there and study,” Father Timoteo replied. “Father Posco was simply very old.”
Narsi nearly asked why Father Timoteo would bother to send the physician away, but then it occurred to him that there was far more at stake than just his ability to give a name to the few vague memories he possessed of his father.
Lady Grunito had often regarded Narsi with the suspicious expression of an eagle finding a skunk nesting with her eaglets. But how furious would she be to discover that a gangly half-Haldiim servant boy was her grandson? Even if she accepted that, she certainly wouldn’t delight in the possibility of him displacing her son Nestor.
Nestor and his wife, Riossa, had been unfailingly kind to him and had gone out of their ways to present gifts to both him and his mother even after he’d left the Grunito household. The last thing he wanted was to take Nestor’s title from him.
And yet that seemed to have been his mother’s dying wish.
The enormity of it all left Narsi feeling at a complete loss. He looked to Father Timoteo—his uncle. He’d always adored Father Timoteo as if he were his family, but now, discovering that they were blood relatives, the idea felt strange and somehow unnatural.
“I don’t know what I should do about this,” Narsi admitted.
“I don’t either.” Father Timoteo offered him a brief smile. “I agree with your mother that is it without question wrong to deny you your rightful heritage and to keep you from claiming the resources of your family—”
“But I don’t want to take Lord Nestor’s title.”
“You could abdicate in Nestor’s favor as Elezar did. Though I would insist that you retain at least the barony of Navine for the security of income,” Father Timoteo responded, but his expression didn’t become any less troubled. “Though even that might not be enough to protect you from the royal bishop and his followers.”
“Because I’m Haldiim.”
“Yes and no. The trouble is that you aren’t Haldiim enough to exclude you from the nobility on grounds of heathenism.” Father Timoteo quieted a moment as someone passed outside the garden wall. He went on in a hushed tone. “You’re legitimate and have been blessed into the Holy Cadeleonian Church. Legally, you are as much a nobleman as the Duke of Rauma or the king himself. You have every right to associate with your peers and even take a Cadeleonian noblewoman for your wife.”
“I’m not about to do any such thing.”
“Whether you would or not doesn’t matter. It’s the fact that you could—that you are within your rights to stand among the lords of this land. Your intentions will have little bearing on the royal bishop’s outrage.” Father Timoteo sighed heavily. “Even if you were to take holy vows and live as a celibate, I fear that the royal bishop would still view you as a threat to the purity of the Cadeleonian aristocracy. Your legitimacy sets a precedent. And that opens a door for other Haldiim—and any number of foreigners—to enter the nobility and bring with them values from outside the narrow confines of holy law. As nobility you—or others like you—could alter laws and even withhold funds from the clergy. From the royal bishop’s point of view you would be the first crack that could bring down the great wall of his church.”
Narsi stared at the dancing shadow of the willow branches. This all seemed more than he could absorb. He was no one—a common physician of no significance—how could his mere existence somehow threaten so formidable a man as the royal bishop? Powerful witches like Count Radulf and his sister were the sorts of important people who inspired such animosity.
“And moreover, now is the worst possible time for our family to reveal your exact relationship to Isandro,” Father Timoteo said.
“Why is that?” Narsi didn’t miss Father Timoteo’s wording. Our family. Except Narsi had never been considered a member before this. He wasn’t sure he wished to be included now.
“Yesterday the royal bishop demanded, on pain of excommunication, that Nestor come to the capital and swear before the king that he has not converted to the Haldiim faith.”
“Should that be a problem?”
Father Timoteo leaned close. “Yes. Because my brother is stubborn, naïve and unrealistic and I fear he will not recant—not even to save our mother and all the rest of the family from excommunication and war. If at the same time it’s revealed that you are the family heir, then that would put you at the very center of the conflict that Nestor has stirred up. You see why I hesitated in telling you?” Father Timoteo asked. “It’s too much of a burden for you. Especially now.”
“I . . . It’s a great deal to take in,” Narsi admitted. Only moments ago he’d felt so wise and worldly about rightfully withholding and dispensing the truth. Now he struggled to think of a way out from under all this knowledge. He wondered what Lord Vediya would have done under these circumstances. He probably wouldn’t have troubled himself over predicaments that were mere potentialities when he had actual difficulties to face.
“Well, if it comes to the worst, I suppose we can all sail north to join Elezar for a family reunion in Labara,” Narsi decided. “Throw a few stone chisels into my medical satchel and I’ll be all set to begin doctoring to a growing population of troll patients.”
Father Timoteo made a noise that was halfway between a laugh and a sob.
“Your voice is so like his. So optimistic.” Father Timoteo gave Narsi’s knee another gentle squeeze. “I’ve done all I could to keep this a secret, to protect you, but the capital is full of spies and informants. You must be very careful. Try to take greater care in the future, even when you are treating a dying man. You can’t know if he’s been placed before you as a trap—”
“I doubt that I was the intended victim of that guard’s murder,” Narsi replied, but even as he spoke he remembered the shadowy figure lurking on the path directly ahead of him. What if the body had been placed in Narsi’s path not by chance but design? Narsi shook his head. Wouldn’t it have been a thousand times simpler to attack Narsi directly? Certainly an assassin skilled enough to silently murder an armed guardsman could have killed Narsi even more easily.
