Argo, the Manor doorkeep, noted our passage in his visitors’ tome in silence, solemn as he stared at us through spectacles in need of repair.
“We have urgent business with the Chancellor,” Etan told him.
Argo pulled a cord hanging from the wall behind his desk and a middle-aged woman appeared through the beaded arch to escort us beyond the entrance hall. She had served the Chancellor for years and knew not to question the purpose of our visit. Her eyes followed me as she left the study, brows drawn together; it was rare for me to accompany my uncle here in daylight hours.
The Chancellor came soon after. His dark gaze swept over Etan, and I fancied a little color left his face. A slow-acting, undetected poison was our greatest fear: more than one Chancellor had lost his life that way.
Etan strode forward with renewed energy. “How do you feel?” He checked Caslav’s skin, eyes, mouth, and nose in turn. The Chancellor sat, mute, as Etan checked his temperature and smelled his breath. My mouth felt dry. No poison attempt had ever passed my uncle. Not one.
“I feel well,” Caslav said slowly.
I finished my own visual scan, and my breath—unconsciously held—hissed out. The Chancellor looked fine. Rattled, maybe, but healthy. Etan settled back on the desk and regarded his old friend with open relief.
“Take these, in case.” He handed the Chancellor a few small dark squares of charcoal to block the absorption of poison through the system. “But it looks like I’m just ill.”
“I’ll send someone to fetch a physic,” Caslav said. “I’d rather you didn’t go to the hospital.”
Etan nodded. Privacy and secrecy were the cornerstones of our role.
“Thank you.” The Chancellor rocked back on his chair and folded his hands into his armpits, a gesture that reminded me strongly of his nephew. We left him there, but the feeling of unease stayed with me.
* * *
Etan stayed behind in a guest suite at the Manor in the care of Thendra, a square-jawed physic with the gleaming black skin of a western wetlander, who often treated Kalina. She knew my need for order well, and watched without comment with her slanted, unblinking eyes as I checked over Etan one last time. She even moved carefully so as not to disturb the arrangement of cloth, drinking glass, and book I had set on the bedside table.
My compulsions always grew in proportion to my anxiety, so sitting in a room berating myself and becoming increasingly erratic would help no one. Instead, I borrowed a Manor messenger and sent for my sister to watch Etan. Our family duty was our greatest honor and my first responsibility. Etan might merely be ill, but we could never assume that. Walking, I pictured the Council lunch, recalling the room, the food. There had been two courses I had seen—fish cakes eaten by hand, and the soup and bread. Etan had mentioned two more, plus drinks: pre-poured cups of kori and kavcha and, at the end of the event, tea served individually from the pot. He’d proofed it all. I counted my steps down the corridor—left, right, left, longer step right to dodge a crack in the stone, longer step left to compensate—out of the visitors’ wing and back through the entrance, nodding to Argo on the way past. There had been no seated meals and no plates designated for a particular person. Unless everyone at the lunch had been poisoned—and Etan was the first to show symptoms because he had proofed the food earlier in the morning—then any poisoner must have been there personally to directly tamper with the Chancellor’s food once he had selected it.
The Talafan nobleman was the obvious starting point. While the Empire was a valued trade partner, partners maneuvered against each other all the time, and Etan had said he knew little about Lord Ectar personally. Certainly the nervous, embarrassed man I had seen didn’t appear a likely poisoner, but looks, of course, meant little.
And if a poison attempt was targeted only at the Chancellor, our Talafan visitor wasn’t the only possible enemy. Most of the Council had been there—all six Credol Families had been represented, as well as four of the six Guilders. Beneath the overt civility of the Council always rippled quiet plays for power and influence; while the rules of honor kept ill feeling masked, the Chancellor had as many enemies as friends, particularly among the Families. A diminution of influence in one family left an opening for another, and this wouldn’t be the first time a subtle poisoning had been attempted. Indeed, our family’s historic role had developed out of a past with more aggressive maneuverings, when the Families jostled for power and quiet, civilized murder was a common tool. These days such things were far rarer, but not unheard of. I was a month behind on current politics, but Etan would know who stood to gain and lose if the Chancellor were harmed.
And of course, Lazar’s servants would bear closer examination; at least one was foreign born, because I remembered seeing a Doranite man in house colors serving kori to the Theater-Guilder. For Silasta’s wealthiest families, invisible servants had better access than the closest friend or lover.
I stopped outside the Reed apartments. The buildings loomed aggressively over the promenade, crowding the land. Unlike the elegant, classically-designed neighboring apartments, Lazar’s expanded buildings were the product of his considerable fortune and his grandiose and, in places, garish taste. Around the side of the narrow garden, my head ducked low, I crept past the veranda where several singers and two pale northern jugglers were entertaining the Credo and his family for the afternoon. Explaining my presence here would create unwelcome issues. Instead, I used the kitchen entrance at the back of the property. Etan’s well-known love of cooking gave me a pretext to study techniques and the opportunity to visit every kitchen entrance of the Families’ apartments, the Guildhalls, and every building the Chancellor might conceivably enter. So although the serving staff looked up, quizzical, upon my entrance, no one seemed displeased.
Lazar’s head cook greeted me jovially. “Credo Jovan!”
Cardamom and honey hung in the air, and something thick and sweet boiled on the great stove. “Nice to see you again.”
The little woman returned my smile. “I am at your service.”
“I’ve come to ask a favor,” I told her. “My Tashi complimented your luncheon and wants to use it as a lesson for me. I was wondering if there were any leftovers—a small sample of each course?”
The cook looked over her shoulder at the swarming kitchen. A stack of clean bowls stood beside several large kori bottles on a bench, and a crumb-scattered platter and two empty soup tureens waited to be washed. In the corner, a long clawed kitsa prowled around underfoot, snatching up spills and crumbs with its quick pronged tongue. “We’ve packed up from lunch, I’m afraid, though there might be some of the sweet left—I was going to leave it for the staff.” She clicked her fingers and a servant sprang to her side. “Boy, serve a sample of the goa confection for Credo Jovan, here.”
I thanked her and accepted the small bowl. “The Credo’s been keeping you busy,” I said, casually stepping out of the way of some of the workers and closer to the tureens. “I stopped by the lunch on an errand for the Chancellor and it looked like the whole staff was in there. Did you have to bring in extra people?”
“No, but the Honored Credo pulled every member of his staff for this lunch,” she said. “And the family has had guests and entertainment out on the porch all afternoon—no one will be allowed a break until tonight.” She added hastily, “Hard work for an honored family is the path to our own greater honor, of course.”