Mercedes Lackey - The Outstretched Shadow

There were times when he wished devoutly to sink every female in the world to the bottom of the Selken Sea. Only a female could create such havoc with so little effort!

So. He took a deep breath, and another, willing himself to be calm in the face of this mortal insult to his Art. No one would see his inner feelings. He went to pacify, not to frighten. We all serve the City, each doing his part in service to Armethalieh the Golden.

Although sometimes only the Light can see how!

HE would easily have found the Tasoaire home even without the uniformed servant who was waiting at the nearest cross-street to lead him to it. The man was wearing a livery more suited to a captaincy in one of Armethalieh's little-used cavalry regiments than to a footman of a proper merchant family, but the Tasoaires had done more than well for themselves, and were not averse to letting the world know it. Wealth had long since outstripped good taste, and though the Tasoaires were not so blind to all good sense and common decency to think of moving out of the Merchants' Quarter, they had certainly let their good fortune seduce them into making such extensive changes to what had once been a modest and sensible home that Lycaelon could almost have imagined for a moment that it was one of the mansions of the Mage aristocracy, grotesquely distorted and crammed into a space far too small for it.

As Lycaelon followed the man to his destination, he kept his face from showing the disdain he felt. The house stood out from its fellows in a way that was almost—Lycaelon's lip curled—foreign. Honest timber and stone had been replaced with golden marble that would not have been out of place in Lycaelon's own courtyard (and so was very much out of place here), and instead of the neat stone walls and colorful glazed pots filled with seasonal flowers that graced the forecourts of other merchant houses, the Tasoaire home was enclosed by a fanciful iron gate with gilded accents behind which a fountain—small, but still far too large for the space it occupied, and covered with vulgar imported colored tiles besides— sprayed jets of water into the sky. Anyone approaching their door, tradesman or guest, was sure to receive a soaking, regardless of the weather.

But "anyone" was not the Arch-Mage Lycaelon Tavadon. He paused for a moment before the gates, and concentrated on a simple Binding Spell, drawing on the stored power in the Talisman around his neck and one of the many simple cantrips he had memorized years before. There was a stuttering sound from deep beneath the earth, and the arcing jets of water drooped and died.

The servant stared up at him, wide-eyed and anxious. Lycaelon allowed himself a thin smile. Let them all wonder—or, if they thought about it at all, perhaps they would blame the fountain's sudden failure on the madness they were harboring within their own walls. The madness he had come to end, and the sooner, the better.

Straightening his robes, Lycaelon tapped the butt of his staff meaningfully on the paving. The servant stopped staring and scurried to open the gate. The Arch-Mage's escort peeled off to stand at strict attention on either side of the gate, while the Arch-Mage entered.

Before Lycaelon had taken three steps up the walk, the door of the house was swinging open at the hand of an even more ornately uniformed personage than the footman who had guided him to the house. Correctly identifying this apparition as the Tasoaires' butler, Lycaelon surrendered his cloak, hat, gauntlets, and staff. He imagined the servant looked embarrassed to be seen in such an outfit—as well he ought, in such a hideously indecent household! Wealth, like power, belonged only in those hands suited to wield it properly.

It occurred to Lycaelon that perhaps something could be done about the Tasoaires' improper good fortune. Some gradual readjustment of their affairs—for the good of the City, of course. He would look into it once he got back to the Council House. But at the moment, he had a more immediate problem to solve…

"I am expected," he announced austerely.

"Of course, Lord Arch-Mage. If you will accompany me?"

Lycaelon followed the butler into the house, amusing himself by attempting to discern the bones of the original building beneath the veneer of its clownish makeover. It was like walking through a jackdaw's nest— there was no regard for taste and balance, only for vulgarity and expensive display. And he was certain that at least a few of these items had made it off the Selken ships without the Council's imprimatur.

He was also interested to note that there seemed to be gaps—prominent, but irregular—in the overabundance of tawdry ornament, as if broken items had been hastily removed and the survivors had not yet been rearranged to hide the absence. Apparently the girl had indeed broken most of what was breakable in the Tasoaire household, for which he held himself much in her debt.

But to Lycaelon's faint disappointment, the room to which he was led seemed to have suffered the least from the Tasoaires' new wealth. The heart-room of the house still displayed its timber and plaster walls unchanged, and the large tiled fireplaces at each end of the room were lovely and tasteful examples of merchant-class craftsmanship. Small-paned windows, open to the unusually warm spring day, showed glimpses of a small back garden that was very much as it ought to be. Carved oak settles, their wood honey-dark with years of beeswax polishing, flanked each hearth, and there was a small writing desk under one window, angled to catch the natural light. There was a sideboard on the wall facing the windows, and Lycaelon was interested to see that where he would have expected to see fiery cut-crystal, he saw instead a pewter jug and a collection of mismatched pewter cups, badly dented but polished to a satiny gleam.

But the seemly and modest effect was spoiled by an enormous gilded chair with a scarlet velvet cushion that squatted in the middle of the room, obviously carried in for his benefit, with a painted and gilded table beside it that was undoubtedly more suitable to a whorehouse than a merchant's townhouse.

The two people awaiting him arose from their seats on one of the settles as the door opened, and moved hesitantly forward to greet him.

Lycaelon recognized loan Tasoaire from his many appearances before the Council, and the painfully overdressed woman beside him must be his wife, though Lycaelon didn't trouble himself to recall her name. Both were upholstered in so much satin, multicolored brocade, gold lace, and velvet piping that they looked like a pair of overstuffed chairs designed by a madman. Both of them looked worn and frightened. Lycaelon smiled, radiating charm—a simple enough cantrip, really, among the many every High Mage always kept in readiness for situations such as this.

"Come, loan, you know me," Lycaelon said, injecting good humor and warmth into his voice. "I'm here to help. And who is this lovely young thing? Surely this isn't your daughter?" loan Tasoaire smiled, and Lycaelon could see that it cost him some effort. "Nay, Lord Arch-Mage, this is my wife, Yanalia."

"You can help her, can't you, Lord Arch-Mage? Help our Darcy?" the woman burst out. "You do know what it is with her, don't you? Don't you?"

"Hush now, Yana," loan said, pulling his wife back before she could approach Lycaelon. "I'm sure the Arch-Mage will do all he can."

"Of course I will," Lycaelon said, settling himself in the garish throne-chair, inasmuch as seemed to be expected of him. "I came as soon as I heard there was trouble—in fact, I'm a little hurt, loan, that you didn't come to me sooner. What are friends for, if not to help one another?"

Yanalia began to weep in harsh strangled sobs, clinging to her husband. Lycaelon forced himself to keep his face smooth, his expression benign. Puling and weeping with hysteria already, and he hadn't been in the house more than a few moments! How like a woman!