L. Modesitt - Imager

Rogaris shook his head, then stopped. “Just one thing . . . the one who talked had an old-style beard.”

“What about the other one?”

“He never said anything to us.” There was a pause. “I remember . . . he had sort of thick bushy eyebrows, because I was thinking you could almost define him in a portrait by them.”

And that was about all I got from Rogaris.

As the driver headed the carriage toward Beidalt Place, just beyond Bakers’ Lane, I thought over what they had told me. The square-bearded man might have been the first assassin, and the bushy-browed fellow could have been the Ferran, but there was certainly more than one man in L’Excelsis with an old-fashioned square beard-and more than a few with bushy brows.

The same apprentice who had opened the zinc-green-trimmed white door to Master Estafen’s studio the last time did so again. He looked at the imager grays and turned pale.

“I’m here to talk to Master Estafen on imager business.”

His eyes flicked past me to take in the gray coach, drawn by the pair of matched grays. If anything, he turned even more pale. “Yes, sir. If you’d come in . . .”

I did, and in less than a few moments, the rotund master portraiturist appeared. He looked at me, then nodded. “I might have guessed. What sort of imager business is this?”

“I’m part of a group trying to track down assassins who have killed several junior imagers, Master Estafen. I was fortunate enough to survive the attack on me, and the Collegium thought I might be of use in looking into this, especially since the guild appears to be involved, at least indirectly.”

“The guild? Involved? How could that be? If it is, shouldn’t you be talking to Master Reayalt?”

“The guildmaster is next, but you were closer. The reason I came is that last weekend I talked to Emanus because it had been brought to my attention that he might have knowledge that might be helpful. The next day he was dead, but he did provide some interesting insights.”

“Interesting does not mean accurate, Imager Rhennthyl. Nonetheless, how might I help the Collegium?” His words were smooth and assured.

“Has anyone asked you about me since I became an imager?”

“Why would they?”

I offered a smile. “That’s what we’re trying to discover. Several members of the guild were approached and observed by one man who fit the description of one of the assassins. It’s possible that others were approached, and since I do have some knowledge of the guild I was asked to follow up on it.”

Estafen nodded, and I had the sense he was not quite so tense. “I can assure you that no one, except Master Reayalt, has even so much as mentioned your name to me.”

“Do you have any idea why someone who has been assassinating junior imagers would be interested in Emanus?”

“I have no idea. Emanus made a few enemies, but those I know of are long dead, and even were they alive, they would not have associated, even indirectly, with common killers.”

I asked questions for almost a quarter glass . . . and learned nothing more. Again, I took my leave, feeling I had learned little, and returned to the Collegium coach.

By the time I left the coach at Guildmaster Reayalt’s dwelling, on the south end of the Martradon area, three blocks south of the Midroad, the sun was just above the rooftops and casting a long reddish light across L’Excelsis.

Reayalt himself opened the door, but he was clearly surprised to see me. “Oh . . . Imager Rhennthyl, it is Imager, isn’t it? I was expecting Master Schorzat.”

“I’m certain he’ll be here shortly. I’m here on a different matter, and it shouldn’t take very long.” I paused. “By the way, I didn’t thank you for sending the study I did to my parents. That was a most kind and thoughtful thing to do, and both they and I appreciated it.”

“From what I know of imager training, it was not likely that you would have been able to recover the painting, and it is quite good. Oh . . . please come in. If you wouldn’t mind, we could just talk in the foyer here.”

“That would be fine.” Without much preamble, I launched into my explanation of my task, but not mentioning Emanus, ending with the same question I’d used before. “Has anyone made any inquiries about me?”

“No. That is, no one outside the guild. Elphens did ask about you a few days ago, because he thought the workmen building his new dwelling and studio had seen you there. There had been an imager there, he said.”

“I was there. I hadn’t realized that Madame Caliostrus had left L’Excelsis, and I wanted to ask her much the same question as I just asked you.”

“Ah . . . that explains much.”

“There’s another aspect to this that may involve the guild, if indirectly.”

He stiffened ever so slightly.

“Emanus . . . or Grisarius . . .” I went on to offer my incomplete story about the old artist.

“I had not heard that,” offered Reayalt. “It is regrettable, but perhaps understandable.”

“Why might that be?”

“Emanus always did take too great an interest in matters political, and even some dealing with intrigue, but I thought he had learned his lesson.”

“I’d heard that there was more to his removal as guildmaster than just selling a representational painting.”

“Most definitely. That was just a convenient, if true, reason to cover up an indiscretion so that the guild would not be tarnished by untoward gossip.”

“Do you think his death might be related to those . . . indiscretions?”

Master Reayalt shook his head. “I cannot say that it is not possible, but it would be highly unlikely. Most of those involved are now dead.”

“The High Holder . . .?”

He looked at me sharply. “It might no longer matter, but I still see no reason to go into that.”

“You don’t think it could involve his daughter, then?”

“Most certainly not. She may not . . . be all that her peers would like, but she is well above any reproach or scandal, unlike her mother. How . . .” He shook his head.

“If that is so, it puzzles me as to how Emanus might know about assassins, and why anyone now might wish to kill him,” I offered.

“It doesn’t puzzle me,” replied the guildmaster. “Emanus was truly brilliant, as well as the finest portraiturist of his time. He watched everything, and could deduce what people might be doing or have done from the smallest of intimations. Yet for all that brilliance, he never truly understood how dangerous that knowledge was to himself, and to the guild.”

“That was why he was removed?”

“Essentially.”

I asked a few more questions, the replies to which offered nothing new, and inclined my head. “Thank you. You’ve been most kind. If you or others do hear of the kind of inquiries I’ve mentioned, I would appreciate knowing of them. The Collegium does not like to lose young imagers, especially when most have still been in training.”

“I can see that, Imager Rhennthyl.”

His glance toward the door reminded me that he was expecting company, and further inquiries would intrude on dinner. So I took my leave and made my way back to the coach, asking the driver to return to the Collegium, but by the lower part of the Boulevard D’Imagers.

Sitting in the coach, I considered what I’d learned. Someone had been looking for me well before I’d been shot. It was likely that the Ferran had hired the first assassin and both were working for someone else. Based on what Master Reayalt had let slip, I was convinced that Emanus’s daughter’s mother had indeed been a High Holder, and that the scandal had been hushed up. What that had to do with the killings of junior imagers I had no idea. I hadn’t talked to Dolemis or Aurelean, but I’d never spent that much time with them, and Aurelean was so wrapped up in Aurelean that he wouldn’t have been able to tell anyone very much about anyone else, and he wouldn’t have remembered what he’d said-unless it bore on his future.