The great houses hove up in splendid independence on the heights of Sabis—occupying the hilltops, generally, set to catch the wind in their upper tiers. The block-long apartment buildings that were the lot of the most of Sabis's citizens occupied the low ground of the riverside and the valleys between Sabis's fair hills, territory prone to settling (and unheralded building collapses), prone to stale air and river stench (and the stink of other things, since the city provided sewers to the street, but not to the buildings), lately prone to overcrowding, since the city had become, over fifty years of dwindling provinces, the refuge and the economic hope for the world (the sink of all the sewers of the earth, the late Emperor had said on his deathbed—so the story ran).
There were Houses and there were Houses, and Shibari's was, like the family, old, well-suited, and cracking in its walls. It sprawled over a large area of the hill of Muzein, with a splendid view of the river and the poor district of warehouses that had grown up in a utilitarian age more dependent on trade than on a warrior aristocracy.
It overlooked the warehouses, it lived off the warehouses, now that the world went as it did. No more divine right for lords: just the Emperor—on the highest of all hills, outside town—and the Emperor's soldiers, also mostly outside town. Sabis had become increasingly polyglot, the old Sabirn aristocracy increasingly strangers in their own city, in the ascendancy of the nine-year-old son of a provincial-born general and his Sabisan maternal -grandfather—who had been a gentleman farmer and an atrocious poet before he became a regent.
So in the modern city, the old House of Shibari survived—in the neighborhood of woodcarvers, a couple of taverns, three slightly seedy apartments, and a wineshop of odd and criminal patronage barely down the street from its vine-covered walls and sheds and its still-magnificent front entry, its plaster pillars incised more with accidents—the bash of a cart here, the knock of a box-edge there, over the centuries—than the graffiti that scored the walls in the poorer areas just slightly downhill from here.
The front doors were still bright; the fish-tailed, twenty-breasted goddess Ioth on the right, and snake-tailed Baiz, pouring the waters of his river from a bottomless jar, on the left. The sea and the rivers indicated an ancient past, a claim on Sabis's long past, when the Sabisi had come in from the sea and conquered the peninsula, when the sea-lords had become the first lords of Sabis, the aristocracy of the aristocracy that arrived later and settled at its skirts.
Of that most ancient past, Shibari was one of the most ancient, perhaps—certainly no one of this nervous age dared speculate—with an ancient claim on imperium, on the throne itself.
But mostly Shibari just struggled, like any house however noble, to pay its war-tax, and struggled with business decisions (because the great Houses traded nowadays; the emperor had confiscated too much of the land in too many previous rebellions, and doled too many holdings out to new favorites, and levied too severe a tax on old wealth for a House to live on past glories.)
And business decisions, Sulun knew, trudging up the cobbled, littered street toward that facade and an unwelcome necessity to confess his results—business decisions were what had to prevail, increasingly.
"Sulun! Sulun!" It was a swarm of youngsters, inside the marble hall, with the sea-goddess frescoes and the bronze figure of a ship prow for a centerpiece—ties to the sea, always, where Shibari's fortunes had begun. And always the children: Omis's three, the cook's two, several slave kids, Shibari's own four—voices pealing off the high ceilings, small feet pattering on the marble . . .
He used to make fireworks, little poppers, paper rolls with just enough firepowder to make a flash—to the annoyance of Shibari's house wizard, whose daughter Memi had been no less a participant in the fireworks.
Memi stood at the back now: a quiet, sullen child.
"Did it work, did it work?" Tamiri asked, clapping her hands. Omis's daughter, who had seen the bombard in its forging, who had, at least to her own estimate, considerably helped Omis work the bellows.
"Mostly," Sulun said. It was terrible enough to face the children. But he had to walk down the hall, shake off his young escort, and walk in on Shibari in his study, accounts in arms, and stand there until Shibari, in a spindly chair at a desk piled high with codices and scrolls, realized he had a visitor.
"Sir," Sulun said, finally, and cleared his throat.
Shibari looked at him most carefully in a troubled way, as if he could read everything in Sulun that he possibly wanted to know today.
"A failure?" Shibari said.
"Not unqualified," Sulun said.
"Not unqualified." Shibari sighed and shook his head.
"Four firings and accuracy, sir—"
"Accuracy where? Expensive fire tubes, apt to explosions? Four strikes at the barbarians and an explosion wreaking havoc in our own lines?"
Sulun squared his shoulders. "Still four to one, sir."
Shibari's mouth stayed open.
"That's the way a soldier put it to me, sir," Sulun said.
"Zeren. Zeren's a mercenary." Disgust came through: the old-line aristocrat against paid soldiers, against foreigners, against a world quite, quite changed from honest, honorable ways. "Blow up one crew, hire another—I suppose that's very easy in Zeren's accounting. I tell you—"
The door opened. Mygenos insinuated himself through the door. "My lord."
"Come in," Shibari said, and Sulun folded his arms protectively across his account book and regarded Mygenos with a scowl. Memi's father. Mygenos the wizard. Mygenos the very well-fed, sleek, and comfortable wizard. Mygenos never had to beg for funds. Even if a house was in Shibari's financial straits, it paid its wizard, and paid two of them if it could afford it—the best wizards it could find.
If he's so damn good, Sulun thought, not for the first time, why is the house in this mess?
But of course he didn't say that. He bowed to Master Mygenos. Mygenos bowed to him with a frown that became a sweet, unctuous look the instant he turned his face Shibari's way.
"I'm very sorry," Mygenos said smoothly. "I was in the garden."
"Master Mygenos asked to be here," Shibari said. "He's quite concerned about this for another reason."
"My lord." Another bow in Shibari's direction, a straightening of the body, and a folding of the arms when he looked Sulun's way. "I hope you'll understand, Master Sulun, I bear you no personal ill will, all our differences aside. It's priorities, and I can't advise my lord to pour more resources down this rat hole, granted, granted you've made minor progress with your fireworks—"
"Not fireworks, Master Mygenos. The salvation of this house, Master Mygenos, and the Empire."
"The damnation of this house, Master Sulun! I must be blunt with you; you are a liability! I am a professional in my trade; I assure you I understand the principle of risk and reward, and in that professional capacity I have to advise my lord that the risk, in your case, is constant! I have a considerable ability, Master Sulun, I would say a very considerable ability. I serve this house with no help, no relief, and I extend my abilities to all my lord's enterprises, which encompass an extraordinary range of territory. I do not mind the sleepless nights and the magnitude of the burden, but likewise I must advise my lord when a disproportionate amount of my effort is drawn away from critical matters, by an enterprise which involves a very poor return on a very high expense—not only of money, Master Sulun, but of my energies! In short, you are exhausting me, Master Sulun. I cannot cover the things that truly affect the welfare of my lord against all his purposeful enemies, and against the pirates at sea and the chances of weather. All these things, I say, are my responsibility; but I am being drained by your enterprise, Master Sulun, which, even if successful, is years away from any useful application. It is a luxury, Master Sulun, for a time less dangerous and less critical to our lord. I protect you as I can—I cannot avoid protecting, considering the possibility of lawsuits and loss of life and limb which could be ruinous to this house—"
"I hope your protection of our lord is more effective!"
"I am a wizard, Master Sulun, not a blacksmith! If your devices are grossly flawed, I am doing all I can to prevent loss of life and property! If you will work with firepowder, you can expect I will concentrate my primary effort on preventing your device working destruction on the city and on this house, and then I will worry about your personal safety, and then I will worry about your personal pride and the integrity of your abominable instrument! But I prefer not to continue to do so!"
Sulun waved his account book. "I require a minuscule amount of support compared to your budget, Master Wizard, and by your counsel, this house would venture nothing, run no risks, and make no profits whatsoever! For centuries, Shibari has stood for explorations and enterprises the monuments of which decorate this house, Master Mygenos, and our master is no less than his illustrious ancestors!"
Argue with the house rhetorician, you fat-bottomed, overpaid son of an ape!
Predictably, Shibari's color came up a bit, his shoulders squared a bit, he took a larger breath and looked a half a hand taller.
But he still looked like a worried man.
"I never implied otherwise!" Mygenos was shouting. "I also know our master is not a fool like some I could name! He's been entirely too generous, and you trade on his good will! I wonder where a good part of this money is going!"
"Enough!" Shibari said. "Enough!"
Sulun folded his arms again and bowed. Mygenos bowed.
"I will support this, three months more," Shibari said. "And then I'll see."
"My lord," Sulun said fervently, with another bow.
"My lord!" Mygenos protested. "I feel I have to talk frankly here about due compensation! I've refused offers of a third again what you pay me! And this tinkerer supports a staff of apprentices, diverts your smithy to his own work, appropriates materials, entertains mercenary soldiers and gods know what other hangers-on with funds that I'm sure don't appear with the morning dew!"
"Three months," Shibari said, with that jut of his aristocratic jaw that meant Interview Ended.
"My lord," Sulun said, another time around the courtesies. "Thank you."
"My lord," Mygenos said.
And outside the door, in the marble hall with its goddesses and its bronze ship: "You son of a whore," Mygenos said. "You'll cross me once too often."
Ordinarily a man was afraid of wizardly wrath. A man worried about accidents.
This wizard, on the other hand, was Mygenos.
"Somebody'd better be seeing to this house's welfare," Sulun snapped, nose to nose with him. "You don't look like you've spent many sleepless nights, Mygenos, or missed any meals lately!"
He really shouldn't have said that, he thought on the way back to the estate storerooms, searching through his belt and the leaves of his little account book for the list he was sure he had brought somewhere about his person. Damn! If he could keep track of things . . .
But a man only got a few good openings with Mygenos. And wizards, they said, couldn't hex against their own work. He was right, he was going to succeed, he was going to do everything he promised, and the very fact that he didn't break his neck going down the steps, for instance, argued that, like it or not, Mygenos had no power to harm him.
Very complicated thing, magery. A natural philosopher was quite glad just to keep the wizards all in balance so that good science worked.
Omis held the burin steady with a block of wood and the pressure of his hand while Doshi worked the leather strap that spun it, back and forth, drilling the bolthole. Sawdust made clouds in the light of sunset streaming through the window.
A simple repair on the worktable this time. The aged legs had gone; too much hammering and sitting on it. Sulun tucked himself up in a chair in a sunny patch, working on his notes and his sketches while the repairs proceeded.
"Here, let me," Zeren said, pushing Doshi aside. With the blacksmith holding the drill steady this time and Zeren's strength pulling, sawdust poured, making a little pile on the dirt floor.
And proliferating in the air. Sulun wiped his nose and sneezed suddenly, convulsively.
"Bless!" said Yanados, worriedly looking up from her grinding and mixing. Not only sawdust smell permeated the room—there was also sulfur.
"Umm," Sulun said, and wiped his nose again. "If that's old Mygenos ill-wishing me, all he can manage is a tickle."
"Don't joke!" Yanados gulped.
"Mygenos is the joke," Sulun said. "Poor Memi. The poor child used to be a nice kid." Another pass of his arm across his nose. "She looked like a scared rabbit."
"Old Myggy didn't take it real well," Omis said, "that it was his precious daughter dropped the poppers in the cistern."
"Wonderful bang," Yanados said. "Tremendous echoes."
"Water tasted of sulfur for a month," Doshi said.
"Memi's changed," Sulun said. "Gods know what he did or what he said. That son of a bitch. Fortunately Shibari didn't listen to him. One of my better—"
The door banged open. Arizun ran in, gasping for air, stirring up a cloud of sawdust. light from the window showed him as pale as his olive complexion could get.
"Sulun!" he panted, and stabbed a finger toward the door. "The word just came—down the river. A ship got in! Shibari's ship was lost—pirates got it! The cargo, the ship—everything!"
"Gods," Yanados said. "Shibari's creditors—"
"They'll eat him alive," Zeren said.
"His whole household will go up on the block!" Yanados said. "What will that mean for us?"
Sulun found himself on his feet. In his mind he saw the ravening creditors running through the house. "They'll strip the laboratory," was the first thing he thought of.
"Nine hells, they'll do worse than that," Zeren said, grabbing his helmet. "They'll seize all the household slaves, too—and gods help the servant who can't prove he's a freeman. I've seen it happen!"
"Oh, gods!" Omis howled, diving for the door. "Vari! The children!"
"And his forge," Yanados exclaimed, scrambling after him. "He can't carry that away and hide it! All his tools—"
"Save what we can," Doshi gasped, hiking up the long skirts of his tunic and following. But Sulun was out the door in front of him.