Ammas shrugged. "As you say. So he responded by wiping out the bar of seer-magistrates, the fellowship of cursewrights, the college of astrologers, the brotherhood of forgewrights, and all the others. Thirteen hundred years of scholarship and magic, thousands of men and women, burnt to ashes. A trifle of an overreaction, don't you think? And even if that was an appropriate response, think of your own siblings, gods grant them rest. Do you have any idea why he did it? Those of us who didn't grow up in the Chalcedony Palace have only rumors to go by, and whatever lies Varallo Thray utters to give your father the excuse."

"I don't," Carala whispered, thinking of Ursus, and Tiburin, and poor Ellion, who had looked so like Sarai. "We do not speak of them where he may hear."

Ammas nodded, having expected nothing else. He almost brought up the illegitimate children who had been murdered, particularly the one the Emperor had killed personally, but thought better of it. This was already a topic sure to upset Carala, and he didn't relish the idea of twisting the knife in her.

"But Ammas makes an important point," said Vos hurriedly, eying Carala and her knitted brows. "The Emperor is many things, but by and large he isn't mad. He has done, er, intemperate things. But always he directs it at people who have opposed him, on matters large or small. He's knows the Realms thrive best when left to their own devices. He has always treated his armies and navies well. He rewards those nobles who render him faithful service. And I have never seen him kill what he can use. But if he has reason to doubt your loyalty to him, or worse, imagines some reason you might stand against him . . . . " Vos trailed off, leaving the results of such behavior to the imagination.

"You are being very knowledgeable of these things," Barthim said in a respectful tone Ammas hadn't heard much. "I think I shall be calling you Vos Wisethrone."

Vos shook his head. Denisius stared ahead at the distant lights of Vilais, thinking of his father's own reward for faithful service.

They crested a hill and found themselves facing the polished granite walls and main gate of the city of Vilais. By night its lamps blazed, guardsmen and travelers milling about the open gates. From somewhere beyond the wall, temple bells were chiming midnight. "What do you think, Vos? Denisius?" Ammas turned to what he sometimes thought of as the delegation from Marhollow. "Either of you know this place very well? I've not been here since I was a subject of the Malachite Throne in good standing. Where ought we to find rooms?"

"I've never been," Denisius muttered.

Vos shrugged. "There aren't many inns on the Isle of Tair, but that's where all the high class ones a noblewoman from Munazyr might stay would be. Beyond that, I'd say Eastshore if you want to blend in with the upper class, Goldenshore if you want to hide among the common folk. We should be careful if you decide on Goldenshore. I'm really not sure where the rough parts of town are."

"Rough parts of Vilais?" Barthim laughed. "What is that, Vos Wisethrone, where the operas are playing all night?"

"There are as many criminal guilds in Vilais as in any other city," said Vos grimly. "And there are other things we should be concerned about, as you know perfectly well."

Carala swallowed hard, nodding at that. Slowly she raised her hood, wondering if she might run into anyone she actually knew if they ventured to the Isle of Tair. Ammas paused, seeming to consider Vos's advice, then with a nod led them through the gates into Vilais.

The Vilain Reaches were one of the first of the Anointed Realms to swear fealty to the Malachite Throne, back in the days when it had been located in Munazyr. Vilais had been its capital for all of that time, first a fortress and now a city grander than any of the provincial capitals, if not so large as Cavis Cove or Gallowsport. As the River Ortien churned out of the Blackspur Hills where Autumnsgrove stood toward the Azure Sea, it split in two for a time, the two smaller rivers girding a vast crescent shaped island before they rejoined each other. That island was called the Isle of Tair, and it was there the military outpost that would become Vilais had been built long ago.

Little remained of that fortress, just a squat stone structure that served as the city's Curia. The Isle of Tair had become home to dozens of theatres and opera houses, all arranged around the Temple of the Graces, one of the largest in the Anointed Realms and easily the most beautiful, with its towering stained glass windows and gold-lit statues of the Graces and their saints. As the city grew it began to sprawl along the shores across from the Isle of Tair, and now Eastshore and Goldenshore were both far more populous than the Isle itself.

Eastshore was considered more genteel and Goldenshore a little wilder -- it was where lowborn workers and would-be adventurers tended to rest before striking out for the gold and silver deposits in the Taskwood Canyons -- but this was no Gallowsport or Adder's Hill in Munazyr. Even the stretch of the Old Godsway where Ammas plied his trade was rougher than nearly any given neighborhood in Vilais. So it was with little hesitation that, after some conferring with Vos as they all stood huddled just beyond the city gate, Ammas decided they would find lodging in Goldenshore.

"Munazyri nobles sometimes like to slum a little when they visit the Anointed Realms," he smiled to Carala, who laughed a silvery little laugh. Ammas could see the flecks of amber in her hazel eyes. The impending brightness of the white moon would have to be dealt with very shortly now. As they made their way through the narrow but well-lit streets, Carala's good humor began to fade.

"There is a sadness in the air," she murmured quietly to Denisius, who had drifted closer to her, perhaps unconsciously. "They are chanting the Sorrows at the Temple of the Graces. I can hear it."

No one else could, but by now they had come to expect Carala to sense certain things they could not. Upon closer inspection many of the doors of the businesses shuttered for the night and even on the porches of private homes were hung swathes of black ribbons adorned with silver tracings: clear signs of mourning in accordance with the Chronicle of Sorrows.

"Who could they be mourning?" Vos asked curiously. "It must have been someone important for them to be chanting the funeral verses all night."

None of them had an answer. Midnight passed and they found themselves wending through the streets of Vilais in the small hours, bone-weary. Ammas paused at the first inn that didn't look like a fleatrap, and whose name seemed welcoming enough: the Kettle Red. Its reputation was a complete unknown, but as long as there were clean beds no one was ready to complain.

To their surprise the common rooms were full to bursting, and they had to splurge on a private suite on the third floor. "Poor Macil, they've come to pay their respects," the innkeeper informed them as Denisius handed over a small pile of silver. "There was a merchantman out of Pere Shan who had the suite booked, but he never showed. Gout, I think. You lot come for the funeral too?"

"Macil?" Carala frowned. "Hedrathua Macil? He's dead?"

"Aye, Lady Zinna, that he is. Leapt off the Bridge of Saint Nicostris not three days ago. They only fished him out of the Ortien yesterday morning." The innkeeper shook his head. "And with the winter season only a few months off. Vilais won't be the same."

As they made their way to the upper floors, it quickly became clear this information meant something to Carala and Denisius that it didn't to the others. "He was a playwright and an actor. And a singer, and a minstrel -- "

"And a complete rake," Denisius said with a faint, wry smile. "Even some of the brothel girls in Marhollow claimed to know him."