J. Calvin Pierce, page 1
The Ambermere Trilogy
The Door, The Sorceress, The Wizard of Ambermere
J(ames). Calvin Pierce
1992-3
The Door To Ambermere
Ambermere, Book 1
1992
ISBN: 0-441-15944-3
A Demon Delicacy
“From what you told me, I would say you drank a drop of demon’s blood,” said the magician with a cheerful smile.
“I’m glad you didn’t mention all this before breakfast,” said Daniel.
“Look on the bright side.” Rogan filled his cup, offering to pour for Daniel, who declined. “You’re perfectly safe, for the moment.”
“For the moment?”
“Well, there’s no telling what will happen when I call the demon tonight.” Rogan took a languid sip of wine. “I imagine he will be happy to see you. You know, you may be the first dinner to have escaped him in the last five or ten thousand years.”
Daniel decided perhaps he’d have some wine after all ….
To my mother and father
Chapter 1
To an observer viewing the avenue from behind a low garden wall, the object, passing as though in languorous flight, would have been something of a mystery, though one perhaps more likely to prompt speculation than active investigation. Could certain little-known plants walk the tops of garden walls? Had slinking cats taken to wearing disguises of leaves, berries, and dried flowers and grasses, cunningly woven together with bits of ribbon?
The object was, in fact, a hat. It sat, squared and true, on the head of a gray-haired woman who was rather short (a little over five feet in the kingdom of Ambermere, a little under five feet in the neighboring kingdoms) and who walked with such an unvarying perpendicularity, such a rigid straightness of spine, that her hat neither dipped nor swayed with her step, but drove forward as though traveling through the air by magic.
As it happened, there were no observers, or low garden walls either, on this particular avenue in the city of Ambermere. The only person observing anything was the lady beneath the hat, who had her eyes fixed on a point far down the street, where a different sort of mystery presented itself.
At first, Mistress Hannah did not recognize the light as an aura. In the distance it seemed only a spot of unexplained brilliance, as though a small hot fire blazed on the street three crossings away.
She kept her eye on the light as she walked. Surely no smith worked a forge on a city thoroughfare, blowing showers of bright sparks to dance and die on the paving stones. This would accord neither with the usual practice of smiths, nor with the customs of the city, and Ambermere was not a place where innovation was common.
Hannah wondered briefly if a magician might be busy with some mischief there, but the streets were nearly empty. With dark summer rain clouds rushing nightfall, all sensible folk were behind their doors, enjoying the aromas of supper bubbling in the pot. Hannah thought all magicians fools, but none was such a fool as to perform his tricks for no audience.
She crossed the next street. No farmers’ wains, no tradesmen’s carts crowded the way at this hour. The only sign that this city had a population was in the wavering glow from lamps and candles to be seen against the curtains at every window.
When she realized the distant light was an aura, Hannah stopped. Her first impulse, which she would not allow herself to obey, was to turn and leave, to avoid a meeting that was certain to be awkward, perhaps dangerous. Had her posture not long ago forgotten that it was possible to depart from the erect, that there were other angles than right, her shoulders would have slumped.
“Complications,” she said. She turned to look back down the cobbled street. In a moment a small shadowy cat trotted into view from behind a hedge. It stopped and sat licking a paw.
“You may as well go back and wait for me,” Hannah called, as though fully expecting the cat to understand her words. She turned and continued in the direction of the light. The cat lowered its paw gently to the ground, gazed after the receding hat for a moment, then turned and disappeared behind the hedge.
Hannah walked neither faster nor slower than she had before. She was accustomed to controlling more compelling forces than her own curiosity or anxiety. She would allow herself neither to hasten nor delay the moment when she must confront the source of the disquieting radiance.
Just ahead, a door opened and released a child, who darted past her on some urgent household errand. A woman wearing an apron and holding a long wooden spoon came and stood beneath the lintel. As Hannah passed she gave the matron a word and a nod, grateful for the chance to let her eye linger for a moment on an aura of no unusual properties, one that did not blaze like a beacon on a hilltop.
Waiting at the corner that had been Hannah’s destination, a young woman sat on a bench under a flowering tree. Her hair was dark, her build slight, and her clothing plain. Seen as most would see her, without the light and colors of the nimbus, she would be just another maiden, youthfully pretty, but not a girl to arrest the eye. For Hannah, the aura was so dazzling, it was hard to remember that to all but the rare adept among women, and to every man without exception—beggars, barristers, even wizards and necromancers—it was completely invisible.
A good thing at that, she thought. If everyone could see auras, much of a social intercourse, dependent as it was upon deception, charitable and otherwise, would be soured. The ordinary woman, blind to the auras of her friends and family, suffered quite enough, in Hannah’s view, from the workings of her natural sensitivity to the nuances of word and glance.
At Hannah’s approach the girl did not rise, but gestured for the older woman to take a seat at her side. Mistress Hannah settled herself on the bench, her back and neck still immovably upright, and folded her hands on the dark cloth of her long plain skirt.
They spoke together briefly, the girl saying little, Hannah less, then rose and walked together down the lane that left the avenue. Though the way was narrow, it was paved with heavy stones, for it ran by many warehouse doors where goods came and went daily by groaning wagons. In the middle of the block there was a tavern, marked by a faded wooden sign that hung above the door.
Inside, the aromas of cheese, smoked fish, wine, and ale mingled in the shadowy lamplight. A few old men sat around a table by the window; a serving girl, tall and slender, like an elegantly elongated figure in a painting, was propped against the bar as though she never meant to move again. Hannah left her companion among the empty tables and exchanged a few words with the barman before leading the way to a dark corner at the rear of the room. There the two women passed through a heavy door. They crossed a storeroom filled with barrels and crates and left by a door at the other side.
They found themselves again in a tavern, similar in some ways to the one on the other side of the storeroom, but with no warm light of flickering lamps, and no heavy aromas of kitchen and cellar. As in the tavern they had just left, a few men sat by a window. Behind the bar was a stout, white-bearded man in an apron.
“Greetings, Master Hugo,” said Hannah. “How is it we find you at work in this place and not with your Brothers at the table?”
“Well,” the man said with a nod to both of them, “Errin has gone to look at something with Jackson, and Gavas and Mervin are off somewhere, so I am left to tend the shop.”
Hannah introduced the young woman. “This is Miss Elise. I have brought her from Ambermere to assist Master Errin for a time, if your Order will permit it.”
Hugo bowed politely. “You are most welcome, miss.” To Hannah he said, “Any adept you present is acceptable, and I am sure young Errin will be delighted. He will hope it means his apprenticeship is coming to an end. In any event, Miss Elise will find much instruction from those who gather here and those who pass this way.”
After being introduced to the others, Elise left, promising to return with Mistress Hannah the next day.
Hugo watched the heavy door close behind her, then stared at it as though lost in thought. He turned to Hannah. “She didn’t stay long,” he said. “She didn’t even bother to look out onto the street.” He gestured toward a door at the other end of the room. “Most who are sent here manage at least a peek on their first visit. Of course, I don’t know her Order or her rank; perhaps she’s no novice despite her youth and her quiet way.” He folded his hands across his ample midriff. “In any event, we must not interrogate our guests. We are here to watch, and sometimes to teach, not to ask idle questions.” He looked at Hannah with an innocent expression. “I suppose one with your talents can see things in her aura that are hidden from me.”
Hannah nodded with a quiet smile. “Trust one of your Brotherhood to be curious. Master. You must remember that we all have our talents. And yours are many; you have no need to envy mine.” She made a completely unnecessary adjustment to her hat, which sat with blameless symmetry atop her gray hair.
“And now to my other errand.” She waved in passing to the men at the table and left by the street door.
On the sidewalk, she did not immediately set out, but gave herself a moment, as she always did on her visits, to get used to the noise and the smells. She stood by the door, her hands clasped in front of her, and looked slowly up and down the street. Beside her the neon sign, long dead, inertly spelled the word bar in the window.
The evening snarl of cars and trucks sat motionless, filling the air with noise and noxious gasses. The trapped vehicles were making no more progress than the parking meters that stood like sentinels along the curb. Exhau st fumes hung so thick in the damp atmosphere that Hannah almost feared for the health of the herbs and berries in her hat. Hoping for fresher air on a wider street, she started in the direction of the nearest corner, where a malfunctioning traffic light stuck on yellow dangled above the intersection.
She turned the corner onto a boulevard where instead of two lanes of traffic, six were locked in perplexity. Like Master Hugo, she thought. It was said of his Brotherhood that its members pursued perfect awareness. Yet he talked of Elise’s aura, certain to be forever an abstraction to him, and said no word of her strange deep green eyes.
Daniel was thinking about Hell. He pushed through the revolving door from the hotel lobby to the street outside. Hell would probably be a bridge tournament, he had decided—one in which his particular punishment would be to have his sister-in-law Margaret as a partner for all eternity. And as the eons slipped by and the infinite future added inexhaustibly to an endlessly lengthening afternoon at the card table, she would never, ever progress beyond the level of smug incompetence.
On the street the situation was about normal for early evening, except instead of moving at an agonizing crawl, the rush-hour traffic had overflowed the intersection from all directions and come to a halt that looked permanent. Daniel watched in awe, wondering if he was witnessing the historical moment at which utter and irreversible gridlock finally took hold. But it wouldn’t do, he realized, to underestimate the resilience of the motoring public. For instance, though they appeared to be hopelessly trapped, many of the commuters had the presence of mind to blow their horns and swear.
The sun had disappeared behind the horizon of tall office buildings without noticeably lowering the temperature outside, but after a long afternoon of air-conditioned duplicate bridge, Daniel felt his body soaking up the heat like a stiff dry sponge softening in a hot bath. He enjoyed the sensation, knowing that his pleasure would be brief. Like rush hour, hot weather in the city had not been designed for pleasure.
He glanced back at the hotel entrance just in time to see a little wisp of a man make a narrow escape from the revolving door and stumble onto the sidewalk. He saw Daniel and came toward him grinning maliciously. Daniel felt ten degrees hotter just looking at the wrinkled wool suit, and the tie cinched tightly around the skinny neck like a noose. He tried to remember if he had ever seen old Milton wear another outfit.
“Hi, Milton. Congratulations on the win,” he said. “You played great.”
“Sure. I do okay. I been a bridge bum for fifty years, so how else should I play?” He looked around suspiciously and patted his suit jacket in the region of the inner pocket. “Plus, I get paid to play good,” he whispered. Milton was short. He leaned back to look up at the younger man and raised his upper lip to expose his front teeth in something between a grin and a sneer. “I hope you got a good price, too; you deserve it just for the suffering.”
Daniel sighed. “I wasn’t playing for money.”
“What, you was playing for the fun of it? With that woman? Don’t make me laugh.”
“She’s my sister-in-law.”
“Oh.” Milton seemed to be pondering the fresh information. “She’s old enough to be your mother,” he said.
“Almost,” said Daniel. “My brother’s a lot older than I am.”
Milton looked irritably at the sea of noisy automobiles.
“Why don’t these people go home?” he said. He lifted his hat by the brim and brushed his white hair back. “So, big shot, you wanna play poker on Friday?” Before Daniel could answer, the old man waved the hat in his face.
“Don’t tell me the stakes ain’t high enough, either,” he growled. “This is a totally different game. Not like that other one.”
Daniel took a step back to get out of range of the fedora. “I have a Friday game,” he said. “Charlie’s. Every week.”
Milton clamped his hat back on his head. “Okay, you are a big shot.” He leaned toward Daniel and looked up at him from under his hat. “But you’re a kid, so I’m gonna give you some free advice, which is: be careful. You gotta watch yourself with those people.”
“Thanks, Milton, but I’m not a kid, I’m just irresponsible. Ask my sister-in-law. Or my brother.” He smiled. “Actually, I’m thirty-one years old.”
Milton chuckled and shook his head. “That’s what I said. You’re a kid. I’m telling you, you gotta watch your step. Those things you hear about Charlie, you know? They’re true.”
For a second Daniel looked troubled, then he smiled again. “It’s just poker, Milton. Most of the players are businessmen.”
“It’s your funeral,” said the old man in a cheerful voice. He waved and started down the street. After he had gone about ten steps he turned around and trudged back.
“Hey. You wanna shoot some pool?”
Daniel grinned and shook his head.
“One-pocket,” said Milton. “Just for fun. My eyes are gone—I can’t play no more.” He examined his fingernails as though he had just noticed them for the first time. “Maybe fifty a game,” he said casually. He looked up with eyebrows raised. Daniel said nothing.
“C’mon, we can make a game,” he said. “I’ll give you a ball.” He paused. “And the break.”
Daniel shook his head again. “You know I’m not going—”
“Two balls,” said Milton.
“Have you ever seen me in a poolroom, Milton?”
“We’ll play nine-ball, then. That’s a young man’s game. You’ll kill me.”
“No, thanks.”
“The seven. I’ll give you the seven and the break. Twenty dollars a game.”
Daniel waited for him to subside. “Why don’t I just give you the money right now and save myself the agony?’
“Nah,” said Milton with an impatient wave of his hand. He started down the street again.
In a moment he was back. Daniel braced himself for another onslaught.
“I forgot,” said Milton, planting himself in front of Daniel. “I wanted to say about that one hand you played—if this had been a chess tournament, you’d have copped the brilliancy prize for making that ridiculous heart contract your partner stuck you with. I felt like standing up to cheer when you pulled that swindle with the clubs, but I don’t think Dr. Lennox”—Milton raised his chin and pursed his lips in imitation of his paying partner’s air of prissy hauteur—“would have liked it.”
This time when Milton left he didn’t come back. He stalked off and was soon out of sight among the after-work crowds.
Daniel didn’t bother to daydream about getting a cab; the traffic was still glued to the street. As he strolled to the corner he noticed that the signal above the intersection was stuck on yellow.
He left the curb and began to pick his way among the cars. His apartment house was three or four miles uptown. If he wasn’t overcome by carbon monoxide or run down by a frenzied suburbanite, he could expect to be home within an hour.
And in the mountains by tomorrow, he reminded himself. He had been neglecting his hobby, besides which, a nice lengthy rock-climbing trip might go a long way toward solving his current problems. Given Roxy’s presumed attention span, she probably wouldn’t even remember who he was by the time he got back, let alone think she was in love with him. And Charlie, having no way of knowing where he was, would not be tempted to do anything rash.
Daniel was trying to imagine Charlie as a father-in-law. It proved as difficult as imagining Charlie’s daughter as a wife.
“Take the girl out for a pizza. Give her a thrill. She thinks you look like a movie star.”
For someone who had been frequently referred to as a “reputed crime figure” in the newspapers, Charlie had been almost diffident, even shy, as though he brought the matter up with reluctance. Just a doting father indulging the whim of a silly girl. Daniel had been certain, erroneously as it turned out, that Charlie thought of this as a trivial matter—a twenty-two-year-old’s version of a schoolgirl crush.
Now, just a few weeks later, Daniel found himself facing the crime family equivalent of a breach-of-promise suit, me imagined penalties of which did little to encourage an optimistic outlook.
“I’m a reasonable man,” Charlie had said. His charming smile was reassuring. For a foolish moment Daniel had dared to imagine he was off the hook. “But if somebody breaks my little girl’s heart, I’m naturally not going to be happy.” The smile had vanished. “And if I’m not happy, I’m gonna make sure he’s not happy, either. You understand what I’m tryin’ to say?”
