2
There was a time when Demir would have entered Ossa only with great pomp and circumstance; dancers, jugglers, wild animals, provincial exotics, bread for the masses. It was the prerogative of a popular politician when visiting the capital, and Demir had used it to build up massive amounts of goodwill with the Ossan people.
That was before Holikan. Before he ran away from his own damned failure.
Entering the city on a private coach service was … something else. For nine years he’d lived among poor provincials, experiencing the dirty, depraved depths of the human condition. In all that time nothing had compared to Ossa: the noise of millions of people packed together; the smell of Glasstown glassworks burning through whole forests every day to produce valuable godglass; the taste of soot and human suffering on the tip of his tongue. Returning to that was not a welcome experience, but it did feel a bit like home.
He went directly to the Hyacinth Hotel, where he stood in the street, looking up at the building where he’d spent much of his childhood. The Hyacinth was a magnificent structure, four vaulted stories of granite with golden gargoyles, immense windows, and a location in the Assembly District that would make an emperor jealous. Purple drapes hung from each window, stamped with the lightning-cracked silic sigil of the Grappo.
Incredible as it might be, it was a painful reminder that the Grappo had once been one of the most powerful guild-families in Ossa. Generations ago, to be sure, but the Hyacinth was all that remained of that wealth and prestige.
And Demir was practically all that remained of the Grappo.
All around him, the streets were full of people celebrating the coming winter solstice. Masked revelers, dressed scantily despite the cold, carried tin flagons of winter beer, throwing paper streamers back and forth across the street, following the bread wagons distributing free meals for the poor. On another day, Demir might have enjoyed the levity of it all. He would have admired the women, laughed at the clowns, and helped distribute winter beer from the front step of the hotel. Not today. Not with the hotel steps draped in a black mourning carpet.
Demir jogged up the massive marble stairs and through the big double doors of the Hyacinth, slipping a few banknotes into the hand of a surprised porter as he passed. During his journey he had made a transformation, changing out his provincial workman’s tunic for a scarlet jacket with purple and gold trim. He rolled his shoulders, feeling the fine clothes hanging uncomfortably, trying to take himself out of the role of Demir the provincial grifter, and back into Demir Grappo, dignified glassdancer and new patriarch of the Grappo guild-family.
Like the sights and sounds of the city, it was a change that felt regrettably natural.
He did not recognize most of the porters, bellboys, or waiters moving through the foyer, but he knew the rhythm with which they walked. He skirted the main floor, heading up the large double staircase to the second floor, where he was stopped by a Grappo enforcer dressed as a porter. She was a young woman, pretty face marred by a soldier’s scar across one cheek, a sword and pistol hanging from her belt along with a cork pouch filled with godglass. The pinkie nail of her left hand was marked with purple client paint to show her allegiance to the Grappo.
“Are you visiting someone, sir?” she said as she maneuvered herself between him and the hallway. To his surprise, she did not look at his hands before interfering, instead meeting his gaze without submissiveness.
Demir lifted his right hand, palm flat against his chest to display the silic sigil. “Adriana is dead already,” he said. “I think Breenen might be overdoing it by posting a guard now.”
A look of confusion crossed the young woman’s face, and then her eyes widened. “Master Demir?”
“In the flesh.”
She inhaled sharply. “Master Vorcien said you weren’t supposed to be here until tomorrow!” She looked around, seemed at a loss, and snapped a salute. “My name is Tirana Kirkovik. I’m the hotel master-at-arms.”
“We have one of those now?” Demir asked in surprise. His mother had always been light on security, insisting on treating the hotel as such, rather than as a guild-family mansion.
“Yes, sir. I’ve been with the hotel for four years.”
Demir searched her eyes. Still no fear, nor submission. She did not care that he was a glassdancer, and was only mildly embarrassed to realize that he was her new boss. Good. “You’re a Kirkovik.”
“Indeed. Hammish Kirkovik is my grandfather.”
“I like Hammish. Still with the Foreign Legion?”
“Retired last year, sir. He’s said a lot of good things about you.”
“That’s because he has very poor judgment of character.” Demir glanced Tirana up and down. She had a soldier’s stance, confident and erect, one hand resting comfortably on the pommel of her sword. At first impression, his mother had chosen her master-at-arms well. “Pleasure to meet you, Tirana. Could you let Breenen know that I’m examining my mother’s suite?”
“Of course, sir!” Tirana turned and hurried down the stairs back to the foyer.
Demir continued on his course, walking down the long, crimson-carpeted hallways of the hotel until he found a little side hall with a sign hung on a string to block the way. It declared this hallway HOTEL PERSONNEL ONLY.
He ducked under the string and walked down to the only door. It was locked, but pressing a catch beneath the gold leaf three inches to the right of the latch caused the door to click and spring open. He stepped inside.
His mother’s quarters occupied a pair of rooms that had once been a servants’ galley and recovery room. It was much as it was the last time he’d seen it: white walls with purple accents, a massive fireplace between two blue hammerglass windows that looked out over the park, fragrant cedar desk and bookshelves, with massive wingback chairs for entertaining guests. To the left was the closed door of the bedroom, next to a door that connected to the secret servants’ hallways that wound through the hotel.
The only thing missing was his mother’s papers. They were gone – all of them, including all the notebooks that had once filled dozens of shelves. There was no clutter, no encyclopedias at hand. It was like she’d just … moved out.
The appearance of the room shocked Demir almost as much as news of his mother’s death had. He checked the drawers only to find them empty, then the cabinets on the right and left. Personal effects remained: crystal drink holder, silver candlesticks, a small ivory carving of a Purnian elephant. But all her letters, notes, and personal correspondence were gone. Demir threw himself into one of the wingback chairs in frustration, resting his chin despondently on one hand.
He was staring at the empty bookshelf when he could have sworn he saw something out of the corner of his eye. It was a face, looking at him through the hammerglass window of his mother’s study.
It was there for only a moment, elongated and dark-skinned, with delicate features and an unnaturally long neck. Black beady eyes stared back at him over a deformed jaw with a severe underbite and jagged teeth. When he turned to look straight at the window, the face was gone. A cold sweat broke out across the back of his neck. The face was burned into his memory, like a face from a child’s illustration of something that walks the night. Except it was broad daylight in the Assembly District.