“... Are you asking me?”
“Certainly I’m asking you. I’m trying to stimulate discussion, sharpen your appreciation for the nuances. Think of it as a form of education especially useful in context - relatively painless but highly relevant. Again, now, the suspicious factor.”
While Mont thought it over, Shaa looked behind them, rechecking the flat roof. The city was becoming a sheaf of paper cutouts silhouetted against the declining sun, their outlines starting to flicker in the glow of firelights.
“... How could Kaar know in advance he’d need troops?” Mont said. “His father dropped dead all of a sudden. They said it was something natural, so how could Kaar have planned for it?”
“Very good!” Shaa said. “That is indeed the point I was after. In a case like this they always say it’s natural causes, but it very rarely is. Whenever you hear about someone dropping dead under questionable circumstances that just happen to mean large advantage to someone else, certain things should run through your mind. Natural causes will run through only long enough to escape out the back. They may creep again into consideration when absolutely everything else has been excluded, and even then they will creep very tentatively.”
“How can you be sure?”
“One can never be sure. The important thing is to keep the various possibilities in mind.”
“Okay, I get it. So what’s next then, murder?”
“Inevitably. The mediums of murder are many, but they can be categorized. There is murder by normal physical means, murder by straightforward magic, and what one might call murder by loophole.”
“What’s that last one?”
“When I say murder by loophole, I mean that some unusual illusion or subterfuge is involved.” Shaa rested his elbows on his knees and leaned forward. Far off on the water, beyond the moored lines of boats gently rocking on the swell, lights twinkled on the hulking masses of the three major islands. The parapets of the palace traced out their serrated edges against the dusk of the evening sky. The walls and island shore Shaa had examined earlier with his spyglass were now deeply in shadow. “Suppose the Venerance had actually expired sometime previously. It’s not impossible, you know; his corpse could have been temporarily reanimated while someone waited for other preparations to come due. Another possibility - suppose the person who died wasn’t the Venerance at all. It could have been a projection, a wraith, a transmogrificant -”
“A what?”
“Somebody else spiffed up to look like him. Think of it as a really good masquerade, yes?”
“Uh, yeah. But then how can you know who anybody really is? How do you know anything you see is really the truth? Who can you trust?”
“Those questions are at the core of the unsettling implications of magic. Magic is a tool like any other tool, sword or hoe or ship or book, and as such can be used for good or ill. Also like most other tools, it complicates life, making many people wish it had never been invented. On a less philosophical level, the questions you raise are a major reason there are court magicians and professional aura readers. Their prime purpose is to see through appearances. For every untruth, there usually is a way to expose the underlying actuality.
“Anyway,” Shaa said, stretching, “practically speaking, these considerations are rarely a problem. Magic may be destabilizing, but it’s also expensive, especially the fancy stuff.”
Mont was sucking on his lip. “I think I thought of something else. What if Kaar had somebody who could see the future tell him when his father was going to die?”
“I believe you have begun to achieve the proper perspective,” Shaa said approvingly. “It is time to advance to the next topic.”
“What’s that?”
One side of Shaa’s mouth curled up and pulled the rest of his face into a sardonic grin. “I thought you wanted to act. You did give that impression.”
“Sure I want to act.”
“Well, then, what is your plan?”
“I thought you were going to do the plans.” Shaa raised an eyebrow. “Oh, I get it, more education. Well, we have to storm the dungeons, release the prisoners, and overthrow Kaar. That sort of thing.”
“That sort of thing,” Shaa said. “The two of us.”
“You don’t have to sound so sarcastic about it. You’ve got a better plan? Then tell me about it.”
Shaa displayed an ostentatious pout, then let it slide deliberately into his more usual lopsided grin. “You do not find me being sarcastic, or at least no more than usual. Your basic plan happens to be the one I had in mind myself. It is, after all, a classic of its kind and, anyway, an adventure is an adventure.”
Mont rolled his eyes. Out of all the characters I could find, he thought, the one I come up with is a nut. Or maybe just an actor. “You’re a pretty strange guy, you know that?”
“I have been told so. Still, I am not alone in strangeness.”
Mont squinted across at Shaa. Shaa was sinking into an air of impenetrability. “You’re about to ask me something I’m not going to like,” Mont said. “I can tell.”
Shaa made a noise midway between a snort and a growl. One of the things he hated most was being predictable, especially while he was doing his impenetrability shtick. “Yes,” he said. “That is true. I need to know more about your seizure disorder.”
Mont looked away from Shaa, off across the river. “I don’t like to talk about it.”
“Nevertheless you must.”
“… You don’t like to talk either. Let’s trade. You ask me a question, I ask you one. Why are you doing this for me?”
Why indeed? Shaa thought. I don’t have to put up with this, I only put up with what I choose. He started to rise. “On reflection, friend Mont, I recall that you clearly fail to have the only adventure in town.”
“Stay where you are,” Mont said. The glint of metal appeared in his hand, its abrupt edge glittering orange in the last light of the sun.
Shaa stared at him. “You do have possibilities, as I have mentioned, but you are still an idiot.”
“What’s the matter with a few questions?” Mont said, waving the knife. “It’s only fair. Okay, I need your help, but you must want something out of me too. I think I’d better know what it is.”
“This is ridiculous,” Shaa said, and this time there was no doubt about his tone. “At this rate a man will have to get a license from the Chamber of Commerce before you help an old lady across the street. Just what do you expect to do with that fly-slicer?”
“I’m going to get some answers.”
Shaa sighed, then whistled a few bars of a sprightly popular tune. Mont’s form sagged. The orange reflections poured from his hand, went dark as they vanished over the edge, glinted once more as the knife entered the water. Shaa seated himself again, leaned back, and draped one leg over the other, ending his tune with the flourish of a chirping bird.
After a moment Mont stirred. “That was a dirty trick,” he said.
“Thank you. Think of it as another educational supplement.” Shaa crossed his hands behind his head, letting one leg swing idly. “I submit that our relationship thus far has not been optimally genial. I propose we make a new start, to preserve our mutual sanity.”
“What kind of new start?” Mont said warily.
I’ve really come down in life, Shaa thought, to be reduced to bargaining with a truculent kid. “Since your curiosity seems to be the primary sticking point, I will answer your questions. Up to a point.”
“You will? Really?”
“Yes, really. I did say so. You, in return, will try to keep in mind that it’s your city and your family in danger, not mine, that I am offering essentially for free a level of expert advice and assistance that you would have trouble finding at any price on the open market, and that finally I might actually have some idea of what I’m talking about and some reason for the things I do. You will also do what I say and argue later. Agreed?”