Heris asked, "Has anything unusual happened? Unexplained noises? Food gone missing? Has anyone seen a ghost?"

The servants looked worried. More worried, and a little trapped.

Delari observed, "We seem to be onto something, now. Mrs. Creedon. Tell me your ghost story. Turking, Felske, don't interrupt. But signal me if you have something to add. Start, woman."

She did not have much, after all. Unexplained noises. Footsteps heard. Nothing there when she looked. A feeling she was being watched. The usual. But no poltergeist activity. No intrusion into the realm of the living.

"Felske?"

"The ghost don't seem malicious. Not like you hear they can be. It's like it just don't care."

"I see. I suppose that fits."

Hecht asked, "Could it be a ghost?"

"No. Mrs. Creedon. Where did you sense the spirit?"

Hecht became unsettled. There might be some sizable Instrumentality of the Night afoot. His encounters with that side of reality were never pleasant. But his amulet was no more active than usual around Principate Delari. His most improbable grandfather.

Delari consulted the others. Then, "You, too, Heris?"

"I don't know that part of the house. But I've felt the watching eyes."

The old man met Hecht's gaze. "Let's go see."

Out of earshot of the staff, Hecht said, "Your Grace, I could never publicly be the man you want."

"That's why you'll always be Piper Hecht. Soldier with an angel."

As was common with the homes of the Brothen rich, the Principate's town house surrounded a central garden. The establishment was smaller than those of the Five Families. It lacked a curtain wall to mask it from the street. The garden had not been maintained – except for the cook's herb bed. Though not much could be told by the light of the earthenware lamps everyone carried.

Delari said, "I need to invest in some upkeep."

The wing they entered definitely needed the kiss of mop and broom. Delari volunteered, "If we have a squatter he'll be here. This wing hasn't been used in ages."

Heris observed, "They wouldn't come here if they bought it was haunted."

Not only was cleaning needed, so was plaster restoration and paintwork.

The dust on the floor showed signs of regular traffic.

Delari said, "The staff still ought to be doing more. This ghost hasn't bitten anyone yet."

Heris said, "They don't have permission to spend your money. Or to bring workmen in."

"You do. Now. Take charge. Piper? What?"

"Back there."

Something clicked. Lamplight glittered off disturbed dust.

"A door," Hecht said. "It must have been open a crack. I didn't catch that." His amulet had begun to itch. The itch turned to pain momentarily.

Delari asked, "Are you all right, Piper?"

"Stomach spasm. I have them sometimes."

The Principate frowned. Before he followed up, Heris asked, "Do we want to open this, Grandfather?" Her voice squeaked. She was terrified.

"Huh? Oh. Yes. Go ahead. I just said he hasn't bitten anybody."

Bright light blasted into the corridor when she pulled on the door.

Hecht leapt past her, into a small, square room. He heard soft laughter. "How come the light went away?"

"It was supposed to startle and distract us." But it had not prevented Hecht from seeing a man duck out.

"Did you see that? Was that him? Is he real?"

"Real, or one vigorous ghost. Either way, definitely the Lord of the Silent Kingdom."

"Cloven Februaren."

"Yes."

"Your grandfather?"

"Your great-great-grandfather."

"Still alive. Looking younger than Grade Drocker when I met him."

"I don't understand, either."

Hecht said, "I thought you were Lord of the Silent Kingdom."

"I was. Never comfortably. But I'm not it if he's still here. He was the original. He was the one who charged the Construct."

"Uhm?"

"I don't have the flare. My father or me. We weren't dramatic enough. The program is largely forgotten now."

The program might be, but not the dread. The entire Collegium feared Muniero Delari.

"Come, Heris." Delari scanned the little room. It had a door in each wall. Floor and walls were a polished marble that, by lamplight, appeared to be the shade called flesh. Veined with gray, like cheese.

Principate Delari began to chuckle. "Definitely his sense of humor at work here. This door opens onto the street. On the west side of the house. Which he could use whenever he wanted without being noticed. This door, that he just went out, will put us in a hallway behind the outer face of the house. Designed with defense in mind, a long time ago, and entirely impractical today. It will have little glazed windows that, at noon, let in only enough light to prove that the staff don't keep the place up."

Hecht and Heris awaited instructions. The Principate eyed them, then chuckled again. "I can be a right bastard sometimes, can't I?"

"You said it, Grandfather," Heris said. "I won't repeat it."

"Ouch! Clever girl. He went that way so we'll check the outside hallway. He'll have left whatever clues he thinks we need."

"Your Grace?" Hecht asked.

"Oh, do dispense with all that, Piper. Go. I'm right behind you. For what good that will do if the Ninth Unknown is in a bad mood."

Hecht pushed through the doorway. The hallway beyond met Principate Delari's gloomy expectations. He asked, "Is there still some point to this? He can stay ahead as long as he wants. We have to be careful. He doesn't. You have sorcerer's skills. This would be a time to tap them."

The itch under his amulet and the unease he felt when he peered into the clotted darkness led him to suggest that.

"He's the superior practitioner, Piper. He'd spank me."

"Do something, Grandfather. Piper is right. We'll be at this all night, otherwise."

The old man turned grim. And pale.

The hallway lit up suddenly, bright as day.

The man in brown, hair standing straight out, eyes bulging, lunged out of a doorway a dozen feet ahead. He croaked, "What have you done?"

Delari said, "Come meet my grandchildren."

The man in brown regained his aplomb. "Took you long enough."

From distress to calm to seriously irritated took scarcely a dozen seconds. Hecht growled, "Don't do that!" when he thought the man in brown was likely to respond unpleasantly. The man stopped, startled. Hecht asked, "Is this really Februaren?"

"It is. Looking pretty much the way he did the day I became his apprentice. I thought you were dead, Grandfather."

"You were supposed to, Muno. Along with everyone else."

"Why?"

"It's easier to roam around and stick your nose in when people think you're gone. So. You've found me out. Come on in. We'll talk about what needs doing."

Hecht said, "Not everyone thinks you're dead. Principate Mongoz recognized you in the mob in the Closed Ground."

"Hugo was born a pain in the ass. He was half the reason I went missing. He built his career on trying to reduce my funding. And it was all personal. He stopped being an asshole as soon as Humberto took over."

"My father," Delari clarified. "His son."

If there was any truth to the lineage proclaimed tonight, Hecht was just the latest in a long line of bastards.

At least he had avoided becoming an Episcopal priest. And a sorcerer. Thanks be to God and his mother, he supposed.

Cloven Februaren led them into small but comfortable quarters with a lived-in look. There were no seats. "I don't have company," he explained without being asked. "And you wouldn't have caught on, Muno, if this boy didn't make it so damned hard to protect him. When some seriously deadly people want him dead."

"Name two," Hecht challenged. "And tell me why."

"Er-Rashal al-Dhulquarnen. Why isn't clear, even with my insight. Something dark is stirring in Dreanger. Something neither Gordimer nor the Kaif are aware of." Hecht did not demur. That fit his own suspicions. "Then you have Immaculate II, Anne of Menand, Duke Tormond in the Connec, and everyone else who'd prefer a Patriarchy with no power to enforce the Patriarchal will. You frighten people everywhere.