I am a peaceable man, one who does not especially care for the brutal contests of strength that so many denizens of Edazzo believe to be the best way of settling disputes. Admittedly I have taken part in battles and wars when there seemed to be no other choice, but rarely have the results of those battles been happy. So it was with great alarm that I found myself locked in a room with a dead man not many days ago, and indeed my hands still shake as I write this account.

He was not dead at first, I hasten to add. We had a long conversation, Agamnu and I, about the southern pirates. He was of the opinion that they would go away in time, and that it would not be difficult for Edazzo and its allies to fend them off indefinitely. I was not so optimistic. It was and remains my belief that the pirates will be the doom of Edazzo, one way or another, though it is not a matter I am eager to dwell on. I only hope that I and my friends will have passed from the scene before the final act.

We discussed Āyuso, a young man of the city of whom Agamnu had a higher opinion than I. I insisted fruitlessly that Āyuso was a scoundrel, a wastrel, and various other things of that sort, but Agamnu saw some good in him, somewhere deep down. Very deep down, it seemed to be. But never mind Āyuso.

Our discussion turned to artistic matters after this. I keep these literary efforts of mine largely to myself for the time being, but Agamnu has often spoken of his desire to acquire a bard for his house, to sing of the deeds of his ancestors. For a man of the sword, Agamnu had surprisingly many opinions on the proper composition of an epic cycle. “The cornerstone of every epic,” he told me, “is the battle between the hero and the dragon. Is it not written in the stars? Every night you see Daryo fight and defeat Hōstupkei under his feet in order to deliver the sun from the underworld.” The science of astrology is a primitive one in Edazzo.

“What about the story of Risseldo in the realm of darkness?” I asked. A tragic story of love and despair, and fairly dragon-free.

“His wife is the sun, and the Bountiful Lord is the dragon. Too easy, my friend. This is one of the tales where the dragon wins, at least for one round. There is the story of how Risseldo came back from the darkness with every song that has ever been sung on his lips, and where did he get those songs if he did not wrest them from the Bountiful Lord himself?”

“True, but I’ve always thought it something of a cheat. I respect the artistry of the old bards, but that is no way to end a story.”

“That is the only way to end a story.” Blatant contradiction is one possible rhetorical technique, I admit.

We argued late into the evening, so late, in fact, that Agamnu invited me to stay the night. The streets of Edazzo can be dangerous in the dark, what with their ruffians seeking the aforementioned brutal contests of strength, so I agreed, and he called for his servant to bring us more wine. Generously, with the spirit of a true host, he offered me the first sip from his cup, and I accepted. There is a lacuna in my memory at this point, and I am confident some knave will bring the charge of drunkenness against me. Pausing only to mention such charges with the scorn they deserve, I continue my account.

The first thing I remember is the way the light of the sun came in through the upper windows. No, that is the second thing I remember. The first thing I remember is the pain in my head, which was definitely not the ache of too much wine, but a peculiar burning behind my eyes. The third and fourth things I remember were standing up and recovering my balance. The fifth thing I remember is Agamnu, lying on his couch with his eyes closed. I made some mocking remark, but he did not move. He was, of course, dead, and I found the door to the room locked from the outside.

It is the belief of my homeland that this body is only a shadow cast by the light of our souls, or something along those lines. I am certainly not a philosopher. Once I knew that Agamnu was dead, I said a prayer to the Flame for his departed soul, that it would escape the maw of the Beast and know true happiness. He was a good man, or at any rate I liked him, and I am rarely perceptive enough to tell the difference between the two. Then I set about trying to alert someone outside the upper room.

First I threw pebbles out through the windows to try and catch someone’s attention, but there was no attention caught. Then I tried shouting, but apparently the street outside was populated entirely by the deaf. I would have to try my luck with the members of Agamnu’s household. It wouldn’t be long before Agamnu’s servant came to bring us our morning meal, and whatever remedy we needed for the quantities of wine we had imbibed. It was not pleasant waiting next to the remains of my friend. From time to time I felt the urge to speak to him, then I would recall that he had departed, and I would have to shut my eyes in grief.

Eventually I heard the bar lift on the other side of the door, and saw the servant’s head poke around the corner. “Your master is dead,” I told him. There was no point in coating the news with honey. “He was like this when I woke up this morning; I don’t know what happened.”

“So I see,” he replied, in a way that drew my suspicions immediately. The mores of Edazzo are not always familiar to me, but he was calmer than I would have expected. “I will see to the body, my lord, if you will come downstairs. I am sure you don’t wish to stay here any longer.”

“No, no,” I said. I was in something of a daze as I followed him down the steps to the great hall, where he promptly abandoned me to go outside. I was left alone with Agamnu’s daughters, who were sitting by the fire tending it and pouring water into bowls. He had had two daughters and one son, and I trembled to think of how I could break the news to them. I can be glib of tongue when the opportunity presents itself, but this was not the time for glibness. Taurūmi, the younger of the girls, looked at me with her lips pressed tightly together, but I am used to that sour look from women, and especially from her. Barzidi, the older girl, was friendlier. She smiled at me and began to bring me a bowl of water, but I shook my head.

“What is the matter?” Barzidi asked me, her eyes wide. There is a bit of poetry, though I can’t remember if it is from this place or my homeland, that starts out, “Cruel the hand that spins the thread of fate,” or something like that. It came to mind then, as I looked at Barzidi and Taurūmi. I still wasn’t sure what to say, and quoting poetry seemed to be the wrong line to take.

“Your father is dead,” I said finally. Better to be succinct and straightforward. Almost immediately Taurūmi began to wail, twisting her neck in a way that made my own neck ache in sympathy. I looked to Barzidi, who carefully set the bowl down on the ground before sitting next to it and putting her head in her hands.

Taurūmi’s wail began to form words, or maybe it had just taken my Bird a while to work out what the words were. “Ruin and death! He comes for all of us, to drag our souls down to the pit of darkness. Her hand is stronger than life and it is stronger than death. Oh, lay your hand upon us! Shield us with your destruction and smite us with your benevolence!”

This was all very awkward, not to mention confusing, and I pondered how to comfort her while maintaining the rather strict propriety of a noble Edazzo household. I wondered at the time where the other members of Agamnu’s family were. No doubt his brother was carousing someplace, but his wife should have been there. And where were the maidservants of the house? I was already disturbed enough from the sudden and mysterious death of my friend, and I began to have the feeling that I was in a nightmare, or a feverish delirium. I do not enjoy writing, and I doubt you care to read, the details of what I felt at this juncture, but after a momentary weakness I was able to control myself again. My mind is as strong as any man’s when I feel the need to exercise it.

I sat with Barzidi and we listened to Taurūmi wail. From time to time I thought of something to say, then thought it would be foolish to say it, then thought it would be foolish not to say it, then thought that it would be foolish to keep thinking about it. This foolish circle was only broken when Taurūmi started to ascend the stairs. I made a desperate heartfelt plea for her to stay and not gaze morbidly on the remains of her father, or at least I did in my mind. I am afraid to report that the only actual sound I made was a kind of anguished squeal that the Bird didn’t bother to translate.

It was at that unfortunate moment that Agamnu’s wife made her entrance at last. She had been out in the courtyard, it seemed, and she entered the hall with a hand pressed to her forehead, moving slowly as if ill, or more likely, as if she was aware in some mystical fashion of the death of her husband. “What is going on?” she inquired. “What is Taurūmi yelling about?” Then she noticed me and asked me rather sharply what I was still doing here. I liked Agamnu very much, but I was never sure how he had come to marry a woman like Lurwi, whose tongue was sharper than a knife and more venomous than an adder, as the Duchess Tailei’s enemies used to say of her.

Breaking the news to Lurwi would be more difficult yet. I pondered the matter for a while, but before I could finish pondering, Barzidi had taken her mother aside to speak with her in whispers. I judged it wisest for me to go out into the courtyard and await the outcome both of their conversation and of Taurūmi’s ascent.

When a good man dies, one expects nature to take notice and put on appropriate scenery involving gloom, clouds, and ideally a light rain. One does not expect the sun to keep shining and the bees to keep visiting flowers, but nevertheless that is what I found when I stepped outside. It was very depressing, especially when I remembered a recent conversation that Agamnu and I had held here. I have lost very many people in the few years I have walked on the earth, yet I hope I will never cease to mourn them.

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I stood in the courtyard for a while, thinking about these things, before I noticed that Huro was standing there too. Generally I look forward to meetings with Huro roughly as much as I look forward to wearing deadly serpents around my neck, but this did not seem to be the time for such petty enmities. I cleared my throat and told Huro the sad news.

“Finally drank too much for his stomach, did he? Well, well,” said Huro, turning away from me to look in the direction of nothing in particular.

Needless to say, I was outraged by this, to the point where I briefly considered striking Huro. But as gratifying as that would be, it was not my place to avenge the insult. And then, Huro is a very large man. Instead I asked him what he was doing here. “It is hardly the usual thing to be visiting another man’s wife in his courtyard early in the morning.”

“That’s the game you want to play, is it? Let me put your mind at ease, my friend. I was here to pay a little visit to Agamnu’s brother. I have business with him in the lower city.”

This was plausible enough: everyone knows that Agamnu’s brother has a finger in every pot of stew from the king’s palace to the beggar’s hovel. Yet I had never heard that Huro was interested in the lower city, except maybe something discreditable here or there. Probably if Huro did have business with Bekzamu, it was to pay off some debt to a prostitute or a gambler. I considered saying this, but thought better of it. Now was not the time.

Without another word, I turned and walked away from Huro, leaving him in no doubt that I had judged him and found his soul buried in shadow. Lurwi was sitting inside with her face veiled, Barzidi’s head on her shoulder. I said farewell to them both, expressing my deep sorrow and condolences, and then I proceeded to leave.

That was what I intended to do, at least, but before I had gotten very far into my farewell, Taurūmi came back down the steps, and it occurred to me that she had been very silent the last few minutes. Her hair was free and disheveled, with a mad look in her eyes underneath it. I have not in fact seen many lunatics in my life, but I have seen plays with lunatic characters, and at that moment Taurūmi would have fit right in.

“Murderer!” she shrieked, pointing a shaking finger at me. “You killed my father, and his blood will haunt you until you follow him to the pit!”

I was not at all sure how to reply to this. Her misapprehension was a serious one. “I did not kill your father,” I said to her in a gentle voice, which I presumed would settle the matter.

“You did! You were alone with him when he died!”

“The door was not barred when I left them,” said someone from behind me. Briefly I entertained the notion that one of the heavenly messengers had descended to establish my innocence, before I realized that this was an exceedingly unlikely happenstance. The more pedestrian reality was that it was Agamnu’s manservant, whose name I just realize I have forgotten to give. Labarinud was his name, an odd enough appellation, which I think means something in the Amikni language. The Bird does something funny to names, but this is not the place to go into all that. Labarinud went on to say, “But when I found them the next morning, it was barred on the outside. Someone entered and left again during the night.”

“Who?” asked Lurwi, looking up at Labarinud and me, raising her veil to show her reddened eyes.

A curious expression crossed Labarinud’s face. I do not mean he was curious, I mean I was curious about what it meant. He bowed and said, “I do not know, madam.”

“If you’re lying, I will have you put to the rack. The tormentors know how to get the truth from unwilling churls.”

But Labarinud was, I knew, a steadfast man who would not be swayed by threats such as those. “I do not know who entered the room. After I brought Agamnu the wine he had asked for, I left to make sure everything was in order around the house before I went to sleep in the main hall. I was awakened the next morning by the sound of Barzidi and Taurūmi conversing as they saw to the fire. That is the truth, and I will swear to it by the Father Above.”

“Girls! You must know,” said Lurwi, addressing the two maidservants who I now noticed were standing behind Labarinud. I don’t think she liked the younger maid much, for all the usual reasons. “Don’t you dare hide the truth from me.”

But they, too, had been soundly asleep all night. It seemed that a general spirit of slumber had descended on the entire household, and that only those few who had escaped it would be able to shed light on the darkness. I said so, and immediately Lurwi stood up and rested her fiery gaze on me. Fiery may not be the right word, but it reminded me of nothing less than the siphons of burning oil that I have seen the ships of my home use against pirates.

“That is what the Hawk of White Mountain would do, anyway. He would gather the entire household together and interrogate them all,” I explained. No one here had heard of the Hawk of White Mountain, of course, and I believe they took him to be an acquaintance of mine back home.

“Then that is what we’ll do!” she proclaimed. “My husband’s blood will be avenged!” Dropping her veil, she turned on her heel and walked away with a certain dramatic air.

All this while, Taurūmi had been staring at the ground, her lips moving without words. But once her mother had gone to her own room, Taurūmi said in a voice that hurt my ears, “I will make a sacrifice to Thundargi, and Thundargi will reveal the murderer to me. Then there will be vengeance.”

“Taurūmi, no!” Barzidi said, but Taurūmi escaped her arms and ran out into the courtyard, where she dodged the man who was coming inside. This man tugged on his shiny locks of hair as he watched her vanish into the streets of Edazzo, then he looked at all of us.

“I should have stopped her,” he said with a great deal of rue in his voice. “But I can’t be expected to be her constant guard, can I? Once was enough. Now just what is going on here?”

I looked at Labarinud so I could avoid answering Bekzamu’s question. Labarinud bowed and said, “I fear that your brother is dead.”

Bekzamu wavered on his feet and accepted Labarinud’s outstretched arm to keep himself from toppling over. “How? What happened?”

Now Labarinud looked at me so he could avoid answering Bekzamu’s question. I explained the matter to Bekzamu as delicately as I could, avoiding any hint that his brother’s death might have been less than natural. Yet he was a discerning man, and my lack of hints he took for evidence of the contrary. It is a rhetorical technique that my tutors tried in vain to impress upon my mind, but Bekzamu was a natural master of the art.

“Do you think it was a god that struck him down, or a man?” Bekzamu smiled unpleasantly. “Or a woman?”

“He was poisoned,” I told him. “That much we know for sure. Whether it was a man, a woman, or a god, I do not know.”

Bekzamu’s face paled. “I can think of many men, women, and gods that would want to kill me, but who hated Agamnu?”

It was true, I reflected. I vaguely recall some barbarous eastern tribe that calls its warriors lions in the form of men, and that is how I could describe Agamnu if I were asked to write his funeral elegy. He was braver than any of his companions and nobler than any lord of the Parako. No one who met him hated him. But I thought then of Huro, and the reason he had been lurking in the courtyard garden with Lurwi, and I allowed dark suspicions into my mind that do not need to be explained, I trust. More than one kingdom has fallen into bloodshed because of such things.

“No one hated him,” said Labarinud in a voice stiff with emotion. “But there are reasons to kill other than hate.”

“You aren’t going to tell me that someone killed him because of love?”

“It has happened many times before. Where did you go this morning, sir?”

“I went for a walk. You saw me leave. You are not accusing me, are you?”

A pained expression crossed Labarinud’s face. “I am not. I was only asking out of curiosity.”

Bekzamu was still somewhat pale as he asked, “Do you know what kind of poison was used?”

“None of us are experts in poisons or such foreign devilry. Taurūmi has gone to divine the answer from her goddess, but I can offer no better solution.”

“I see. Does anyone outside the household know?”

I thought it depended a great deal on what Taurūmi said as she went her way to whatever shrine she visited. If she met some inquisitive, or even if someone overheard her wailing, which it would be very hard to avoid doing, the matter would spread throughout Edazzo in the blink of an eye. Foolish girl, I thought. Discretion is one of the keys to wisdom. Then I remembered, and I cleared my throat to soften the confession I was about to make. The pre-confessional clearing of the throat is not one of the rhetorical techniques my tutors taught me, though they should have. “I may have told Huro.”

“Huro? What was he doing here?”

“He was meeting you.”

“Blast me to the underworld if he was!” It was very nearly a scream that emerged from Bekzamu’s mouth. “I don’t know why Huro was here. He certainly wasn’t meeting me.” He took a deep breath and tugged on his locks of hair until he had calmed himself down. “Where is my brother now?”

“He is in the upstairs room. I have done what little I can to prepare the body for the pyre.”

“I will see him,” said Bekzamu, and went upstairs.

The demands of family piety often conflict with the desire to seek the truth. It occurred to me, far too late, that it had perhaps not been the wisest thing to have so many people left alone with Agamnu over the past hour. But what the stars have set in place cannot be undone. (If I had the skill of reading stars like the astrologers of my country, what a name I would make for myself in Edazzo! That art has not yet come here.)

I looked down at the ground somberly, glad for the opportunity to be alone with my thoughts. Labarinud was quiet with thoughts of his own, no doubt. Barzidi had gone to her loom where she was contemplating her funeral shroud, no doubt. The maidservants had contemplations of their own. We were all remembering Agamnu, I trust.

And now I leave off writing, as I did not linger much longer, but returned to my own home to set these thoughts down. I am not even sure yet if I will keep them for my readers’ sake. It is a painful tale, and I have a fearful premonition that it will grow more painful yet. But the wound must be opened if the shard is to be removed.