The baron was never overly sentimental, but now his heart lurched with pity and anger. “Stop it this second! Honestly, I only want the orchids. You haven’t earned money
She nodded and sniffed childishly. “A dungan is a lot of money for us, noble sir. Mama and sister and I can live for half a year on that.”
“So take it and live on it,” he grumbled, putting a golden disk bearing Sauron’s profile in her hand. “And pray for my fortune, I’ll need it real soon…”
“So you’re a knight of Fortune, not a noble sir?” Now she was a wonderful blend of curiosity, childish excitement and fairly adult coquettishness. “I’d never guess!”
“Yeah, something like that,” the baron grinned, picked up the
Alviss’ old housemaid Tina opened the door and reeled back as if she had seen a ghost. Aha, he thought, so my appearance is a real surprise and not everyone here will like it. With this thought he headed towards the living room and the sounds of music floating from there, leaving the old woman’s sad dirges behind – Tina must have realized that this visit from the past was not going to end well… The company in the living room was small and very refined; the music, superbly performed, was Akvino’s Third Sonata. At first, no one paid attention to the baron when he noiselessly appeared in the doorway, and he had a few moments to watch Alviss in her form-fitting dark blue dress from behind. Then she looked around, their eyes met, and Tangorn had two simultaneous thoughts, one stupider than the other: “Some women benefit from everything, even age” and “I wonder if she’ll drop her goblet?”
She moved towards him very, very slowly, as if against resistance, obviously external one; it seemed to him that music was the culprit – it had turned the room into a mountain stream rushing over boulders, and Alviss had to walk upstream, against the current. Then the rhythm changed, Alviss was trying to reach him, but the music resisted: it had turned from a foot-dragging mountain stream into an impenetrable blackberry thicket; Alviss had to tear through those prickly vines, it was difficult and painful, very painful, although she tried not to show it… Then it was all over: the music gave up, falling to Alviss’ feet in a spent heap, and she ran the tips of her fingers over his face, as if not yet believing: “My God, Tan… my darling… you’re back…”
They must have stood in that embrace for an eternity, and then she took him by the hand and said quietly: “Come…”
Everything was like it always had been – and not. She was a totally different woman, and he was discovering her anew, like the first time. There were no volcanic passions, no exquisite caresses to suspend one on a thread at the edge of an abyss of sweet oblivion. There was an enormous all-engulfing tenderness, and they both dissolved in it quietly, having no other rhythm than the flutter of Arda pushing blindly through the prickly starscape… “We’re sentenced to each other,” she had once said; if so, then today the sentence had been carried out.
“…Will you stay here long?”
“I don’t know, Aly. Honestly, I don’t know. I wish it were forever, but it might be for just a few days. Looks like this time it’s the Higher Powers that will decide, not I.”
“I understand. So you’re in business again. Will you need help?”
“Unlikely. Maybe a few small things.”
“Darling, you know I’ll do anything for you – even make love in the missionary position!”
“Well, I’m sure that such a sacrifice won’t be required,” Tangorn laughed in the same vein, “Perhaps a trifle – risk your life a couple of times.”
“Yes, that’d be easier. So what do you need?”
“I was joking, Aly. You see, these games are really dangerous now, not like the good old times. Frankly, even my coming here was totally crazy, even though I checked real well… I’ll just have some coffee and plod back to my hotel now.”
There was a moment of silence, and then she said in a strangely hoarse voice: “Tan, I’m afraid… I’m a broad, I can foresee… Don’t go, I pray you!”
She’s really out of sorts, never saw her like this… Oh, really – never? He remembered, from four years ago: “You’re going to war, Tan.” This just keeps getting worse, he thought with displeasure. Meanwhile she clung to him fiercely and just kept repeating desperately: “Stay with me, please! I’ve never asked anything of you, not once in all these years… Just this once, for me!”
He gave in just to calm her down (what does it really matter from where I come to the Seahorse Tavern tomorrow?), so Mongoose’s team had waited for him in vain at the Lucky Anchor that night.
Very well – he’ll come tomorrow if not tonight. Rather than chase him all over the city, better to wait for him near his lair, there’s no hurry. Besides, it’d be imprudent to divide the capture team: the baron is, after all, the third sword of Gondor, something to reckon with… Mongoose knew how to wait better than anyone.
The Umbarian Secret Service, well-hidden in the dusty ink-smelling burrows of the Foreign Ministry under the deliberately ambiguous plaque DSD – Department of Special Documentation – is a stealthy organization. Even the location of its headquarters is a state secret: the Green House on Swamp Alley that ‘well-informed’ high officials and senators mention sometimes in appropriately hushed voices is actually only an archive holding documents declassified after the one hundred twenty years prescribed by law. Only three people know the name of the Department’s Director: the Chancellor, the Minister of Defense, and the Prosecutor General (the Office’s employees may kill only on the Prosecutor’s sanction, although sometimes they obtain it after the fact), and only he himself knows the names of his four Vice-Directors.
Unlike the secret services that are set up on the police model (these tend to never lose their penchant for pompous headquarters buildings on major streets and for scaring their own citizens with tall tales of their omnipotence and omnipresence), DSD had arisen more like a security service of a major trading corporation, and is above all concerned with always staying in the shadows. The Department’s organizational structure follows that of the
The Department’s mandate is ‘to provide the top officials of the Republic with precise, timely, and objective information about the situation in the country and beyond.’ Obviously
