The Cursewright's Vow

Chapter 23: The Cursewright's Confession, Part 1

 Paison Meer had served as a steward at Bluestead House, the official residence for the Prefects of Gallowsport, for over forty years. For the last twenty-five of those years he had enjoyed the title of Chief Steward. In that time he had come to believe there were two sorts of Gallowsport Prefects.

The first sort was an unimaginative puppet who did nothing but what the Emperor demanded of him in exchange for the title (which, unlike most Prefectures, was not hereditary), and under whom the city's thriving criminal underworld operated so openly there were sometimes bloody gang wars right in the streets. Inevitably the city became so ungovernable such a Prefect would have to be replaced, sometimes executed for incompetence (though the warrant never said so outright), but more often trundled off to some distant corner of the Anointed Realms where he couldn't do too much damage.

The second sort was closer to the criminals themselves. Usually such Prefects threw themselves into so many of the various underhanded dealings in the city that they often became victims of one of the guilds they had somehow crossed, or else found themselves in front of the High Bench in the Grand Curia, only to be hanged and displayed out over Hangman's Harbor.

Oraldus Traiste, who had survived seven years as Prefect and thus was the one Paison had served the longest, was somewhere in between.

The Prefect had served under Perseun Deyn in his embassy to Q'Sivaris, until a fever had forced a return to his home in the Vilain Reaches. On the Prince's suggestion the Emperor had installed him as Prefect when his predecessor was convicted of running a slaver's ring right out of Nightgate Armory, and in the subsequent years Gallowsport had become a more tolerable place than it had been since the days of Senrich Mourthia, even if it was still not exactly safe or reputable. Oraldus seemed to understand instinctively how to thread Gallowsport's uniquely treacherous needle: he could appease the criminal guilds without actually endorsing them (and even managed to break a few when they became too violent), and he knew how to please the Emperor without becoming a sycophant. Like Varallo Thray, he knew when to challenge the Emperor and how to do it in a way that provoked his humor rather than his wrath, and had managed some improvements for the city. The Grand Curia was better staffed than it had been in years (though in his most private thoughts Paison believed the courts would never again be what they had been when ruled by the seer-magistrates), and the city guard was finally well-funded enough that there were no districts they feared to police, barring occasional bribery by the criminal guilds.

Within a few years, Paison Meer had begun to feel something for Oraldus he had never once felt for a Gallowsport Prefect: respect. It wasn't something he usually displayed in any overt fashion, although he pilfered a good deal less wine from Bluestead House's cellar than was his usual wont. That, however, might have been due to his advancing age.

So it was with a genuine sense of grief and aching sympathy Paison had witnessed the swift, awful destruction of the Traiste family over the last few months. To lose not one but both of his sons to illness when there was no plague in the city was something Paison couldn't fathom. His own children were long grown and departed from Gallowsport, but he still got letters from them every now and then, and occasionally they reunited for Festival days. 

Oraldus, who could not have been older than fifty, looked closer to eighty on most days, and was usually surrounded by a most uncharacteristic reek of drink. Lady Perrine wandered around Bluestead House in a fog, often not changing from her nightgown into more appropriate daytime clothing for days at a time, and Paison rather suspected she would not live to see Yearsend herself. Whether she would pass from sheer despair or at her own hand was something he didn't care to contemplate.

In a way Paison was disappointed in the behavior of Prefect and Lady Traiste. Yes, it was a tragedy that their sons had died so close together, and so young. Yes, it was a dreadful shame that Toris should catch fever and die just weeks after receiving a letter from the Imperial Prince himself inviting him to Q'Sivaris. Yes, it was terrible that Sorence had passed only days after his fifteenth birthday. Yes, he was aware that men who had children later in life, as the Prefect had, tended to be more attached to them. Paison understood the situation perfectly.