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Vimes padded on silent feet across the thick carpet, taking a circuitousi route to his target thus ensuring he approach from the side the man slumped in a chair before the fireplace, head back and seemingly sleeping. He paused, a little over an arms’ reachii away, and when his presence garnered no response he moved closer, frowning slightly.
He stared a few seconds into the fire, an unusual sight in this room, before reaching down to extract the worryingly-tilted finely-crafted glass from the long-fingered hand that held it perhaps a foot above the floor, dangling at the end of an arm limp against the outside of the chair.
It didn’t move.
“I think we'd both rather you didn’t pour wine all over the carpet,” he said quietly.
His response was a slow, deeply drawn breath followed by a heavy, nasal sigh. The fingers relaxed, and he saved the servants the headache of trying to get red wine out of carpet that was ancient enough to be an antique and probably a bugger to clean at the best of times.
Raising the glass to his nose, he sniffed, then grimaced before placing the delicate and no doubt expensive glass on the coffee table – a safe distance from the shod foot currently propped upon it.
“Not to your taste, Sir Samuel?” There was a faint undercurrent of amusement beneath the weariness that left Vimes oddly relieved. Some of the tension he hadn’t realised he was carrying eased from his shoulders.
“Not especially. Sir.”
He could feel eyes on him, studying him with quiet regard, but it wasn’t a sensation that filled him with wariness and irritation as it so often did. Tonight wasn’t really a night for the games they had crafted over the years in this very office, the games with mostly unknown and ever changing rules which he countered by ignoring and making new rules of his own. Not tonight.
“How drunk are you?”
“Hmm. Some. Not enough.”
Vimes snorted. “How drunk do you want to be?”
“At what point does ‘not having to think about things for a few hours’ take effect?”
A self-inflicted expert in such things, Vimes pulled a face and gave a one-shouldered shrug. “It doesn’t, really. It’s still there, you just won’t care about it. Or won’t care as much, anyway.” He crossed to the side cabinet, filling a glass from the wateriii jug and pouring a rather generous serving of what smelt like quality brandy into another.
A snort in mimicry, a sound so undignified he wasn’t sure whether his brain was playing tricks on him, before deciding there was no way this man had made that noise and therefore it didn’t happen. “Pity.”
He returned, taking a moment to study the secretive, private man who was both thorn and benefactor, occasional help and frequent hindrance on a regular basis. He looked no more pallid than usualiv, but he did look drawn; stretched thin and discomfortingly fragile with it. One thin arm laid across his abdomen, the left still dangled by his side; the left leg was bent at the knee with the foot twisted on the ankle and set on the floor to the side in a position that should have been awkward and which Vimes suspected the man would regret later. The right foot remained on the small table between the chairs and the fireplace. It was very rare for him to show that his leg was bothering himv But then, there shouldn’t have been anyone to see; Vimes was not supposed to be here.
He wondered briefly why he hadn’t been sent away. Knowing he’d never understand the man well enough to be able to answer that question, he dismissed it and extended the tumbler.
“Here”.
Eyes opened and the man finally lifted his head from the back of the chair to stare at the glass. Vimes waited, patiently.
“Drunk, your Grace, not comatose.” He reached out his hand, though, and accepted the glass. Vimes gave him a look, pointedly didn’t roll his eyes, and turned to tend the fire briefly before moving to an adjacent chair and settling himself, taking care that the breastplate didn’t dig into sensitive places.
“Sybil told me. I’m sorry.” And he genuinely was, more than he would have expected to be for someone he barely knew, and that more than 30 years ago in a different life.
He received no response, but then wasn’t really expecting one. The long silence that ensued was strangely companionable, a welcome, quiet interlude to their usual sparring.
Eventually the man dropped his head back against the chair again, the near-empty tumbler granted the same precarious treatment as the wine glass earlier.
“She was quite taken with you,” came an unbidden, unexpected, and uncomfortable observation.
“Keel.”
“Both of you.”
“Technically, I never met her.” He knew if he had looked he would have been treated to one of those lightning-fast, serpentine smiles, the ones that set the hindbrain on edge and left the receiver looking frantically for the nearest exit. Or tree.
“No, but she followed your exploits with great enthusiasm. Interestingly, she commented more than once on how you reminded her of him. In later years, anyway.”
Vimes did look at him then, frowning. Did she know? He didn’t ask.
Don’t be ridiculous. Of course not. Came the silent retort.
No, Vetinari would never have told her, but she was a wickedly smart woman. Still, if the man said she didn’t know, the chances were high that she didn’t. Not that it mattered now.
He swirled the water in the glass, and studied the eddies. He had questions, but predominant over all was;
“Why?”
“Many reasons, I suspect. But Madam appreciates all forms of talent of which you, Sir Samuel, have many. Whether they are talents that endear you to others or not. Although, to hazard a guess I would say she was most intrigued by the ‘not’.”
Vimes shifted, not sure what to do with the knowledge that Vetinari considered that he had talents, but all he could really think right then was, present tense.
“Appreciated,” Vetinari corrected, quietly.
There would, Vimes knew, be no commemoration in Ankh-Morpork for the remarkable woman who had, largely, orchestrated and driven a revolution. Her passing would go unobserved except, perhaps as idle conversation over brandy and cigars in those circles that cared about such things. And then, very quickly, she would be forgotten as something new and shiny caught the attention of the aristocracy.
“Are you going?” A long pause.
“Yes.”
Vimes nodded. They would work out the security details tomorrow. It could wait.
He took a moment to remember the mysterious, vibrant, and mildly terrifying young woman from all those years ago. He hadn’t looked her up when he’d gotten back; had no idea what she’d done with the years between. I doubt she was idle, Vimes thought. And I doubt I’ll ever know what puddings she had her fingers stuck in. Truthfully, however, despite his curiosity he didn’t really want to know. He suspected that if he did, he may need to arrest someone.
He didn’t raise his glass, or offer empty platitudes to a long life well lived; gave neither toast nor hollow words of comfort. He doubted Vetinari would appreciate any such offering, could easily imagine the caustic reply, and he didn’t want to upset the temporary truce between them with such a crass gesture.
Instead he kept the nights’ watch, and guarded the silently grieving man beside him as the hours burnt down. That was the best way he knew to honour Lady Meresole, and he rather felt she would have appreciated it.
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i he’d rather not get stabbed.
ii see above.
iii actual water, and clear too. Gods alone knew where that was imported from. Maybe. If they were paying attention. Which they probably weren’t.
iv which would have been a challenge at the best of times; he’d seen more corpses with better complexions.
v Vimes suspected much of it when he was in company was for show, anyway. No one, not even Vimes, was really sure how genuine his limp was, and Vimes’ suspicion was that he enjoyed keeping people guessing. Vimes himself didn’t care one way or the other; if the man collapsed, he’d pick him up and carry him, but until such a time Vimes was content to stay out of it and watch the man toy with other people for a change. He knew that some days bothered the man, but he never tried it on with him, for which Vimes was grateful; he reckoned as well that the man wasn’t foolish enough to risk his healthvi, so didn’t have too much to worry about on that front
vi which just went to show that Vimes really didn’t know the man well at all