“I think,” Ulaam said, “that perhaps nothing is wrong. Maybe you should snap at me more often. I forget sometimes what I’ve been told about the stresses mortals live under.”
“You’re right though,” she said, pacing the other direction in the small room. “We are going to die. This quest is foolishness! When it was only me who was risking my life for Charlie, that was bad enough. I can’t force the rest to join me.”
“You aren’t forcing them, Tress,” Ulaam said. He finally rose and began to make the tea. “Have you seen how they walk these days? How they hold their heads? They know they’re partially to blame for the people Crow killed.
“You’re not bullying them. You’re offering them a chance at reclaiming their humanity. They want to try to rescue your friend. They want to prove to themselves that even though they might not be first-rate men and women of valor, they at least possess a secondhand variety.”
He turned, handing her a cup and gesturing toward the seat. It was a nice cup. Tin, but dinged up with the respectable scars of favorite use, and shined along the handle from the caress of fingers. She sighed, taking the seat and the tea, though she put the latter aside to let it cool.
“Look,” she said, “Huck was willing to move against me. Perhaps I should see his point. Even if I don’t, I can’t use him to get into the tower now. So the mission is a bust.”
“You still have Midnight Essence,” Ulaam said. “Maybe you can make a creature that can sneak in and unlock the door.”
“The tower is coated with silver,” Tress said. “So I wouldn’t be able to touch it as a midnight creature. At least that’s what Huck said. I don’t know if that’s true, or what to trust from him, but either way we have a bigger problem. Ulaam, I can’t beat the Sorceress. She’s going to know I’m coming.”
“She knows already, I suspect,” Ulaam said. “From what I know of her, she is probably looking forward to seeing how you deal with her defenses.”
“Is it…possible to impress her so much with what we do that she lets Charlie go?”
“Unlikely,” he said. “Best you can hope for is that she finds you amusing and sends you away with a particularly creative curse.”
“So there’s no hope.”
“Well…”
Tress looked up.
“I am supposed to remain neutral, you see,” he said, “in the actions of certain individuals such as the Sorceress. But there is someone who never follows those rules. He’s on this ship. And he has a pair of bright red sequined briefs.”
“Hoid,” she said. “You’ve mentioned that he’s…not what I think he is. Is he truly something greater than the Sorceress?”
“Well, these things are famously difficult to judge,” Ulaam said. “But I should say yes. I wish you could know the real Hoid. As amusing as it has been to watch his current incarnation in all its splendor, he is normally quite different from the person you know.”
“And that person is…less embarrassing?”
“Well, usually more embarrassing. But also quite adept at certain things. If there is a single person on the entire planet who can defeat the Sorceress and get you and yours out alive, it is that man. I tell no joke or exaggeration in this, Tress. When he wants to, there are few people in the entire cosmere who can influence events like our dear friend with the inappropriate undergarments.”
I’ll have you know I owned those briefs before the curse, and I stand by the purchase.
Tress considered that. Then she finally tried her tea, which alone proved her bravery. I never drink anything Ulaam gives me without first seeing what it does to the houseplants.
“If he’s so powerful,” Tress said, “how did the Sorceress end up cursing him?”
“I have no idea,” Ulaam said. “But it’s not that surprising. For how capable he is, Tress, he often overreaches in some way. It doesn’t matter how powerful a person is, if they believe they are slightly more powerful than they truly are, there’s room between those margins for big errors. Hmmmm?”
Yeah, that one was fair.
“Regardless,” Ulaam said, “I think in this case, what happened to him wasn’t an accident. If I were to lay down money—or, more valuable, my favorite set of fingernails—I’d guess he got cursed on purpose. And is now having more trouble than expected getting out of it.”