by Victor Poole
"Not much," the boy admitted.
"What did he say?" Ajalia asked.
"He said he'd come back," Leed said.
"Did he tell you anything else?" Ajalia asked. She tried to keep the aggravation out of her voice.
"He mostly talked to Philas," Leed said. "They didn't want me to hear."
"Okay," Ajalia said. "I appreciate you not running away."
"I want your money," Leed said.
"Do you want to know something valuable?" Ajalia asked. Leed nodded. "Philas has money sewn in his coat," she said. Leed licked his lips. "If he catches you," she warned him, "he will beat you."
Leed curled his lip in disdain, and went to stare at the boats in dry dock. Ajalia went to the shaded bench where Philas was dozing; she kicked his shoe.
"Go away," Philas said.
"It's me," Ajalia said. Philas opened his eyes with a jerk. He took in the time of day, and frowned.
"You took your sweet time," he complained.
"I had an adventure," she said dropping the saddle onto the bench. "And you've been drinking."
"Hardly," Philas said bitterly. He stretched out his arms and legs, and slid lower on the bench. "Tastes like piss now."
"Are you serious?" Ajalia asked. Philas cracked a belligerent eye at her.
"Would I joke about drinking?" he demanded. He had blue hollows under his eyes, and his skin was ashen. "I have been trying to get drunk," he said, leaning his head back on the wall behind the bench, his eyes closed, "all day long, and it hasn't worked yet."
Ajalia stood partly in the shade and partly in the sun; she watched Philas breathe.
"What did Delmar say to you?" she asked. She saw Philas stiffen a little. He shifted lower on the bench.
"Talbos is a nice city," he said.
"I told Leed he could take the money in your coat," she said. "He needs the practice."
Philas sat up with a shock, his eyes flying open.
"Why would you do a fool thing like that?" he hissed. His hands began to pat over the seams of his clothes. Ajalia shrugged.
"I like Leed," she said. "I think he will be very useful." Philas was eyeing her with deep dislike. "This way," Ajalia added, "he will get an idea of how to hide his own money." Ajalia stretched out her elbows, and sat down on the bench. Her body was sore, but she had swallowed the pain until it had become a relentless roar in the back of her mind. "I met a few men in the mountains," she said, pushing her feet out into the sunshine.
"I thought you were with Delmar," Philas said.
"Oh, no," Ajalia said. "Delmar came straight ahead with the horse."
"And you followed with the saddle," Philas said, giving her a sideways glance.
"Isn't it funny, how these arrangements turn out?" Ajalia asked. She watched Philas struggle with himself. She saw that he wanted to ask her what had happened with Delmar, but also that he didn't want to give away that he had known something was going to happen. Philas did not seem to realize that his thoughts were written all over his face.
"You are a horrible person," Ajalia told him. "A terrible, awful, deceitful person." A shy smile began to show on Philas's haggard face.
"Did you have a fight with him?" he asked, failing to hide the eagerness in his voice.
"I was kidnapped briefly," Ajalia said. Philas stared at her.
"I don't understand," he said.
"What did Delmar say to you?" she asked again.
"How could you have been kidnapped?" Philas demanded.
"It's a long story," she said.
"Share," he said.
"No," she said. "What did Delmar say?"
Philas looked at her with narrowed eyes; she saw that he was trying to see if she would give up asking if he ignored her question.
"I don't like the little boy," he said finally, and slumped back against the bench.
"His name is Leed," Ajalia said.
"He's very bossy," Philas complained.
"Are you finished with your drinking now?" Ajalia asked. Philas sighed deeply, and got up.
"Fine," he said. "Fine. What do you want to do first?"
"Did you go to the market?" she asked.
"Robust. Bustling. Reasonably well-priced," Philas intoned.
"Better cloth than in Slavithe?" Ajalia asked. Philas guffawed. "Do they sew?" she asked. She had come down a second road to the docks, and had not passed through the city proper on her way to meet Philas.
"There are seamstresses," Philas said. "There is a road full of tailors. There are people who sew doll's clothes."
"Good," Ajalia said. "You find a house we can take, and I'll collect Delmar."
"What do we need him for?" Philas asked sourly.
"He has the horse," Ajalia pointed out.
"We could buy another one," Philas grumbled.
"It isn't our horse," Ajalia reminded him.
"Then we'll give the new one to the horse trader," Philas complained.
"You're a mess," Ajalia observed.
"Well, is it my fault?" Philas demanded. "No!" he shouted, before Ajalia could tell him it was, indeed, his fault. "How was I to know Slavithe would have nothing but that foul black drink?" His voice dwindled at the end of this question into a pathetic croon. "I miss it," he confided to Ajalia, glancing at Leed, who was wandering back towards them. "I miss the black stuff. I haven't had it for a whole week, but after today—" Philas made a harsh crackling noise in his throat. "Can we go back tonight?" he asked in the Eastern tongue.
"Find a house," Ajalia said in Slavithe. "And make sure it has doors and windows."
Philas shot a look at her under lowered brows and scooped the saddle up into his arms. Ajalia told him she could carry her own saddle, but he waved her off with an angry sound like a knot of hornets, and stalked away.
She had slipped into the habit of speaking only in Slavithe since she had taken on the bevy of native servants; Leed had heard what she said to Philas. He asked her why Philas would need to ensure the presence of windows or doors in a house.
"Managing slaves try to save money sometimes," Ajalia told the boy. "I don't like living in empty sheds, or big warehouses."
"I like warehouses," Leed told her. "They are loud." He followed her away from the lapping water of the docks. "Philas won't try to save money," he added.
"Why?" Ajalia said.
"He dropped lots of money on getting drunk," Leed said wisely.
"He was not drunk," Ajalia told him. "He was not even slightly inebriated."
"He drank a lot," Leed said defensively.
"Philas can drink like a fish," Ajalia said. "Keep up." She turned into a road that ran straight into a narrow suburb, and began to watch for signs of horses.
"Are we going to live in Talbos now?" Leed asked.
"You aren't," Ajalia said. "Philas is, and the other slaves."
"Why?" Leed asked.
"Money," Ajalia said. The boy accepted this explanation without question. He trotted along behind her as she followed a pair of harnessed horses through the narrow streets until they came to a long, dirty row of stables.
Ajalia was glad she had brought the boy Leed; she found as she moved from stable to stable, asking for a visiting brown gelding, that the people of Talbos spoke quite a different variety of the Slavithe language. She could almost communicate with the people of the city, but some of them had thick dialects that she could not understand, and Leed, who, it turned out, knew a smattering of several forms of the language, proved invaluable.
She located the whereabouts of the brown gelding at nightfall, and trudged with Leed through the darkened streets. Talbos was narrower and darker than Slavithe; the buildings here were constructed of wood or brick, and the streets had less illumination at night than the city of Slavithe. Many of the roads were corroded with deep ruts of dried mud, and the variety of buildings was enormous. Whereas Slavithe was almost uniformly built of solid white stone, with buildings of two or three stories, and tenements that went, at most, up six narrow floors
, Talbos had bristling structures that bent and melted together at every turn. Here and there were freestanding buildings, or magnificent palaces, but the majority of buildings were ugly and joined together. Ajalia saw that the walls and roofs were sturdy; she wondered if the seaside city experienced many violent storms.
The last stableman Ajalia had spoken to had told her the gelding was up the mountain in lodgings that spun along below the king's palace. As she and Leed walked up the crest of the long dirt road that had been pointed out to them as the straightest way to the palace, Ajalia looked back over the city. The sea was visible some distance away; the two harbors made great swoops into the land.
Ajalia had found out what she could about this city before she had come; she had learned that a long stretch of arable land ran along the coast to the north. Where the black mountains ended, a curve of farms and villages clustered in a long crescent into the land before the desert began. The city of Talbos itself ran in a deep valley against the side of a large mountain; the side of the mountain against the city had a smooth slope, and many houses and fine residences had been dug into the black stone. The palace of the king of Talbos nestled near the top of the mountainside, where the gradual slope turned up into a cruel peak. The top of the mountain curved over the king's palace, and cast a sharp shadow over the palace and the mountainside.
Ajalia found the side street that led up the mountain slope towards the lodgings where she had been told the brown gelding was stabled. The road grew utterly dark in the night that fell swiftly after the sun had set. The echoes of their footsteps scraped against the sides of the buildings that hugged the mountain on either side.
Before they had come to the end of the street, a clop of horse hooves came through the darkness. The moon cast little light; Ajalia could not see the man who led the horse. She found a gleam of light dancing from a lamp far down the road that shimmered over the sides of the horse. The horse had no saddle.
"Delmar?" Ajalia asked.
"Jay?" Delmar replied. A hot flush crept up Ajalia's cheeks, and she was glad for the night that covered her face. She wanted to tell Delmar that no one called her "Jay", but the memory of Philas calling her that made her feel ashamed.
"I'm here, too," Leed piped up.
"Yes, thank you Leed," Ajalia said. She turned back down the mountain. Delmar moved to the other side of the horse so that he walked beside her. Ajalia scooped the boy up in her arms, and settled him on the bare back of the brown gelding. She almost emitted a pained grunt as she lifted, but she bit down on the insides of her cheeks, and was silent. The boy was heavy; a surge of angry pain throbbed through her ribs and down her back.
"Philas has the saddle with him," Ajalia said. The night was too dark to see Delmar's face, but she thought she could hear him nodding. Ajalia glanced back at where Leed sat astride the horse; she wanted to ask Delmar what he and Philas had said to each other, but she didn't want the boy to overhear. Delmar reached out in the night and gripped Ajalia's hand. She tangled her fingers around his. His palm was rough and warm.
They walked without speaking down the uneven road that spun down the mountain. When they drew abreast a pair of brilliant torches that hugged the walls of a nearby mansion, Ajalia glanced at Delmar's face. She wanted to ask him where he had gone in the mountains, and how he knew the bearded man in the shining armor. She wanted to know what the men would have done with her, if she had not talked them into leaving her alone. She wanted to know if Delmar still wanted her.
Her whole body felt bruised and sore. Instead of a blank numbness, her two forearms were pulsating with an agonizing and relentless wash of hot blood. She had avoided looking at her skin; if she was bruised, she thought the sight of reddened scars would make her faint again, and she was determined never to faint again for the rest of her life.
"You left me," she said lightly, as they wound down a curve of the road.
"I know," Delmar said.
"And you have secrets," she said softly. She saw Delmar look involuntarily back towards the boy. The light from torches and lamps was growing a little; the slope of the mountain, farther down from the king's residence, was crowded with buildings that spread outwards from the road. Many of these had lit up windows, and the yellow light spilled out dimly over the road.
"I'm asleep," Leed announced.
"Not asleep enough," Ajalia told him.
"You can talk," Leed said. "I won't listen."
The horse's hooves made a sharp clatter against the stones in the road. Ajalia wished Leed were somewhere far away.
"I could find Philas for you," the boy suggested.
"You're a pest," Delmar told Leed.
"I probably know most of your secrets," Leed added.
"I don't have any secrets," Delmar said.
"What are his secrets?" Ajalia asked.
"No," Delmar said.
"He's the dead falcon," Leed rattled, "and he travels to Talbos secretly to visit his grandparents."
Ajalia glanced at Delmar in the thin light; he had a sour look on his face.
"What is the dead falcon?" she asked. Leed looked at Delmar; when he didn't speak, the boy piped up again.
"The falcon is the ancient symbol of our magical leader. Long ago—"
"Stop," Delmar snapped. "I'll tell her."
"You won't tell her about your father," Leed rebutted. Delmar puffed up like an angry bird. Ajalia could see his shoulders bristling with aggravation.
"What?" Ajalia asked.
"Don't," Delmar said shortly to the boy.
"I'll just tell her later," Leed said sensibly. "And no one cares except for you."
"What does no one care about?" Ajalia asked.
"His father is a slave," Leed said.
Ajalia stopped walking. Delmar's hand slipped from her grasp. A freezing chill was spreading through her bones.
"I thought that was—" Ajalia said, her voice even.
"Forbidden," Delmar said. "It is."
They walked quietly for a long time. Ajalia thought back over what Delmar had said about his family.
"My grandparents don't live here," Delmar told Leed. "You got that part wrong."
"Where do they live?" Ajalia asked.
"They're dead," he said.
"Your grandfather isn't, and neither is your mother's father," Leed put it.
"They're dead to me," Delmar said harshly.
"What were you doing up there?" Ajalia asked, gesturing at the top of the mountain, where the king's palace lay.
"Delmar is the grandchild of the king of Talbos," Leed told her.
"You—" Delmar said. He stopped short. His face was contorted with rage. "I—" he said. His voice was strangled.
"Well, everyone knows," Leed told him. "Anyone could tell her that."
"You have interesting secrets," Ajalia told Delmar. "I don't have any good secrets like that."
"Getting out of the wetlands twice is exciting," Leed told her.
"You're nosy," she told the boy. He shrugged.
"Can I have more money for being interesting?" Leed asked. Ajalia handed him a coin.
"Why are you encouraging that infant?" Delmar asked. His voice was shaking with suppressed and incandescent fury. They had reached the lower slope of the mountain, and regular lights were hung along the edges of the road they were on. Ajalia thought that it was refreshing to be in a place that had honest dirt and rocks, black, and brown, and muddy, instead of endless straight streets of unrelenting white stone.
"I could have known you for ten years," Ajalia told Delmar, "and you never would have told me any of that."
"So what?" Delmar said. Ajalia thought she could hear him clenching his teeth as he spoke. "None of that matters."
"Has he always been this stupid?" Ajalia asked Leed. Leed nodded soberly.
"The elders despair over him regularly," Leed said chattily. "My uncle meets with them on the full moon, and they have been whining about how dull the young dead falcon is for at least twelve years."
> "You made that up," Delmar said viciously. "You aren't old enough to know that."
"I do too know," Leed said with dignity. "That is part of one of my uncle's favorite jokes, and he doesn't lie."
"Do you know a man with a black beard?" Ajalia asked Leed suddenly. "He wears an armor that shines in the moonlight."
"That's one of the elders," Leed said. "Everyone calls him Rosk."
"I like Rosk," Ajalia told Delmar. "He told me I was like a snake."
"You weren't supposed to meet Rosk," Delmar said huffily.
"You left me out in the middle of nowhere without a horse," Ajalia said. "That is not a plan."
"It was fine," Delmar said. "You were fine. Everything was fine."
"That's stupid," Leed told Delmar.
"No one asked you," Delmar snapped.
"Caum hopes that you and I work out," Ajalia told Delmar. "Although, at first, he wanted to kill me."
"None of those things really happened," Delmar said. His face was flushing heavily in the dim light. "You didn't even meet Caum, I bet."
"I want to find my knife," Ajalia told Delmar, "when we go back on the road to Slavithe." They had come to the entrance to the city proper, and Ajalia turned to Leed. "Find Philas," she said to the boy. "Help him down," she told Delmar, but Leed had dropped his leg over the front of the brown gelding's neck and slid to the ground. "Tell Philas to meet us outside the city," she told Leed, "on the road that goes out to Slavithe."
The boy darted into the darkness.
"That boy won't be able to find Philas," Delmar said. "He'll get lost, and we'll have to find him." Ajalia grabbed Delmar by the hand, and pulled him into a little street that went down a narrow space between two tall rows of buildings. The horse stepped along behind Delmar, his breath huffing loudly in the dark.
"The boy has had money of me twice today," she told Delmar. "He will not get lost."
"He's an awful child," Delmar said grumpily, "and he shouldn't have told you any of that about me."
"Come here," Ajalia said, and pushed Delmar up against a wall. He had found a new shirt somewhere, and Ajalia filled her hands with the fabric around Delmar's chest.
JEROME AND BAKROTH
