Dangerous Gifts

by Gaie Sebold

  Rikkinnet walked up to him and took his arm. “All right, lads?” I said to the gate-guards. “Now, come here.”

  They glanced at each other and did as I asked.

  I grabbed a collar in each hand and drew their heads close. “I should crack your fucking skulls together right now,” I said. “Maybe let in some daylight. What did you just do?” I pitched my voice loud enough for them all to hear.

  “Here, what are you...” The Gudain boy tried to pull away and I tightened my hand. He clawed at my grip, and failed to break it. The Ikinchli, who seemed to have at least half a brain, stood very still.

  The rest of the guard stirred and muttered.

  “I’ll tell you what you did,” I said. “You just let someone walk in through this gate, that you are supposed to be guarding, because you’ve seen him before. And last night you let a total stranger in. A stranger who happens to be an extremely powerful warlock.”

  “But he...”

  “One more word and I gut you. I do not care what he did, or what he said, or why the fuck you let him in. Now.” I tightened my grip. “I want you all to watch this,” I said, looking around at the rest of them. “I want you to watch this very closely.”

  Rikkinnet took Inshinnik by the shoulders and stood him in front of us. I tossed him the doll.

  He turned up his hands, bowed, and drew a short, vicious knife from his sleeve, and cut off one of the doll’s hands. He regarded his work, shrugged, and drew another knife, much longer, with a serrated edge that caught the light like shark’s teeth, from under his coat. With this, he sawed off a leg. He tossed the knife onto the grass, drew out of his trousers (carefully) a fat-bladed dagger. Then a well-used short sword. Finally, from his coat, a small hatchet.

  One weapon at a time, with a calm, almost studious expression on his face, he dismembered the doll. Stuffing drifted on the breeze. The two gate-guards watched, frozen. When the hatchet appeared, the Gudain drew a breath, which he seemed to have been holding all this time, and said, “Don’t.”

  Inshinnik glanced at me.

  “Why not?” I said. “It’s a doll. It can’t scream, or bleed, or choke on its tears while someone slices the life out of it.”

  “Just... fucking... stop,” he said.

  I let them go. The rest of the guard were watching, round-eyed, though Dentor still looked mostly sullen.

  “Do you understand?” I said. “That could be the child. That could be Chitherlee. You know there will be people after the Lady Enthemmerlee the Itnunnacklish. They won’t stop if any of her family get in the way, you know. Not even that little girl. I don’t know what being a guard has meant to you up to now, maybe it’s been a cushy post, nice easy work and three meals a day, but that is not what it means now. Now, it means you do not let anyone, you do not let an ant, through this gate without checking their identity and searching them for weapons.

  “I don’t care if it’s your own grandma, I don’t care if it’s the Lord High Poobah of all creation, you stop them, you politely ask them their business, and you check them. If you do not do this, even once, and even if nothing happens, even if it doesn’t mean everybody down to that little girl being found in their bed with their throat slit, even if nothing comes of it, I will personally skin you, by inches, and roll you in salt and leave you in the sun. Do not doubt that I can do this, and that I will do this. Do you understand me?” By this point I had the guard’s face an inch from mine and was damn near screaming.

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Say, ‘I understand, no one gets through this gate without being checked.’”

  “Yes...” – swallow – “ma’am. I understand. No one gets through this gate without being checked.”

  When we left, both guards were standing rigidly, hands on weapons, staring around as though assassins might leap out of the very grass. The rest of the guard dispersed, some muttering, others very quiet.

  Malleay was looking at me as though he’d never seen me before.

  “That was... thoroughly unpleasant.”

  “I know,” I said, perhaps a little more snappishly than I should have. The sight of that stuffing floating on the breeze had given me the shudders.

  “It worked, though,” Malleay said. “You know, the third Palatine emperor had a very similar training method. Only he used several of the guard’s own relatives.”

  “Really.”

  “Yes. Very effective, apparently.”

  “Oh, good.”

  CHAPTER

  FOURTEEN

  DARASK FAIN WAS waiting for me at the house. “An impressive demonstration.”

  “I didn’t realise you were there. Let’s see if it works. In the meantime, I’ve been thinking about my other task. There’s usually at least one place in a city on a major route that caters to the caravans. I think I should go find it. Talk to some people, find out if there’s been anything unexpected about what’s going through.”

  “I see,” he said. “Yes, that could be productive.When would you wish to go?”

  “As soon as I’ve spoken to Rikkinnet’s cousin. I can walk into the town from here. If you can, again, keep an eye on things.”

  “It really isn’t as though I have a choice,” he said.

  If he was waiting for me to apologise, he was out of luck. I’d apologised all I was going to. If something happened to Hargur without me there, he’d be lucky if I didn’t kill him.

  INSHINNIK KNEW HIS stuff, all right, and obviously didn’t keep all his brains under his tail, as he’d thought to bring drawings of the Palace. Bergast, Rikkinnet and I pored over them.

  Fancy as the Palace was, it was based around something built as much for defence as for show. The inner keep was a solid block of stone. Unfortunately, over years of comparative peace, it had sprawled and spread, narrow defensive windows had been widened to let in the light, and more doors had been cut. There were dozens of places an assassin could sneak in, not to mention all the people who wanted Enthemmerlee dead who would be there quite legitimately.

  “Where’s the ball going to be held?” I said.

  “Here.” He tapped one of the drawings. “The Room of the Cousins. Two entrances; one for important peoples to come in, one for servants. Main entrance leads to vestibule here. Here is three doors, two go to outside, one to stables.”

  “That’s all right, I’m only interested in these entrances right now. What does the servants’ door open onto?”

  “Corridor to kitchens, lots of doors off to pantries, store rooms, cellars.”

  “Windows?”

  “Three windows, high up, all done with painted flowers, very pretty, not so easy to get in though. Need a ladder and need to be skinny like me.”

  “Who will be there?”

  “The Patineshi, like the Lady Enthemmerlee. Those Advisors to the Crown, that is, those already Patinate, who have a relative who is Patineshi, next in line. The other Patinate, those without a young relative who is Patineshi, they do not need to be there. Only I think many of them will. Curiosity, yes?”

  “I assume the attendees will include Tovanay Defraish and his mob?”

  Inshinnik winced slightly, though he tried to hide it. “Tovanay Moth en Laslain Defraish, and his lady mother, yes.”

  “You know the Advisors to the Crown, Inshinnik. Any of them likely to want to harm the Itnunnacklish?”

  He shrugged. “Want, perhaps. But to do? I do not know.”

  “I don’t suppose there’s some massive unbreakable taboo against killing in the Palace... is there?”

  “No.”

  “I thought not.” I’d been grabbing for a passing straw, and knew it. The closer we got to Enthemmerlee’s first appearance, the twitchier I was getting. I might have got the household guard smartened up, but it didn’t mean they were going to be any better at their job.

  “So who else will be there? Guards, servants, and so forth?”

  “Palace guard and servants, and individual escorts of each of Patinate. Guard usually w
ait outside.”

  “Not this time, they don’t.”

  “Can bring them in, yes; will perhaps make a little gossip, but still. Then music, little bits of food on plates, drinks, all that.”

  I’d have to remind Enthemmerlee to use the jug.

  “Then there’s the ceremony in the Ancestor Caves, the...”

  “The Enkantishak,” Rikkinnet said. “And before you ask, every Ikinchli who can get there will be there. Thousands. All of the tribal leaders. Even if they do not believe, they will feel it politically necessary to be there.”

  “And then there’s the Patinarai ceremony. Who’ll be at that?”

  “Representatives from all of the Ten Families, the other Patineshi and their families. Also guild leaders, local dignitaries and such.”

  “Significant individuals?”

  “Enboryay, of course. The Patineshi is accompanied by the person who is handing over to them.”

  “Handing over?”

  “Yes.”

  “So when Enthemmerlee becomes Patinate, her father isn’t Patinate any longer? Even though he’s still alive?”

  “Yes. Can only be so many Advisors to the Crown at a time, you know?”

  I remembered the conversation at that damned awkward dinner. “So she gains his political position and control over the household and the estate. What are the chances that papa is not too enthusiastic about that?”

  “Patinate is a very old thing,” Inshinnik said. “Big taboo against causing harm to the heir, big law, big tradition.”

  “Especially now,” Rikkinnet said. “The old houses, they are dying out.”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “Some men find it hard enough to deal with their daughters growing up as it is, but she’s done rather more than that. He may no longer regard her either as his daughter or as the legitimate heir.”

  “He has no choice,” Rikkinnet said. “There is no other. There was a brother, but he died.”

  “They’re not a fortunate family, are they?” I said. Then I wished I hadn’t. An ugly echo seemed to hang around the words.

  I CHANGED MY shirt and grabbed my heavy coat for the trip into town. It was too warm for the weather, but I didn’t want to get soaked. Even the best-made armour starts to rub and gall when everything you’re wearing under it is wet through.

  The soft dripping silence as I walked towards the town made me twitchy, as though I were listening for something. This is why I prefer cities; there’s always a distraction. The country’s just too damn quiet.

  Eventually I was in among people again. I had pulled my hood up, to try and stay slightly drier, but though it shaded my face a little, my height and the coat screamed ‘foreigner,’ and I was getting a few looks.

  There were plenty of shops along the trade road, their windows large and fine, but almost empty. Now, there are shops that display only one or two items because their price fills up all the rest of the space, and there are shops that only display one or two items because that’s all the shopkeeper can get. Most of these looked like the latter sort.

  It didn’t take me long to find the place that catered to the caravans. It was one of the few buildings with fresh paint and recent repairs, with a wide gate for big loads and a vast stableyard to cope with a lot of beasts. There were only a few at the moment; little dun-coloured Perindi workbeasts. They’re like a stocky pony, but with a long floppy nose that hangs over their upper lip, legs like columns, wide flat feet, loud voices and the brains of a flea. They sat and looked at me, chewing.

  Inside, the place felt welcoming: a cavernous room, with bunches of drying herbs and fat hard sausage hanging from the ceiling. The ceiling itself was pleasingly high after the louring Gudain buildings; I supposed they had to cater to taller races in a place like this. I was surprised to see some Gudain servers as well as Ikinchli. The people they were serving were a mix: Monishish with yellow, creased skins like old leather water-bottles, hanging in warty folds, and long snakelike necks which bent as they talked, gesturing with their long-fingered hands. A Thrail, and a couple of stocky, green-skinned, tusky types who looked like Gornack, the woman I’d seen in the fight Filchis and his crew had started. Several humans (we get everywhere).

  For a second I felt so utterly, wrenchingly homesick for Scalentine I almost burst into tears. Instead, I went to the bar, and eyed their stock, which was wide and various, another advantage of being on the caravan route. They even had some half-decent golden. I ordered, with some regret, a glass of fokee juice.

  One of the humans came up to the bar while I was waiting, a hard-muscled type with short, greying hair and a look of ex-soldier about him. The one he’d been sitting with was, by contrast, a skinny drink of water who sat staring mournfully into his beer.

  Grey-hair nodded at me. I nodded back. “Hey. What’s the food like in this place?”

  “Not so bad,” he said, “but I’d stay away from the Gudain dishes if you want to be able to taste anything else for a week. Oh, and don’t bother asking for bread, or dumplings. They don’t do ’em.”

  “Grain doesn’t seem to be a big thing here,” I said. Something about that struck me as odd, but I put it aside.

  “No.”

  “Good travelling?” I said.

  “Fair. Apart from the fever, been quiet as a virgin’s bedroom, the whole trip.”

  “Fever?”

  “Me and my mate got sick, they dumped us off. We were going to hang around until they came back, only...” He gave a glance around. “You been here a while?”

  “Few days.”

  “I think we might wait somewhere else,” he said. “It’s got that bad times smell, you know?”

  “I do. All too well.”

  “You with one of the caravans?” he said.

  “No, I’m working local, but the job finishes in a couple of days, I thought I’d scout round for some guard work.So what was your cargo?” I said.

  “Why’d you want to know?”

  “Just curious.”

  “Well, they’re two days ahead of us now, so I don’t suppose it matters,” he said, eyeing me sidelong. “Besides, if you were planning on robbing it, you’d need help. Never seen so many damn guards on one caravan, we were jostling each other out of the road. You stick that many guards on a load you’re pretty much yelling that it’s worth a touch, am I right?”

  “Point,” I said.

  “And Tesserane drivers. I mean.”

  Tesserane. That was it. Our silk, I’d bet money on it. Of course, I already had, though not willingly. “Might as well light a beacon.”

  “Well, they’ll be coming into port in Scalentine in three days, if someone doesn’t knock ’em over.” He grinned, and I did my best to grin back. I just hoped he was right. We must have been damn close to passing the load on our way into Incandress. I thought of the empty landscape we’d travelled, and peopled it with bandits behind every bush; I thought of the sea, and imagined storms, and wrecks, and the worth of the Lantern and everything in it sinking to the ocean floor, of sharks trailing scarves of Tesserane from their fins as they swam heedlessly away.

  Well, there wasn’t a damn thing I could do about it now. For all I knew, the stuff was already in Scalentine.

  Where warehouse fires weren’t exactly unknown, either...

  Stop it, Babylon.

  I bid my new friend farewell and headed out, but realised as I left that I wasn’t going to make it back up the hill without a stop. The privies were around back, and – perhaps in tribute to Gudain modesty – were actual wooden cubicles, with latches, instead of a bench and a row of buckets. The latch on the one I chose was so new the wood still bled sap, and stiff as an old woman’s knees. I spent some time ramming it into place before I could get down to business.

  I was lacing up when I heard the next stall open and close. “They’re going to think we’ve come in here for a poke,” muttered someone who sounded a lot like my friend from the bar.

  “Why would you care?” said a second voi
ce.

  “And it stinks.”

  “Shut up complaining. That woman. You think she was law?”

  “So she sounded like Scalentine. Doesn’t mean anything.”

  By this time I had my ear pressed so hard against the adjoining partition I was getting splinters.

  “I don’t like it. What’d you have to go and tell her about the cargo for?”

  “I was checking her out, donkey-brain. She was looking for work, like she said. Look, even if she was law, what’s she going to do? It’s all sorted. Into the warehouse, out of the warehouse, neat as you like. It’s all planned.”

  “And we’ll get our cut.”

  “You bet your arse, or someone else’ll get cut.”

  I’d heard enough. I hit the latch with the heel of my hand.

  It squeaked, but wouldn’t move.

  Shit.

  I wrestled with the bloody thing, but they’d heard the movement; there was the sound of running feet, and by the time I got out, they were long gone.

  There was no sign of them in the bar, of course.

  I WAS DUE back on duty and couldn’t even find Fain before I had to stand guard through another excruciating formal dinner.

  I had to fight to concentrate. What I’d overheard had been enough to tell me that somebody had plans for that silk when it hit the warehouse, and I didn’t think they involved legitimate trade.

  What the hells was I going to do? Even if I told Fain, he couldn’t do anything from here, not in the time. And he’d want to know why I was interested, which would give him information I wasn’t comfortable with him having.

  I watched the servants come and go. The main dish this time was some kind of yellow vegetable so powerfully spiced that my eyes watered, surrounded with a flotilla of tiny dishes of this, that and t’other; colours of cinnabar and jade, sunsets and seascapes. I wondered if the spices did that, or whether they just liked their food exotically coloured.

  I leaned close to Enthemmerlee’s ear. “Jug?” I whispered.

  She nodded, and gave a small sigh, as she spooned a fragment of the first dish into the jug as surreptitiously as she could.