The Face of Chaos tw-5

by Robert Lynn Asprin

  'You take it. You take it. And where did they go, then? Where's your left-hand man? Where's Stilcho? Where's our informer?'

  'I -' The Stepson stared off somewhere vague, his face contracted as if at something that just escaped his wits.

  'Why didn't you do something?'

  'I don't know,' the Stepson said in the faintest, most puzzled of voices. 'I don't know.'

  Dolon stared at the man and felt the flesh crawling on his nape. 'We're being used,' he said. 'Something's out of joint. Wake up, man. Hear me? Get yourself a dozen men and get out there on the streets. Now. I want a watch on that bridge not a guard, a watch. I want that woman found. I want Mor-am watched. Finesse, hear me? It's not a random thing we're dealing with. / want Stilcho back. I don't care what it takes'

  The Stepson left in all due haste. Dolon leaned head on hands, staring at the map that showed the Maze, the streets leading to the bridge. It was not the only thing on his desk. Death squads. A murder uptown. Factions were armed. The beggars were on the streets. And somehow every contact had dried up, frozen solid.

  He saw things slipping. He called in others, gave them orders, sent them to apply force where it might loosen tongues.

  'Make examples,' he said.

  The streets gave way to one naked rim along the White Foal shore, an openness that faced the rare lights of Downwind, across the White Foal's rain-swollen flood. The black water had risen far up on the pilings of the bridge and gnawed away at the rock-faced banks, trying at this winding to break its confinement and take the buildings down, this ordinarily sluggish stream. Tonight it was another, noisier river, a shape-changer, full of violence; and Mradhon Vis moved carefully along its edge, in this soundless darkness of deafening sound, in the lead because of the three of them, he was most reckless and perhaps the most afraid.

  So they came up in the place he had aimed for, in the underpinnings of the bridge on the Mazeward side; in this deepest dark. But a star glimmered here like swampfire, and above it was a pale, hooded face.

  He felt one of his two companions set a warning hand on his arm. He kept walking all the same, watching his footing on this treacherous ground. He could look away from that face, or look back again, and a strange peace came on him, facing this creature who was the centre of all his fears. No more running. No more evasion. There was a certain security in loss. He stopped, took an easy stance, there above the flood.

  'What's the job?' he asked, as if there had never been an interlude. The light brightened fitfully, in the witch's outheld hand.

  'Mor-am,' she said. A shadow moved from among the pilings to stand by her. Light fell on a ruined, still-familiar face.

  '0 gods,' Mradhon heard beside him, Moria lunged and he caught her arm. Hers was hard and tense; she twisted like a cat, but he held on.

  'Moria,' her twin said, no longer twin, 'for Ils' sake listen -'

  She stopped fighting then. Perhaps it was the face, which was vastly, horribly changed. Perhaps it was Haught, who moved in the way of her knifehand, making himself the barrier, too careless of his life. Haught was a madman. And he could win what no one else could. Moria stood still, still heaving for breath, while Mor-am stood still at Ischade's side.

  'See what love is worth,' Ischade said, smiling without love at all. 'And loyalty, of course.' She walked a pace nearer, on the slanted stones. 'Mor-am's loyalty, now - it's to himself, his own interests; he knows.'

  'Don't,' Mor-am said, with more earnestness than ever Mradhon had heard from the hardnosed, streetwise seller of his friends; for a moment the face seemed twisted, the body diminished, then straightened again - a trick of the light, perhaps, but in the same moment Moria's arm went limp and listless in his hand.

  'You'd live well,' Ischade said in her quiet voice, an intimate tone which yet rose above the river-sound. 'I reward - loyalty.'

  'With whatT Mradhon asked.

  She favoured Mradhon with a long, slow stare, ophidian and, at this moment, amused.

  'Gold. Fine wines. Your life and comfort. Follow me - across the bridge. I need four brave souls.'

  'What for? To do what for you?'

  'Why, to save a life,' she said, 'maybe. The bumed house. I'm sure you know it. Meet me there.'

  The light went, the shadow rippled, and in the half-dark between the pilings and the flagstone bank, one shadow deserted them. The second started then to follow. 'TTie patrols -' he said to the dark, but she was gone then. Mor-am stopped, abandoned, his voice swallowed by the river-sound. He turned hastily, facing them.

  'Moria -1 had a reason.'

  'Where have you been?' The knife was still in Moria's hand. Mradhon remembered and took her by the sleeve.

  'Don't,' Mradhon said, not for love of Mor-am, the gods knew; rather, a deep unease, in which he wished to disturb nothing, do nothing.

  'What's this about?' Moria asked. 'Answer me, Mor-am.'

  'Stepsons - They - they hired her. They sent - Moria, for Ils' sake, they had me locked up, they used me to bargain with - with her.'

  'What are you worth?' Moria asked.

  'She works for Jubal.'

  That hung there on the air, dying of unbelief.

  'She does,' Mor-am said.

  'And you work for her.'

  'I have to.' Mor-am turned, amorphous in his cloak, began to vanish among the pilings.

  'Mor-am -' Moria started forward, brought up short in Mrad-hon'sgrip.

  'Let him go,' Mradhon said, and in his mind was a faint far dream of doing something rash, breaking with sanity and heading for somewhere safe. To the Stepsons, might be. But that was, lately, no way to a long life.

  Haught was on his way - why, he had no idea, whether it was despair or ensorcelment. 'Wait,' he called to Haught, losing control of things, but he had lost that when he had come out here, blind-sotted as Moria at her worst. He let her draw him up the stone facing, among the pilings, chasing after Haught at the first, but then joining him in the open, where anyone might spy them.

  There was the empty guard station, the pole standing vacant.

  'They got him down,' Haught said.

  'Someone did,' Mradhon muttered, looking about. He felt naked, exposed to view. The rain spattered away at the board surface of the bridge, a shadowed span leading through the dark to Downwind, to Ischade. A distant, solitary figure flitted like illusion at its other end, lost itself into Downwind, among its shuttered buildings. Here they stood, neither one place nor the other, neither in the Maze of Sanctuary nor in the Downwind, belonging now to no one.

  And there was no hiding now.

  Haught started across the bridge. Mradhon followed, with Moria beside him, and all he could think of now was how long it took to get across, to get out of this nakedness. Someone was coming their way, a shambling, raggedy figure. He clutched his cloak about him, gripped his sword as this beggar passed; he dared not look when the apparition had gone by, but Moria swung on his arm, feigning drunkenness like some doxy.

  ''Sjust a beggar,' she said in full voice, hanging on him, terrifying him with the noise. Haught spun half-about, turned again, and kept walking like some honest man with disreputable followers - but no honest man crossed the bridge.

  'Beggar,' Moria whined, leaning on Mradhon's arm. He jerked at her and cursed, knowing this mentality, this bloody-minded humour that he had had beside him in the field, soldiers who got this affliction. Heroes all. Dead ones. Soon. 'Straighten up,' he said, knowing her, knowing her brother, knowing that this was a game both played. He twisted at her arm. 'You see your brother? You see what games won him?'

  She grew quiet then. Subdued. She walked beside him at Haught's back, past the tall end-pilings that themselves bore nail-holes from the time that hawkmasks, not Stepsons, were the prey.

  To the right, a huddle of blackened timbers, of tumbled brick, was the burned shell of a house. Haught went that way, entering the shadow of Downwind, and they came after, out of choices now.

  Erato slipped back into shadow, his pulse beating do
uble-time, for a shadow had passed that disturbed him. He felt a presence at his shoulder, where it belonged, but he trusted nothing now. He scanned the figure at near range, his heart still thumping away until he had (pretending calm) resolved his left-hand man still beside him, and not some further threat, some shape-changer, night walker. He had no taste for this witch-stalking. 'They're across,' the partner said.

  'They're across. We're not the only ones moving. Get back along the bank. Get the squad in place. Get a message back to base.' Erato moved back along the alley, headed towards the river house.

  It smelled of double-cross, the whole business. His partner jogged off, holding his cloak tight to him, muffling his armour. They kept well away from the grounds, wary of traps. This was the place to watch. Here. He was sure of that. He settled in then, watching the storm clouds lose themselves on the seaward horizon in the dark, down that split that divided Downwind from Sanctuary, poor from rich, that division no bridge could span. He had been smug once, had Erato, well-paid, well-armed as he was, convinced of his own skill, of the reputation that would keep challenges off his neck. And somewhere in Downwind that bluff was called, and they dared not go in, dared not pass the streets except by day had effectively lost nighttime access to their own base beyond the Downwind, the slaver's old estate, and relied more and more on the city command. And their enemies knew it.

  It would be a long, cold wait. It eroded morale, that view of the bridge, the river, the Downwind. The realization came to him that he was sitting now in the same kind of position the bridge guard had been in, alone out here. Sounds came and went in the streets, rustled in the thin line of brush that rimmed the river-shore. Wild fears dawned on him, to wonder whether the others were there, whether those sounds masked murder, creepings through cover, throats cut, or worse, his comrades snatched away as Stilcho had gone. He wanted to call out, to ask the others were they safe; but that was craziness. He heard the rustling again near himself.

  Some vermin creeping about; they grew rats large here on riverside. So he told himself. Something feeding on the garbage that swept down the sewers, the gutters, some choice tidbit brought down from the dwellings of the rich, to tempt the rats and snakes. And the fear grew and grew, so that he eased his sword from its sheath and crouched there with his back pressed to the stones and his eyes constantly scanning the dark that he had view of.

  There was nothing anywhere but the splash of rain, the steady drip off eaves of buildings that still had eaves. Beside them, the shell, the timbers, the loose piles of brick.

  One moved with a dull chink. Mradhon whirled about, saw a figure close against the wall, at the corner.

  'Come,' Ischade said.

  'Where's my brother?' Moria asked.

  But the witch was gone around the corner.

  Mradhon cursed beneath his breath, adding things as he went, as Haught did, as Moria stayed with them. There was no way of retreat, now, against the flow of things. The beggar on the bridge - someone was watching. The body was gone. There were likely Stepsons on the loose. He came round the corner, down the alley where once he had waited in ambush, where the three of them had, before the Stepsons had chosen to make a bonfire of the place, to use the clenched fist.

  He knew this place. Knew it because he had lived here. They had. He knew the law here, how it worked apart from Kadakithis's law, from Molin Torchholder's, from any governance of Ranke. Law this side flowed from a place called Becho's. It flourished on the trade of vice, on things that went dear Across the Bridge, that most men never thought to sell, or never planned to. He remembered the smell of it, the reek that clung to clothes; the smell of Mama Becho's brew.

  Haught stopped, for the witch had, waiting in their way, a tall shadow-shape; and a second had joined her.

  'Now you earn your pay,' Ischade said, when they had come close. The dark surrounded them, buildings leaned close overhead where listeners could have heard, perhaps did hear, but Ischade seemed not to care. 'I have a matter to discuss. A man who certain folk want back, in whatever case. Mor-am knows. The second Stepson. Stilcho is his name.'

  'Moruth,' Mradhon said.

  'Oh, yes, Moruth has him. I do think this is the case. But Moruth will be reasonable, with me.'

  'Wait,' Mradhon said, for she had moved to drift away again. This time she did wait, looked at him, faceless in the dark; and this time the question died stillborn. Why?

  'Is there something?' she asked.

  'What are we supposed to do - that you can't?'

  'Why, to have mercy,' Ischade said. 'This man wants rescuing. That's your business.'

  And she was off again, a shadow along the way.

  'Becho's,' Mor-am said, all hoarse, keeping a safe distance from them. 'Follow me.'

  But they knew the streets, every route that led to that place, that centre of this shell.

  'No luck,' the man said, in the commander's doorway. 'Everything's gone underground. This time of night -'

  There was disturbance beyond; the outer doorway opened, creating a draught that blew papers out of order. Dolon slammed his hand on to them to stop the fall. 'Get someone,' he said. 'I don't care -'

  One of his aides appeared behind the man, signalling with a nod of his head. 'What?' Dolon said.

  'Erato sends word,' the aide said, 'the woman's gone to the Downwind. Taken the informer with her.'

  Dolon stood up. 'Who says? Get him in here.'

  'By your leave,' the other said, trying graceful exit.

  'You stay.' Dolon walked round the desk and met the man that came in. Erato's partner. 'Where's Erato now?'

  'Set up to watch the shore. Figuring she'll come home - sooner or later, whatever she comes up with.'

  Dolon drew a breath, the first easy one in hours. Something worked. Someone was where he ought to be, taking advantage of the situation. 'All right,' he said. 'You get back there right now -Tassi.'

  'Sir,' the other said.

  'Get ten more men. I want them down there on that rivershore. I want every access under watch, from both directions. I want no surprises out of this. You get down there. You get those streets blocked. When the witch shows up, I want an account from her. I want names, places, bodies - I don't care how you get them. If she cooperates, fine. If not - stop her. Dead. Understood?'

  There was hesitance.

  'Sir,' Erato's partner said.

  'Understood?'

  'Yes, sir.'

  'They say fire works on her sort. You get what you can.'

  'She's-'

  Heat rose to his face. Breath grew short.'- gone undependable. If she ever was. You cure it. Hear? You get what you can, then you settle her. I want Stilcho quiet, you understand: back here safe, number one; but if he's become expendable, expend him. You know the rule. Now move!'

  There was flight from the doorway, a clatter in the outer room, one injudicious unhappy oath. Dolon stood gathering his breath. Critias's list of reliables was itself the problem; unstable informants; men on double payrolls. A witch, for the gods' sake, an ex-slaver, a judge on the take.

  There was, he began to reckon, a need to purify that list. His discretion, Critias had said. Critias had delayed too long in passing power, that was what it was. Uncertainty set in. The opportunists wanted convincing again.

  Then the rest would fall in line.

  It was near Becho's. Mradhon Vis knew that much, and it set off nerves, this approach. Tygoth would be in his alley, patrolling up and down, banging at the wall with his stick to let all Downwind know that Mama's property was secure. The surviving crowd of drunks would have collapsed in the streets. Gods knew who might have inherited that room in the alley now. He did not want to know. He wanted out of this place, with all his soul he wanted out of it, and he was where he had never looked to be again, following Mor-am through the labyrinth of alleys, with Haught at his back - and Moria between them. He glanced back from time to time, when there was too much silence; but they still followed.

  And now Mor-am stopped. Waite
d, signalled silence, outside a street that had gotten overbuilt with lean-tos.

  Beggar-kingdom, this. Mradhon grabbed a handful ofMor-am's cloak, pulled, meaning retreat.

  No, Mor-am insisted. He pointed just ahead, where suddenly a figure darker than the night was treading amid the ragged, lumpish shelters. Ischade paused and beckoned to them.

  Mor-am followed, and Mradhon did, taking it on himself whatever the others did, wishing now they would keep their feckless help out of this. He gripped his sword, meaning to kill a few if it came to that, but Ischade kept her pace slow, down that street of furtive eyes, of watchers within collections of board, canvas, anything that might fend away rain and wind. The stench rose up about them, of human waste, of something dead and rotting. He heard steps at his back and dared not turn his head, praying to Ilsigi gods that he knew who it was. His eyes were all for Mor-am, for the wand-slender darkness of Ischade, who walked before them through this aisle of misery.

  And none offered to touch, none offered violence. A building made this lane a cul de sac, a dilapidated, boarded-up building, but light showed from the cracks about the door.

  Sound got out. Mor-am wavered at that whimpering, that human, wretched sound. At voices. At laughter. He stopped altogether, and Mradhon shoved him, put him into motion, not because he wanted to go, but because it was not a good moment to stop, not here, not now, without any path of retreat. There was a moment in battles, the downhill moment past which there was no way to stop, and they had reached it now. Things seemed to slow, just as they began to move in earnest, when the door flew open outward with no one touching it at all, when light flung out into the dark and there were dark figures leaping to their feet inside that building, but none darker than Ischade's, who occupied that doorway.

  And silence then, after momentary outcry. Dire silence, as if everyone inside had stopped, just stopped. Mor-am stood stock still. But Mradhon stepped up the single step to stand behind Ischade.