by Jo Clayton
Danny Blue moved back to the central bank of instruments. An impulse to try taking control of the computer stirred in him-that was Daniel Akamarino fighting to surface, the Akamarino phasma retreating to memories of a reality so different that his reactions had no connection to what Danny Blue had to cope with; even with all he’d seen since he’d been pulled into this reality, down deep Daniel then and his phasma now simply didn’t believe in magic and wouldn’t, perhaps couldn’t, incorporate it into his worldview. Danny clamped down hard on his half-sire’s urge, knowing it for the stupidity it was. He moved away to stand at the edge of the silver, staring down at BinYAHtii.
The Ahzurdan phasma stirred uneasily; he was uncomfortable this close to the Hexa; his anxiety sent cold chills down Danny Blue’s spine. Daniel Akamarino was trying to be heard, saying: Pattern a drain, set it on delay and let’s get out of here. If you won’t try breaking the Kephalos free of the god, at least destroy it. I know we tried that before. I know the god caught us at it and put us down. It’s different now. That thing is dormant. Can’t you feel it?
Like eels in a sack, Danny’s half-sires were fighting against his control, flexing and writhing, punching at him; he was getting more and more impatient with this nonsense, it was distracting him when he needed all his intellect focused on the problem before him. The Chained God was dying and if he couldn’t get out of here, he was going to die with h/it.
Danny Blue frowned at the talisman; he could feel his half-sire Ahzurdan coveting the stone despite the phasma’s fear of the Hexa. If Danny could get at it somehow, he knew from a sweep of Ahzurdan’s memories that he could use its power to protect them all from the god. From that sweep he learned also that the Hexa he saw was a dangerous variation on the more usual pentagram. Ahzurdan had never used one and knew very little about them, but he was afraid of this one; he didn’t know why the amp;id had laid it there, he didn’t want anything to do with it. He fought to keep Danny from touching it.
BinYAHtii lay dull and red, sucking such light as there was into its rough heart. It was close enough to be tempting, two long strides would take him to the center of the pattern. Rubbing at his chin, Danny looked about, hunting, for a pole or something he could use to rake the talisman from the silver.
His half-sires began wrestling with him and each other again, leaving his brain a muck of half-thoughts, half-desires, half-terrors.
Impatient and angry, he swore aloud, backed off a few steps, then took a running leap into the center of the Hexa. With a smooth continuation of the, motion, he bent and grabbed for the chain, planning to straighten and leap again as soon as he had it. -
His hand passed over a surface like glass. He couldn’t touch the talisman. He thought suddenly, No dust, there’s no dust on…
5
– He dropped a few inches, stumbled and fell to his hands and knees on black sand.
He got to his feet, brushed sand off his knees and hands. To his left, diminishing black hills curved around a placid bay. The sun was low enough in the west to glare into his eyes and dazzle off wrinkle-waves. He knew this place. “Haven Bay,” he said aloud.
There was a ship anchored out near the narrow mouth of the bay, a sleek black hull with a green and black port flag snapping in the wind. I know that ship, he told himself. He scowled at it, disconcerted. Unless she has a twin, that’s the Skia Hetaira. What’s going on here..?
He shook his head and starting trudging along the beach, heading for Haven Village, out of sight around a bulge in the foothills.
6
The corral was empty. The erratic wind lifted then dropped clouds of ancient dry manure and sent the gate creaking on its cracking leather hinges. The stable doors gaped wide; several of the windows were cracked or broken; all of them were smeared with gray dust and veiled with dusty cobwebs. The cottage beyond had lost part of its thatching. Like the stable, its door was open and a litter of leaves, twigs and dirt had been blown through the gap into the kitchen beyond.
Danny Blue walked along the rutted street, frowning and nervous. The village was deserted; it looked like it’d been empty for years. He had a chilly feeling he knew what had happened to the people living here; that freaking Ratbait had fed them to the Stone. BinYAHtii. Haven was as dead as the god was going to be. Danny smiled at the thought, then shivered, thinking about the hook the god had set in him; he was afraid his fate was linked somehow with that abomination.
He came round a curve and saw a pale skim of yellow lantern light laid out across the ruts; it came through the open door of a tavern. He hesitated, glanced toward the bay. He couldn’t see it now, but nodded anyway. Someone off the ship. He stepped through the door.
Lio Laux was perched on a stool at the bar, a lantern beside him, the only light in that stale dessicated room. There was an open bottle and a tankard at his side. He was sitting with his elbows on the bar, his bare feet hanging loose beside the legs of the stool. He wasn’t drunk, but elevated enough to watch the mirror with philosophic melancholy as Danny Blue walked toward him.
Danny dusted off another stool, wiped his hand on his pants and sat down. “No one about.”
There was a flicker as Laux moved his head slightly; his silver and moss agate ear dangle shivered in the lantern light. The light touched his ancient dark eyes, snuffed out as horny eyelids closed to slits. “No.” After a moment, he added. “You live round here?”
“Just passing through. There another of those tankards left?”
“Ahind the bar.”
“Ah.” Danny slid off the stool, sauntered around the end of the bar and squatted so he could inspect the cluttered, dusty shelves. It looked very much like the proprietor stepped out for a breath of air and never came back. He found a tankard; it was thick with dust so he hunted some more until he discovered some clean rags in a tilt-out bin.
When he was back on his stool, he filled the tankard from Laux’s bottle, took an exploratory sip, then a larger gulp. “That your ship?”
Danny saw ivory glints as the old man’s eyes darted toward him and away; Laux was puzzled by a vague sense that the two of them had met before, but he couldn’t pin down time or place. He had plenty of reason to remember Ahzurdan and Daniel Akamarino and Danny had something of each in his face and form. The resemblance to either wasn’t all that strong, but it was there, a family likeness as it were.
“Yah. Looking for passage?”
“Might be, say we can do a deal.”
“What you got to offer?”
“I could whistle a wind should you be wanting one. And I can do another thing or two if the need arises.”
“Wizard, mage?”
“Nothing so grand. A bit of Talent, that’s all.”
“You set wards?”
“Yah.”
“How far you want to go?”
“Next port bigger’n this.”
“‘S a deal. You ward if we need it, give us a wind if we draw a calm, take a hand if we run into sharks round the Ottvenutt shoals. And I’ll carry you on crew as far as Dirge Arsuid, that’s ten days west of here. It’s a chancy port, but you won’t have to sit around long, there’s a lot of trade in and out this time o year, take you just about anywhere you want.”
“Good enough.”
Laux drained his tankard, his ear dangle clattering musically as he tilted his head. He squinted at the bottle; there was half an inch of wine left in it, wine thick with wax and wing. “Reach me another of those bottles… ah… what do we call you, man?”
“Lazul, Laz for short.”
“And while you’re ahind the bar, hunt out the biggest of those rags, Laz. I wave that out the end of the pier, my second’ll come fetch us.”
Danny took one of the dusty bottles lined up below the mirror, set it on the bar. “Need something to open that?
“Got something.” Laux drew the cork, sniffed at the neck, poured a dollop into his tankard and tasted it. He grunted with satisfaction and filled the tankard. “Found that rag?”
Danny shook out a gray-white rectangle that might once have been a flour sack. “This do?”
“Should. Toss it over. You been here before?”
“First time.”
Laux sucked at his teeth, tilted his tankard and contemplated the dark red wine. “Haven’t been here for some years now,” he murmured, talking more to himself than to Danny Blue. “It was quiet, the glory days were gone, long gone… time was there was near a thousand here, a dozen taverns, a casino, the place wide open day and night… yah, it was quiet when I was here last, but not so quiet as this. Two/three hundred people hereabouts, more down along the inlet. Don’t know about them, maybe they’re still around. You see anyone?”
“No.”
“Mmh. Funny. The notion come to me one night, I ought to go see Haven again. Don’t know why. Just something I ought to do. Wish I hadn’t.”
“Know what you mean.” Danny put his elbows on the bar beside the rag, scowled into the tankard Laux shoved across to him. The wine was past its peak, but it wasn’t that put the sour taste in his mouth. It didn’t take a lot of thinking to see why Laux and his ship were here right now. Jerking my string, he thought. Whatever it takes, I swear I’m pulling that hook out. He gulped at the wine, wiped his hand across his mouth. “Any reason you’re hanging about? Tides or something?”
“Ah the vastness of your ignorance, young Laz.” Old
Laux grinned at him, shook his head. He sobered, looked depressed. “Crew took a look round an hour ago. Got spooked and left. I told them to fetch me come sundown, I wanted to poke about some more. Haaankh.” Having cleared his throat, Laux spat the result into the dust on the floor. “Being you’re over there, shove a couple bottles in the pockets of that thing you’re wearing and push another couple across to me. I saw a vest like that once, some years back. Never seen another.”
“Gotcha. Never saw another myself. Could be it’s the same one. I picked it up in Kukurul Market a little over a year ago.”
“Ah.” Lio Laux collected his bottles, slid off his stool and ambled toward the door. Over his shoulder he said, “Bring the lantern, Laz.”
Danny grinned. Getting his money’s worth, old thief. Well, I’m riding for free. So what’s a dime’s worth of flunkying.
7
Danny Blue, Laz to his companions, emerged into the abrasive cold, shivered as he wandered over to stand beside Lio Laux who was leaning on the port rail, watching the play of light across the walls and towers of the city on the horizon. The pointed roofs of Dirge Arsuid glittered blackly in the dawnlight; it rose in white and crimson and raven black over the dark drooda trees and the broad reedfields of the mouth-marshes of the Peroraglassi.
Danny/Laz folded his arms across his chest. “What’s the problem? Why aren’t we moving?” The Skia Hetaira was hove-to a half mile out to sea, riding the heave of the incoming tide, lines and spars humming, clattering in the brisk wind.
“No problem, Laz. We just waiting till it’s full light before we go closer.”
Danny inspected the water and what he could see of the city. “No rocks.”
“Nah. Arsuid’s built on mud.”
“How come it don’t sink?”
“It’s Arfon’s toy. You didn’t know that?”
“Never been out this way. Arfon?” In the back of his head, the shade of Ahzurdan sneered. *You know,* the phasma said in a thin scratchy mindvoice, *if you condescend to remember. Fool. All right, go ahead, show your ignorance. Who cares if he despises you for it.* Danny Blue ignored his fratchetty half-sire and waited for Laux to answer him.
“River god. Dwolluparfon, which is too much of a mouthful so Arsuiders just say Arfon. Never, huh?”
“No. I come from way out where the sun pops up. I’m a rambling man, Laux; can’t stand sitting around watching the same scenery all the time. If it’s not silt or rocks, why are we sitting out here? We waiting for high tide?”
“Nah. Lemme tell you something, Laz. Darktime in Arsuid is a thing a smart man keeps shut of. Unless he’s an Arsuider and even then,, hmm. We’re not going to move for another couple hours, so I might as well spend it telling the tale of Dirge Arsuid.” The plaques of his ear dangle clattered softly as he tilted his head to look up at Danny/Laz; the silver shimmered, the moss agate insets seemed to alter as if spiders crawled about under glass; there was a quizzical amusement in his old dark eyes. “You may have noticed I like to talk.” He twisted his head around further, beckoned to the ship’s boy who happened to be passing. “Pweez, tell Kupish to burn some duff for us, eh?” To Danny, he said, “You turning blue. Han’t you got a coat or something? It’s getting on for winter, jink. “
“I didn’t expect it to get this cold this south.”
“Winter’s winter. Let’s go below. I’ll spin you the tale over hot grog an’ one o Kupish’s fancier fries. Taksoh caught a gravid kuvur last night, we’ll have roe an’ cheese to start.”
8
“In the time before time when the Wounded Moon was whole…” Lio Laux sucked up a mouthful of thick hot grog, let it trickle down his throat. “And the gods were sorting themselves out and sharing up the world, Dwalluparfon found he’d got hisself a river, a swamp and a handful of vipers. The story goes like this; he took a while to root round and get to know his mud, then he stuck his head up and looked round at his neighbors. And lo, they had lots of things he didn’t. They had cities and farms, most of all they had people. He had fish and snakes. He didn’t like that no way, wahn’t fair. So he caught him a mess o snakes and made hisself some people.” Laux’s eyes slid round to Danny, the wrinkles round them crinkling with his sly-fox grin. “Not a tale Arsuider mams tell their lovin’ infants. Lessee. He
‘16 to Clayton
, watched the snake people slither round in the mud and that was amusing for a while. But it was kind of drab, so he decided they were going to build him a city. He thought about it a long while, being slow that way; like his river he takes a long while to get anywhere, lots of detours, but he finally reached a conclusion. He wanted a shining city like the other gods had. He built up a mound of mud at the river mouth and cooked it until it was hard, then he drove a grid of canals through it and fixed the canals so the water was always moving in and out of them in good strong currents to keep them scoured clean. He went snooping around to the cities people built in other godplaces and picked out the things he liked about them and made hisself a city pattern. When he got back home, he scooped up a clutch of his snake people, rinsed them off and set them to work with ovens he made for them, turning out tiles, red, white and black. He spread his plan out for them so they’d know what he wanted, then he drove them generation after generation till he had his city built. Then he said, go live there and follow my rules and do me honor. And there you have it, Dirge Arsuid.”
“Snake people, hmm9”
“To know ‘em is…” Laux sucked up more grog, twinkled at Danny “… to know ‘em.”
“So, tell me more. If I’m going to be knocking about there, I better know what to look out for.” In the back of his head, the Ahzurdan phasma snorted but said nothing. Danny ignored him. For a lot of reasons, he wasn’t willing to trust the information in the memories his half-sire made available to him.
Laux ran his tongue over his teeth, stared past Danny at the cold white light coming through the porthole. “Been thinking ‘bout that. I’ll tell you a thing or two first, then… well, that can wait. Arfon say you get a trial if you accused of something. He say you got to be guilty ‘fore they can send you to the strangler. Guilty o something, if not the thing they say you did. That’s the law an’ Arsuiders, they hold very strict to it. Arsuid honor. Hmh!” He shook the grog jar, emptied the last drops into his mug. “Trouble is, most folks have a thing or three staining their souls, an’ if they don’t, well a smart ysran, what they call their judges, he can f’nagle it someway to shift someone else’s guilt onto that poor jink’s head. Arfon don’t care, long as the look o the thing’s right. Mostly he don’t
notice what’s happening; like I said, he’s not too swift. Keeping all that in mind, it’s a pretty loose guarantee ‘less old Arfon, he sticks his head up and takes your side. It do happen. Can’t count on it, but it do happen. I know. I run into something first time I showed up wanting to trade. Nearly got my neck in the strangler’s noose too. But Arfon took a notion, don’t ask me why, he stick his weedy head through the floor an’ tell the ysran let me go. Ysran don’t like it, but he do it. I don’t have a smell o trouble the rest of the time I was there, I got some mighty profit out of it too. Why I bother to come back an’ why I don’t go in while there’s dark on the canals. Trading here’s worth walking the edge awhile. That f’ sure. Long’s you do it in daylight and watch the ‘ifs’ and ‘buts’ in your bargaining, they good folk to do business with. Arrogant bastards, make you want to skin ‘em the way they act, but they keep their word. An’ if they tell you something ‘bout what they’re selling, it’s true. An’ they got a lot to sell. Hennkensikee silks, for one thing. Better price than you can get just ‘bout anywhere. Lessee, what else… ah! Stay inside once the sun’s down. All bets ‘re off after dark. Strangers on the walkways or riding the canals, they dead. Don’t think you could argue your way loose or fight ‘em off, you won’t. You dead. Floating out to sea. Sacrifice to Arfon. Arsuiders, they know what their god likes.” He wrinkled his nose, sat back in the chair, dark fingers laced over his small hard pot. “Lots o pretty red blood and fancy screaming. Long’s it’s foreigners making the noise and doin’ the bleedin’. Way I see it, old Arfon, he never did get over other gods gettin’ the jump on him with their cities an’ their temples an’ their busy-busy little folk, and he kinds likes seeing outsiders wiggle for it.”
