The Book of Taltos

by Steven Brust

Oh. Here I was. I’d been so distracted thinking about Kragar that I hadn’t considered how to approach the Orca. Well, since I didn’t know what to say, I hit him in the stomach with the stick. He said something like “Oooph” and buckled over. I think I might have cracked a couple of ribs; my aim wasn’t all that good. I wondered if he was the right guy.

  In any case, the top of his head was right below me. I almost brought the club down, but I remembered Kiera’s words and didn’t. Instead I put my foot against him and pushed. He fell over backward and it occurred to me how easy it had been to take the guy when he wasn’t expecting an attack.

  He rolled over onto his stomach, coughing. I’d gotten him pretty good, but Orca are tough. I put my foot on his back. Kragar came up next to me and put a foot on the guy’s neck. I removed my foot and walked around, then knelt down in front of him. He seemed startled and craned his neck, looking around. I guess he hadn’t realized there were two of us. Then he glared at me.

  On impulse I reached into my cloak, pulled out my jhereg, and held him in front of the guy. I said, “Hungry, Loiosh?”

  “Mama?”

  “It’s okay.”

  Loiosh flicked a tongue out toward the Orca, whose eyes were now wide with fear. I said to him, “You owe people money.”

  “Let me up,” he croaked. “I’ll give it to you.”

  “No. I don’t want it. I want you to pay it. If you don’t, we’ll come back. You have twenty-four hours. Do you understand?”

  He managed to nod.

  “Good.” I stood up and put Loiosh away. I headed out to the stairs, Kragar behind me.

  Once we’d left, Kragar said, “Why didn’t you take the money?”

  I said, “Huh? I don’t know. I guess it would have felt like robbing him.”

  Kragar laughed. Well, I suppose on reflection it was funny. I was trembling a bit. If Kragar had commented on it I would have smashed his face in, but he didn’t.

  I had settled down by the time we were back where we’d started. The shoemaker wasn’t around when we returned, but Nielar was. He studied me, ignoring Kragar, and said, “Well?”

  I said, “I don’t know.”

  “You don’t know?”

  “Does the guy have dark hair that he wears plastered straight back, kind of a wide face, big shoulders, a short neck, and a little white scar across his nose?”

  “I’ve never noticed the scar, but, yeah, that sounds right.”

  “Then we talked to the right guy.”

  “That’s good. What did you talk about?”

  “We asked him if he wouldn’t mind paying what he owes.”

  “What did he say?”

  “He seemed to consider the matter carefully.”

  Nielar nodded slowly. “Okay. Where’s Kragar?”

  “Right here,” said Kragar, sounding amused.

  “Oh. What do you think?”

  “He’ll pay. We gave him a day.” He paused, then, “Vlad does good work.”

  Nielar studied me for a moment. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll be in touch with you guys.”

  I nodded and walked out of the shop. I wanted to thank Kragar, but I couldn’t find him. I shrugged and went home to feed Loiosh and wait.

  I got home feeling a bit exhausted, but good. I was pretty pleased with life for a change. I fed Loiosh some cow’s milk and fell asleep on the couch with him on my stomach. Perhaps I was smiling.

  THE FIRST THING I noticed was the sky. It was still the ugly reddish, orangish thing that hangs over the Empire, but it was higher and somehow cleaner. We were surrounded by grasses that reached my waist. There was not a tree or a mountain or a building in sight.

  We stood there for a few minutes, Morrolan politely remaining silent while I took several deep breaths, trying to recover from the aftereffects of the teleport. I looked around, and something occurred to me. I tried to figure it out, then said, “All right, I give up. How did you get a teleport fix on a spot with absolutely no distinguishing features?”

  He smiled. “I didn’t. I just fixed on approximately where I wanted to go, visualized the area, and hoped nothing would be there.”

  I stared at him. He smiled back at me. “Well,” I said after a while. “I guess it worked.”

  “I guess so. Shall we begin walking?”

  “What direction?”

  “Oh. Right.” He closed his eyes and turned his head slowly from side to side. He finally pointed off in a direction that looked like any other. “That way,” he said.

  Loiosh flew overhead. The breeze was cool but not chilly. Morrolan cut back on the length of his strides so he wouldn’t keep getting ahead of me.

  I tried not to think of the whithers or the wherefores of the journey, but the staff in Morrolan’s left hand kept reminding me.

  9

  The object of my desire was there, and I needed it here. I had forged most of those links already: there was represented by a quivering knife, here was the glowing rune. But more, I had to break a spatial barrier and cause a thing to exist that did not, while destroying a thing that did, yet in fact do neither of these, merely cause a spatial readjustment.

  If that sounds confusing to listen to, try doing it.

  I had become a thing of rhythm and wave, sight and sound, of a wavering landscape and a humming knife and a glowing rune and a pulse.

  They were united in my will and in the symbols before me. Think of it as a cosmic juggling act in the mind, and you’ll have about the right idea.

  I was getting to the hard part.

  WE RESTED UNDER THE open sky that night, which sounds romantic but wasn’t, and ought to have been chilly but Morrolan fixed that. I don’t like the hard ground, but it was better than it could have been. Morrolan doesn’t snore, and if I do he never mentioned it.

  We didn’t have any cooking gear with us, but we didn’t need any, what with Morrolan being along. I drank tea from an invisible glass and ate bread that hadn’t been with us the night before and berries that were growing all around us, nice and ripe.

  I stared at the slowly diminishing cylinder of liquid in my hand and said, “Now, that’s the sort of magic I’d like to be able to do.”

  Morrolan didn’t deign to answer. The good stuff is always difficult. We resumed our walk. It was a nice warm day, and I saw the distant peaks of mountains.

  I said, “Is that our destination?”

  Morrolan nodded.

  I said, “How long a walk would you say that is?”

  “It doesn’t matter. When we get close enough to make out a few details, we’ll teleport again.”

  “Oh.”

  It was, I have to say, hard to stay hostile to the man next to me, if only because the day was nice and the walk so pleasant. Birds sang, the wind rustled, and all that sort of thing.

  Loiosh flew above me and occasionally disappeared for brief intervals when he found something to scavenge. I could feel that he was enjoying himself. From time to time I would catch sight of wild jhereg, flying high above us, but Loiosh and I ignored them.

  We stopped around midday, and Morrolan conjured more food for us. I don’t know whether he was creating it from thin air or teleporting it from somewhere. I suspect the former because it tasted pretty bland. As we ate, Morrolan studied the mountains that were slowly growing before us as we walked. As we stood up, he announced, “Not yet. We need to be closer.”

  That was fine by me. We resumed our walk, and all was well with the world.

  I wondered if I’d be dead by this time tomorrow.

  I GOT A MESSAGE the next day to see Nielar. This time I was to meet him at his office—in back of the shereba game, which was in turn in back of a small sorcery supply shop. I was admitted at once, without having to identify myself (“When the Easterner shows up, let him in”), and Nielar nodded me to a chair.

  He said, “Let’s wait for Kragar.”

  Kragar said, “I’m here already.”

  We both did double takes, then Nielar cleared his throat. “Right
,” he said. “Well, here’s four imperials for you two to split. And, Vlad, here’s another four for your first week’s pay. You work for me now, all right? I want you here tomorrow evening to keep an eye on the shereba game.”

  I took the eight coins and gave Kragar two of them. I had just earned, in one day, more than I would have taken in at the restaurant in several weeks. I said, “Right, boss.”

  MORROLAN STOPPED SUDDENLY, WITH no warning, and he stood still, staring off ahead and a little to his left. I looked in that direction and saw nothing except unbroken plain, with more mountains in the distance.

  “Check it, Loiosh.”

  “Right, boss.”

  We stood there for most of a minute, Morrolan continuing to stare, Loiosh flying off in the indicated direction. Then Loiosh said, “Boss, you’ve got to see this.”

  “Very well. Show me.” I closed my eyes and let Loiosh fill my brain.

  Yeah, it was quite a sight.

  There were these beings, maybe two dozen of them, and I’ve never seen anyone or anything run so fast. They had four legs and from the waist down appeared to be feline, smaller than the dzur, perhaps the size of the tiassa but without wings. From the waist up they appeared human. They carried spears.

  “Cat-centaurs, Loiosh?”

  “I guess so, boss. I hadn’t known they were real.”

  “Nor had I. Interesting.”

  “I think they’re heading toward us.”

  “Yeah.”

  I broke the connection, and by now I could see them with my own eyes, as a gradually resolving blur in the distance. Verra, but they were fast. I noted that Morrolan had not touched his sword, and I took some comfort from that. I began to hear them then; a very low rumble that made me realize I ought to have heard them some time ago. They were awfully quiet for their size.

  They were suddenly stopped before us. The butt ends of their spears rested on the ground as they looked at us through human faces with expressions of mild curiosity. The spears had worked metal heads, which I decided was significant. I had the impression that they ran just because they wanted to. None of them were breathing hard. They stared at us, unblinking, like cats. They wore no clothing, but many of them carried pouches, tied around their backs and hanging down the sides. The muscles around their back legs were impressive as hell.

  I said, “So, what else do you do for fun?”

  Morrolan turned and glared at me. The cat-centaur who was at their head, and who was emphatically female, looked at me and smiled a little. “Chase things,” she said. She spoke Dragaeran without any trace of accent.

  Loiosh landed on my shoulder, and the leader’s eyes widened. I said, “My name is Vlad Taltos.”

  Morrolan said, “I am Morrolan.”

  She said, “I am called Mist.”

  A cat-centaur with red eyes said, “That’s because when she throws her spear—”

  “Shut up, Brandy.” There was some laughter, which included Loiosh, though only I was aware of that.

  Mist said, “The jhereg on your shoulder—he is your friend?”

  I said, “Yeah.”

  “Jhereg feed on dead cat-centaurs.”

  I said, “Dead men, too,” which seemed to satisfy her.

  She said, “What brings you to the Forever Plains?”

  Morrolan said, “We journey to Deathgate Falls,” and the entire collection of cat-centaurs took a step back from us. I stooped down and picked and ate a strawberry, waiting.

  After a moment, Mist said, “I assume you have good reason.”

  Morrolan started to answer, but another cat-centaur said, “No, they’re just out on a lark.”

  Mist said, “Keep still, Birch.”

  I said, “Say, are those real spears?”

  Morrolan said, “Shut up, Vlad.”

  Loiosh seemed about to have hysterics. Some of the cat-centaurs appeared to be in the same situation. Me, too. Morrolan and Mist caught each other’s eyes and shook their heads sadly.

  Mist said, “If you wait here, we’re following a very large wild kethna. When we bring it down, we’ll share it with you.”

  “We shall get a fire going,” said Morrolan. Then, “Um, you do cook your meat, do you not?”

  Brandy said, “No, we prefer to let the raw, fresh blood of our kill drip down our—”

  “Shut up, Brandy,” said Mist. “Yes, a fire would be nice.”

  “See you soon, then,” said Morrolan.

  “Quite soon, I expect,” said Mist, and they turned and sped off the way they’d come.

  THERE WAS A GOOD tailor who lived near my flat. I went to see him late in the afternoon of the next day and ordered a full, grey cloak. I also ordered a new jerkin, with ribbing parallel to the collarbone. I lusted after a hat with a tall plume, but didn’t get it.

  The tailor said, “Come into some funds, eh?”

  I didn’t know what to say so I just gave him a terse nod. I don’t know what he read into that, but his eyes widened just a bit, showing what could have been fear. A small thrill passed through me as I turned away and said, “I’ll expect them in a week.”

  He said, “Yes, they’ll be done.” He sounded just a bit breathless.

  I went a bit farther down the street and bought a brace of throwing knives. I resolved to start practicing with them.

  Then I reported in to Nielar. He nodded to me and sent me to the room with the shereba game. Two days before, I’d been playing there, and a large Jhereg had thrown me out after I’d gotten into a tussle with another customer. Now I was sitting where the Jhereg had sat. I tried to look as relaxed and unconcerned as he’d been. I guess I was partially successful.

  But, hell, I enjoyed it.

  WE LOST MOST OF the day eating and socializing with the cat-centaurs and enjoying it, although it got us no closer to our goal. I don’t usually gamble, but these poor, uncivilized creatures didn’t even know how to play S’yang Stones, so I had to show them, didn’t I? We had a good medium of exchange, too, as there are certain cuts of kethna that are better than others. The cat-centaurs were fairly dexterous, so I quit when they were starting to catch on.

  Mist said, “I suspect that I won’t be thanking you for teaching us this game, in another few weeks.”

  “It’s just harmless fun,” I said between bites of my fresh-roasted winnings. As they say, gambling isn’t fun; winning is fun.

  It was fun exchanging banter with them, and I learned to know when I was pushing one too far by watching the tail, which would have been very strange if I’d stopped to think about it. Morrolan did some healing spells on three of the cat-centaurs whose left legs had been injured in one way or another. “There’s been a rash of that lately,” said Mist after thanking him.

  “A curse?” said Morrolan.

  “Just bad luck, I think.”

  “There’s a lot of that going around,” said Morrolan.

  “Especially where you’re going.”

  Morrolan shrugged. “I don’t imagine you know much more about the place than we do.”

  “I usually avoid it.”

  “We would, too, if we could,” said Morrolan.

  Mist stared at the ground, her tail flicking. “Why are you going there?”

  Morrolan said, “It’s a long story.”

  Mist said, “We have time for long tales. Shut up, Brandy.”

  Morrolan seemed disinclined to talk about it, so a silence fell. Then a male I didn’t recognize approached Mist and handed her something. She took and studied it. I hadn’t noticed before how long and sleek her hands were, and her fingernails made me wince, recalling a girl I once knew. What Mist held seemed to be a piece of bone. After some study she said, “Yes. This will do.” She handed it to Morrolan.

  He took it, puzzled, while I went around behind him and stared at it over his shoulder. It probably had been broken from the skull of the kethna. It was very roughly square, about two inches on a side, and I could see some thin tracings on it. I could make nothing whatsoever of the ma
rkings.

  Morrolan said, “Thank you. What—”

  “Should you come across Kelchor in the Paths of the Dead, and show her this token, it may be that she’ll protect you.” She paused. “On the other hand, she may not.”

  “Gods are like that,” said Morrolan.

  “Aren’t they, though,” said Mist.

  I had my doubts about whether either of them actually knew anything.

  HERE’S SOMETHING YOU CAN do, if you ever get the mood. Find a Dragaeran who isn’t inclined to beat you up, and start talking about magic. Watch the curl of his lip when he hears about witchcraft. Then start discussing numbers associated with the art. Talk about how, with some spells, you want two black candles and one white one, other times you want two white ones and no black. Mention that, for instance, in one of the simpler love spells you must use three pinches of rosemary. The size of a “pinch” doesn’t matter, but the number three is vital. In another spell you can tell him, you must speak in lines of nine syllables, although what you say doesn’t matter.

  Long about this time, he’ll be unable to hide his contempt and he’ll start going on about how silly it is to attach significance to numbers.

  That’s when you get to have your fun. Cock your head to the side, stare at him quizzically, and say, “Why is the Dragaeran population broken up into seventeen Great Houses? Why are there seventeen months in the Dragaeran year? Why is seventeen times seventeen years the minimum time for a House to hold the throne and the Orb, while the maximum is three thousand something, or seventeen times seventeen times seventeen? Why are there said to be seventeen Great Weapons?”

  He will open his mouth and close it once or twice, shake his head, and say, “But seventeen is the mystical number.”

  Now you can nod wisely, your eyes twinkling, say, “Oh, I see,” and walk away.

  I mention this only because I have a little nagging feeling that the Dragaerans may be right. At least, it does seem that the number seventeen keeps popping up when I least expect it.

  At any rate, I was seventeen years old the first time I was paid to kill a man.