by K. J. Parker
Lonjamen beamed at him. “My advice is, wear a hat,” he said. “Drink plenty of fluids. Here,” he added, pouring. “It sort of grows on you. Like leprosy.”
Chanso looked at the bowl, picked it up and swallowed the contents. Then he said, “Can I ask you a question?”
“Depends what it is?”
Amazing how quickly that stuff could wear off. “‘Na Lysao,” he said.
The corner of Lonjamen’s mouth twitched. “What about her?”
“Does she want to be here?”
All traces of expression left Lonjamen’s face. He put his bowl down on the table. “Of course she does. I’m sorry, but that’s a stupid question. Why don’t you ask her?”
“I’m sorry,” Chanso said. “I just got the impression—”
He tailed off. Lonjamen waited, then said, “What impression?”
“Oh, I don’t know. I’m sorry.”
“It’s the only place in the world where she’s safe,” Lonjamen said. He picked up the bottle and moved it out of Chanso’s reach. “I think we’ll put that down to Aelian peach brandy. Seriously, if you don’t believe me, ask her yourself. She will undoubtedly answer you. You’ll wish she hadn’t, but she will.”
“I said I’m sorry. Can we forget it now, please? I didn’t mean to give offence.”
“None taken.” Still the completely blank face. “But several good people died getting her here, and the next tide could bring five warships loaded down with marines; we could put up a pretty good fight, but we really don’t want to have to. ‘Na Lysao’s previous entanglements aren’t really a suitable subject for speculation, please bear that in mind. All right?”
The next day he got a summons to the Principal’s office.
“You have to understand,” the Principal said, “Beal Defoir works because everybody who lives on the island would rather be here than anywhere else in the whole world. We expect our students to be broken-hearted when they leave and spend the rest of their lives wishing they could come back.” He leaned back in his chair and steepled his fingers. “How about you?” he said. “Where would you rather be, right now?”
It was a remarkable chair. Its legs were four sword blades, deliberately bent, the curves all inwards, like two pairs of Cs back to back. They were constantly flexing as the Principal shifted his considerable weight. He was tall, fat, bald, with a close-cropped black beard and forearms like a bear’s, which poked out from the wide, short sleeves of his academic gown. He was missing the index finger of his left hand.
“Nowhere,” Chanso said. “I like it here. Very much.”
“Oh, sure. But you’d rather be home, wouldn’t you, among your own people. We can fix that for you. We can send you home tomorrow, if you like. No charge. Comfortable ride in a coach all the way.”
“No,” Chanso said, a little bit too loud. “Thank you,” he added. “What you said, about nowhere else you’d rather be. That’s me. Really.”
And deep, brown eyes, like a cow’s. “Is that right?” he said. “That’s saying something, bearing in mind you didn’t ask to come here. You could almost say we brought you here against your will.”
“Captain Myrtus saved my life.”
There was a sheaf of papers on the desk. Needless to say, from where Chanso was sitting they were upside down, but he’d spotted his name all over them. “You’re not a believer, are you?”
“I don’t know,” Chanso said. “I don’t not believe, if you see what I mean. And now I’m here, it’s beginning to make a lot of sense.”
The Principal picked up one of the papers. Chanso couldn’t read a word of it, because it was in ‘Na Herec’s handwriting. “Apparently you’re an exceptional student with occasional flashes of genuine insight.” He put the paper down gently, as if afraid of waking it. “The old bat never said anything nice like that about me. And ‘Na Seutz says you’re diligent, hardworking, eager to learn and a pleasure to teach.” He shuffled the papers into a neat stack. “I’ll let you in on a secret. ‘Na Seutz loathes teaching. She says the students are all lazy and they take the edge off all her tools. You’ve made two very good friends since you’ve been here.”
There was a but coming. It filled the air, like imminent thunder.
“I’ve had a formal complaint,” the Principal went on, “from Procurator Lonjamen. You have a right to see the charges against you.” He handed Chanso a slim roll of parchment in a brass tube.
“I don’t understand,” Chanso said. “I was talking to him yesterday. There was – I said something, I didn’t know it was wrong. I said I was sorry.”
The Principal was waiting. Chanso looked at the tube. How were you supposed to get the paper out? He tried poking one end with his finger, but that just squashed it up and jammed it. He tried again from the other end, and managed to nudge out a quarter-inch, just enough to get a grip with his fingernails. Eventually the paper slid out; he spread it out on his knee. The writing was very small.
“Well?” the Principal said.
“I don’t understand.”
He’d said the wrong thing. “You’re charged with gross misconduct and conduct unbecoming a craft apprentice,” the Principal said, “in that you suggested to Procurator Lonjamen that he should join with you in a conspiracy to abduct Domna Lysao and deliver her to the agents of General Belot in return for a substantial bounty. Further or in the alternative, you declared that you are in love with Domna Lysao.” He paused. “What don’t you understand about that?”
“It’s not true.”
“Procurator Lonjamen says it is,” the Principal replied. “He has no reason to lie. You, on the other hand—” He raised his hands. “Slandering a procurator isn’t going to help matters,” he said.
“I suppose not.”
“You suppose right.” The Principal was looking at him. “In your defence, Lonjamen says that at the time of the incident you had been drinking, and you aren’t used to strong liquor. I think he’s inviting you to say that it was the drink talking, and you didn’t mean a word of it. Well?”
“It’s true,” Chanso said. “Lonjamen bought me a drink—”
“You bought him a drink.”
“I’m sorry,” Chanso said quietly. “I must not be remembering straight. We had a drink together, and we don’t have anything like that at home, and I said a stupid thing. I’m very sorry. I wouldn’t ever do anything to harm ‘Na Lysao, or anything that might get me sent away from here. I love it here. I didn’t mean anything by it.”
The Principal carried on looking at him for a while, as though he was waiting for something. Then, quite abruptly, he clapped his hands together. “I thought that must be how it was,” he said. “When you’re young and stupid and a long way from home, you do the occasional stupid thing, especially when there’s peach brandy involved. I’m not saying that makes it any better, but at least it’s understandable. Perhaps you’re thinking we’re being a bit harsh on you, for a matter of a few badly chosen words. But I ask you to consider what it must be like for ‘Na Lysao, with that terrible weight hanging over her head all the time. If I was in her position, I don’t know how I’d cope with it. Think what it would be like, every time somebody looks at you, they’re seeing a million angels. Think how she’d feel if she knew that a student she has high hopes of was saying that sort of thing about her, even in jest.”
“She doesn’t know?”
That had come out far too quickly. But the Principal smiled. “I saw no need to distress her with it,” he said, “and you can see for yourself, if she knew it’d make it very awkward for you to carry on as her student.”
“She has high hopes—”
“Based on one lesson, yes.”
“I can carry on going to her for catechism?”
The Principal frowned. “Well, that depends, doesn’t it? These are serious charges. If you deny any part of them, there would have to be a hearing. If you admit them in full, I have the discretion to let them lie on the file – not dismissed, you understan
d, and not forgotten about, but not proceeded with, so long as nothing of the sort ever happens again. It’s not the way we usually do things. But since you’ve had such excellent reports from two highly respected members of Faculty—” The Principal frowned and lowered his voice. “More to the point,” he went on, “I have to tell you, Procurator Lonjamen spoke up very strongly on your behalf. He told me, he knows exactly what it’s like for a young no Vei coming here for the first time, it’s overwhelming, so totally different from anything you’ve ever experienced before. First you think you’re less than nothing, an ant or a beetle; then, once it sinks in that you’ve been accepted, you go right to the other extreme, you think the place belongs to you and you’re the equal of the gods and can do no wrong. In fact, Lonjamen’s sticking his neck out for you, and you’d do well to remember that.” He frowned some more, then said, “I’m prepared to let you stay here, on probation. From now on, you’ll be the perfect student. You will not take one step out of line. If I ever hear your name again, it’ll be because you’ve won a prize. And you won’t just be very, very careful about what you say, you’ll be very careful indeed about what you think; because there are a lot of extremely clever people here on this island, and from now on they’ll be watching you. Do you understand?”
“Yes,” Chanso said. “And I really am sorry.”
“Good,” the Principal said. “So I should think. You’re a lucky man, you’ve got three very good friends on Beal Defoir. Do try not to let them down again.”
Five days later she told him, “That’s fine. You’re all done.”
“Excuse me?” he asked.
“The course is finished. You passed. Congratulations.” She had her back to him; she was looking out of the window. For the last three days she’d had it shuttered, and they’d had their lesson by lamplight, even though it was mid-morning. “You can go.”
It hadn’t occurred to him that this might happen. There was still so much he didn’t understand. All they’d done was read through the text, with a few rather strange discussions. “I don’t – I mean, it doesn’t feel like I’ve finished.”
“You have, believe me. Well done, you’re a smart boy. Usually this course takes fourteen days, you’ve done it in six. You’re getting five stars and a commendation. What more could you want?”
He walked down the stairs in a daze. He’d passed, apparently; five stars and a commendation, the Principal would be pleased, and probably Lonjamen as well. And he’d never see her again.
“Human figures?” ‘Na Seutz looked at him. “Why would you want to try that?”
Now that he wasn’t doing catechism, he had double lessons with ‘Na Seutz. She was very pleased with him. Most of the time, he was hardly aware of what he was doing. “I thought I’d like to try,” he said.
“I thought representations of the human form were taboo in your culture.”
He shrugged. “I’m not no Vei any more. Not really.”
“Wash your mouth out with ashes and lye,” she said sternly. “That’s a terrible thing to say. Take me, for instance. I’m Euxentine. That’s who I am, and I’m proud of it. The Lodge isn’t a country. You are who you are.”
He wasn’t interested in the subject. “I just thought I’d like to try people,” he said. “There’s a long and noble tradition of human sculpture, look at Diagoras, look at the Sensualists. And I’m sick to death of carving squirrels.”
Instead of answering, she reached up into the rack of fine timber that hung from the roof and took down a three-inch-square section, two feet long. “Sycamore,” she said. “A bit pale for skin tones, but it’s got that faint iridescence.”
To see her, all he needed to do was close his eyes. He worked with the knife only, because it was slower. He made her stand at a window, half turned away. While he was doing the elbow, the knife slipped and cut his hand to the bone. Blood splashed on the wood; he wiped it off straight away, but of course there was a stain, on her shoulder and cheek.
“You’re not usually that careless,” she said, grabbing his hand and binding it with a bandage of fine muslin. She looked at his work; he thought, she doesn’t approve. “I wouldn’t do any more to that, if I were you,” she said. “It’s perfect. Anything else would spoil it.”
He knew she was right, but it hurt worse than the cut. “Will that stain bleach out?”
“Not unless you want to raise the grain,” she said. “And don’t try sanding it, either, it’s too deep. Just leave it. Actually, it looks sort of meant.” She picked it up and moved it on to the windowsill. “Are you going to give it to her?”
“What?”
“To ‘Na Lysao. She doesn’t usually accept presents, but—” She turned it slightly, to adjust the play of light and shade. “She’s only human.”
“No,” Chanso said. Then, without knowing why, he said, “You have it.”
She stared at him. Then, “Yes, please,” she said quickly.
‘Na Seutz had four more blanks from the same tree. Three of them he made into near replicas of the first one, slightly adjusting the angle of her head, nothing else. For the fourth one, he made her sit, just like the first time he’d seen her. His hand was taking a long time to heal, there had been a slight infection, and he kept using the wound to press down on the back of the knife.
“You know,” ‘Na Seutz said gently, “that’s the most amazing work I think I’ve ever seen. But maybe you should try doing something else next.”
He looked at her. “Squirrels.”
“You wouldn’t go hungry. People will always want squirrels.”
Just for her, he added a squirrel, sitting beside ‘Na Lysao on the window seat. “Actually, it looks more like a friendly rat,” she said. “But I like it, it’s good.” She peered at it, then added, “You know, in five hundred years’ time people are going to be puzzled as hell about why you put in a rat.”
“Symbolism,” Chanso said.
“Ah.”
He was dreaming about horses. His father had sent him to find the old white mare, but he couldn’t find her. He rode for hours, covering extraordinary distances, but she was nowhere to be seen. He called her name, over and over again.
Something nudged him and he woke up. A man he knew vaguely by sight was standing over him. In his right hand was a drawn sword.
“It’s all right,” the man said. “Well, no, it’s not. You need to get up, now.”
He knew the man, but he couldn’t remember where from. There was light in the room, coming from the corridor outside: bright torches, or a lantern. “What’s wrong?”
“The city’s under attack,” the man said. “Come on, get up. Report to the sergeant at the head of this staircase.”
The man left him. He lay for a moment, then swung his legs out of bed, pulled on a shirt, stuffed his feet into his boots and staggered out into the corridor. A man pushed past him; in armour, holding a sheaf of spears tied up like a faggot of firewood with green twine. Chanso followed him. He could hear shouting – orders, not panic. Under attack? Made no sense.
On the landing he saw most of the occupants of the neighbouring rooms, men he’d seen now and again but never spoken to. They were in shirts or coats, and they looked bewildered and terrified. Two men in armour were handing out weapons.
“You,” one of them said. “You’re no Vei. You get a bow.”
“I’m a terrible shot.”
A bow and a quiver forced their way into his hands. “Bullshit. Archers to the front wall, fifth level. That’s you,” the man clarified. “Move!”
He had no idea how to get to the front wall, fifth level. But out in the quadrangle he saw a squad of archers, half a dozen or so, jogging grimly across the grass. He ran and caught up with them. He heard a horrible thumping noise that made the ground shake.
He grabbed the arm of one of the archers. “What’s happening?”
“We’re being attacked.”
“Who by?”
The archer just looked blank. They started runnin
g up a long staircase, two steps at a time. Chanso kept up for as long as he could, but then they pulled ahead. He followed, gasping for breath.
At the top of the stairs he saw Lonjamen, talking to a man in armour. By the time he reached him, they’d finished their conversation and Lonjamen was walking away. Chanso called out his name.
Lonjamen glanced at him. “Get with the other archers,” he said.
“What’s going on? Who’s attacking us?”
“I don’t know, do I?” Lonjamen walked away, then turned. “Down the corridor, third left, brings you out on to the north gallery. Keep going till you see a staircase going up. Three flights, you’ll be there. Good luck,” he added, and disappeared through a doorway.
Another thump; the floor shook. Chanso slipped, fell on his left knee, jumped up again. Hell of a time for an earthquake. He did as Lonjamen had told him and came out into the night air. He was on a sort of huge balcony with a high stone wall in front of him. It was almost as bright as daylight, but the wrong colour.
“Get down,” someone shouted at him. That made no sense. Then a heavy hand landed on his shoulder and a foot rammed the inside of his knee, forcing him into a crouch. “Shrapnel,” a voice bellowed in his ear. “Bloody great chunks of flying rock. They’ll take your head off.”
“What’s going on?” he asked.
A hand clamped to the back of his neck guided him tight up against the rampart. “Artillery,” the voice said. “They got two barges anchored out there mounted with siege engines, mangonels probably. They splashed a couple of bulbs of Vesani fire against the walls, just so they could see to aim, and now they’re trying to shoot out the gate.”
Chanso turned his head and saw a helmet, Ironshirt type, with cheek-guards that almost met at the front. “Who are they?”
“Search me,” said the helmet. “My guess is, somebody who wants a million angels. What else’ve we got worth taking?”
Something whistled through the air, a swishing sound, like a broom sweeping. Then a thump that made Chanso’s ears ring, and the stonework under him trembled again. Then there was a lot of shouting. The helmet swore and stood up. A voice close by called out, “Archers front and centre!”
