Soul of the City tw-8

by Robert Lynn Asprin

  The door crashed shut behind her and the iron gate squealed' violently as it banged open. The wind took her cloak and played games with it, with a power that might have leveled Sanctuary.

  "Damn it, no. Let me be." And Straton left the mage-quarter room and headed down the outside stairs.

  Left Crit, with argument echoing in the room and the dark.

  Crit came to the door, came out onto the landing. "Strat," Crit said; and got only Strat's back. "Strat."

  Straton stopped then and looked up at his left-side leader, at the man he owed his life to a dozen times and who owed him. "Why didn't you shoot? Why didn't you damn well pull the trigger when you came into the yard if you're so damn convinced? Ask me why things in Sanctuary have gone to hell-come in damn well late and find fault with me when I've kept this town alive and kept the blood from running down the damn gutters-"

  Crit came down the steps and leaned on either wooden railing. "That's not what I'm talking about. It's your choice of allies. Strat, dammit, wake up."

  "We're public. We'll talk about it later. Later isn't tonight."

  Crit came a step further, checked him on the step. "Listen to me. We've got the witch-bitch out. The other one's got you. Command of this city, hell, you lost it. Ace, you lost it a long time ago. I don't know how the hell you're still alive but if the Riddler gets his hands on you now you're done-dammit, Strat, where's your sense? You know what she is, you know what she does-"

  "She killed me weeks ago. I'm a walking corpse. Sure, Crit. I'm best at full of moon. Dammit, that woman's why we're clear of the Nisi witch, she's why you had a city left down here, and why the empire has a backside left at all. I'll tell you what it is with you, Crit; it's knowing your partner was damn well right and you were wrong; it's having your mind made up before you got here and riding in there to haul me out for a traitor-that's what you came to do, isn't it? To shoot me down without a chance if I went for your throat? It's not catching, Crit. It's not even true. They blame her for every body that turns up in the alleys; in the Maze, for the gods' sake- as if corpses never happened before she came to town. Well, I've been with her when those stories spread; I know damn well where she was at night; and they still blame her-"

  "-like they blame lambs on wolves; sure, Strat; but a wolf's still a wolf. And you're damn lucky this far. I'm telling you. The Riddler will order you. Stay the hell out of there."

  "Stay the hell out of my business!" Strat slammed an offered hand aside and ran the steps down to the bottom.

  "Strat!"

  He looked up in mid-turn. By the tone there might have been a weapon. There was not. He hardly broke stride as he went for the stable, flung the door open, and fumbled after the lantern that hung there. A soft whicker sounded. Another, rowdier, sounded off loud and two steelshod hooves hit the stall: Crit's sorrel, ill-tempered and fighting the rein every step of the way into the stable, bucking and banging boards and making itself heard upstairs.

  "Shut up!" It was the same as yelling at Crit. About as useful. The hooves hit the boards again.

  And Crit arrived in the stable doorway, stood there dark against the starlight on the cobbles outside. Straton ignored him and made another attempt at the light. It took. He adjusted the wick and hung the lamp on its peg, and did what he knew might be fatal. He turned his back on Crit and walked away down the aisle.

  Not a quarrel between friends. It was nothing private. Tempus's orders were involved. Tempus disavowed him, disavowed everything he had done, everything he had set up, every alliance he had made; and told him (through Crit) to break off with his woman and own up to failure. Sent his own leftside leader to kill him.

  He gave Crit the chance. He walked the stable aisle and got his tack off the rail, flung it up onto the rim of the bay's box stall. He kept listening through the sorrel's ruckus, for the soft stir of straw that would be Crit walking up behind him.

  Try it. From disspirited suicide, to a gathering determination to fight back, to the imagination that he could beat Crit, beat him to the ground, sit on him and make him listen. Not kill him when he could. Then Crit would come to sanity. Then Crit would be sorry. Then Crit would go and tell Tempus it was all a mistake, and his partner had done the best that any man could do, tried his damn heart out and done what no one else had been able to do, gods, had held the Nisi witch at bay, had worked out at least a fragile truce with the key factions, had patched the whole hellhole of Sanctuary together and held onto it.

  He deserved thanks, by the gods. He deserved something besides a partner trying to murder him.

  Come on, Crit, dammit. Not a sound in the straw, not a move.

  He turned around and looked. Crit was not there at all; had gone-somewhere. Upstairs again, maybe. Maybe to pass an order.

  Straton turned and flung the blanket on the bay, stroked its shoulder. The horse bent its head back and delicately nipped at his sleeve, nosed his ribs. He flung his arms about its neck, which indignity the bay protested by backing and fidgeting; gave the warm neck a hug and a slap and tried to stop the stinging of his eyes and the pain in his heart by holding onto something that simply loved him.

  She loved him that way. Supported him. Helped him. Never contested with him for credit for this or credit for that, handed it all into his lap with a whispered: But I don't want that, Strat. You're the mind behind it, you tell me what you need. I do it for your sake. No other in all the world. Yours is the only judgment in the world I trust more than my own. You're the only man I've ever trusted. The only one, ever.

  She was quiet, was safety, she understood what he needed and when he needed it. She was the only woman who knew him the way Crit had known him; knew what he did, knew he was the Stepsons' interrogator, unraveled his own pretense that cruelty gave him no sexual thrill at all: took the body-knowledge which was his skill at interrogation and at lovcmaking and bent him round again till he could see the torment he inflicted on himself, inner war against his own sensibilities. She took all these things and knit them up and let him turn gentle and sentimental with her, which was his deepest, darkest secret- it was this fragile, inner self she got to, which Crit rarely had. That he could deliver himself to her inside and out, and sleep in her arms in a way he never slept with his lovers-not without an eye and an ear alert, somehow-alert in the way a cynic never sleeps, never trusts, never hopes. Ischade's embrace was a drug, the gaze of her eyes a well in which Straton the Stepson became Strat the man, the young man, Strat the wise and the brave-

  Strat the fool to Crit. Strat the traitor to Tempus. Strat the butcher to everyone else he knew.

  He flung the saddle up and the bay which was her gift stood quietly while Crit's damn sorrel kicked a stall to ruin and Crit did not come to see to the animal.

  He checked the bridle and turned the bay and led it out into the stable aisle, from there to the door.

  Perhaps Crit would be waiting there, having known his chances slipping up on him. Perhaps it would be one fast bolt through the ribs and never a chance at all to tell Crit he was a fool and a blackguard.

  Strat leapt up to the bay's back and ducked his head, sending the bay flying out that door with a powerful drive of its hindquarters. If a bolt flew past he never saw it. The bay scrabbled for a tight turn on the dirt of the little yard and lit out down the cobbles of the alley, never pausing until he reined it to a walk a block away.

  Where he was going he had no idea. Stay away, Ischade had said. He had believed her then, the way he believed implicitly when she spoke in that tone to him, that it was something she understood and he did not. It was something to do with Roxane. It was something that brought a wildness to her eyes and meant hazard to her; but it was a witch-matter, not his kind of dealing. Nothing he could help her with. And he and Ischade had the kind of understanding he had once with Crit, an understanding he had never looked to have with any woman: an unspoken agreement of personal competencies. Witchery was hers. The command of the city was his. And he would not go there tonight, though that was wher
e every bone in him ached to go, to reassure himself that she was well, and that it was not some misapprehension between them that had driven her away. Things had changed. Crit being back, and Tempus-gods knew what was in her mind.

  If this visitor makes an end to what is-was-between us-

  It's yours to say-

  His to say. His to say, by accepting her command to stay away tonight? or by defying it?-He suspected one and then the other with equal force; he agonized over it and called up every nuance of her voice and body and behavior over weeks and months, trying to know what she had meant, whether it was keeping that unspoken pact with her inviolate or defying it and risking (he sensed) his life to pass those wards tonight- that would cancel that doubt he had felt in her. Or confirm it.

  Damn Crit. Damn Tempus's coming now, late, when he had everything virtually in hand. Damn their arrival that suddenly undermined everything he had built and poisoned the air between himself and Ischade, the only (he suddenly conceived of it as such), the only unselfish passion he had ever owned, the only peace he had ever conceived of having in the world.

  The bay horse picked up its pace again, moved with astonishing quiet over the cobbles and down the long street where the scars of factional violence still lingered.

  Factions and powers. He waked suddenly, as if he had been numb since Ischade flung him at Crit and Crit flung him away again. He heard Ischade's voice whispering in his brain: The only man-the only one who understands how fragile things are-

  The only one who stands a chance of holding this city-

  The only one who might make something of it yet-truer than the weakling prince, truer than priests and commanders who serve other powers-

  You're the only hope I have, the only hope this city has of being more than the end of empire-

  You might not have their love, Strat, but you have their respect. They know you're an honest man. They know you've always fought for this town. Even llsigis know that. And they respect you if nothing else of Ranke-

  -llsigis! he had laughed.

  You are the city's champion. The city's savior. Believe me, Straton, there is no other man could walk the line you've walked, and no other Rankan they know fights for this town.

  ... They respect you if nothing else ofRanke.

  Tempus counted him a failure. Tempus arrived in the midst of Roxane's death throes and laid that chaos to his account.

  Let Tempus see the truth, let Tempus see that he could pull strings in this web, let him hand peace with the factions to Tempus and let Tempus deal with gods: Tempus was not inclined to tie himself down to one town, one place; Crit loathed the place-but one of Tempus's men next in line, one of Tem-pus's trusted men could find that answer to everything he wanted.

  Ischade and Sanctuary.

  There had been disturbance downstairs, a door had opened, and Moria hugged the quilts to her in her lonely bed, lay hardly daring to lift her head. The whole night was terrifying with thunders, with the fitful, fretful character of a sky which promised no rain and perhaps the renewed warfare of witches. Her with the Nisi witch. The full scope of disasters possible in that eluded gutter-bom Moria; Moria the elegant, the beautiful, curled into a fetal ball in the soft down comforters and the satin and the lace of the mansion Ischade provided Her most pampered (and hitherto least used) servant. But the depth ofMoria's imagination was better than most-who had seen the dead raised, the fires blaze about Ischade and pass harmless to her- but not to others. And she had every Ilsigi's reason for terror- a dead man had turned up one morning, outside her very door: the skies arced lightnings overhead, terrible storms haunted Sanctuary nights, and there were wails and scratchings round about the house and the shutters, thumps in the pantry and the basement which sent even the hardened staff shrieking down the halls in terror of ghosts and haunts-a murdered man had lived here; he manifested in the basement all wrapped in his shroud, to Cook's abject terror and the ruin of a whole jug of summer pickles. A ghostly child sported in the hall of nights and once Moria had wakened to the distinct and most horrible feeling that something had depressed a body-shaped nest on the feather-mattress beside her. (For that, she had sent a terrified message to Ischade, and the manifestations abruptly stopped.) If that were not enough, there were pitched battles in the streets downhill, fires, maimed men carried past in blood-soaked litters-a fiend had rampaged through the house of the very Beysib lady Moria had visited on Ischade's orders, and Moria knew all too much about the Harka Bey and their dreadful snakes and their way of dealing with people who brought harm to one of their own. She feared jars, jugs, and closets of late; she feared packages and baskets brought in from market (on those days market functioned): she was sure that some viper might lurk there, some Beysib horror come to find Ischade's helpless agent in some moment that Ischade was elsewhere occupied-the Mistress would take a terrible vengeance for such an attack: Moria believed that implicitly; but it was also possible that Moria would be dead and unable to appreciate it.

  And, o Shipri and Lord Shalpa, patron of a one-time thief and Hawkmask, even the dead were not safe from Ischade, who might well raise her up to let her go on like poor Stilcho, like the Stepson-slave Ischade took to her bed and performed gods-knew-what with because he was dead and could not succumb to Ischade's curse-could not die as every man died who had sex with Ischade-or Stilcho died nightly and Ischade raised him up from hell (though how her living and latest lover, the Stepson Straton, had survived beyond one night she could not guess; or did guess, in lurid imaginings of exotic practices and things that she dared not ask Haught-does he, does Haught, with Her? Would he, could he, has he ever-? with direst jealousy and helpless rage; for Haught was hers). It was all too confusing for Moria, once-thief turned lady.

  And now the Emperor was dead in Ranke, the world was in upheaval, and back from the Wizard Wars the Stepsons came scouring through the streets, all grim in their armor and on their tall horses; back in Sanctuary again and determined to set things into their own concept of order.

  Make the house presentable, Ischade had sent word through Haught; and told her the house had to host the chiefest of these devils, including Tempus, who was an Ilsigi's direst enemy: an Ilsigi hostess had to entertain these awful men, with what end to the business Moria could not foresee.

  A door had opened downstairs. It closed again. She lay between terror and another thought-for Haught came to her now and again. Haught came wherever he liked and sometimes that was to her bed. It was Haught who had made her beautiful, it was Haught who cared for her and made her imprisoned life worth living.

  It was Haught who had prised a knife from her fingers and prevented her from suicide a half a year ago, then kissed those fingers and made gentle love to her. It was Haught who stole a little of the Mistress's magic for her and cast a glamor on her that had never yet gone away. Perhaps the Mistress tacitly approved. But the Mistress had never laid eyes on her new self; and that might happen tomorrow night-

  That would happen. Oh, if there were a way to make herself invisible she would do it. If that were Haught-it must be Haught, coming up the stairs so quietly.

  A shiver came over her. She remembered the thing which had been in bed with her. She remembered the cold in the air and the steps which used to come and go in the basement, which might pass a door in the middle of the night and come padding up the stairs-

  The latch of her room gave gently. The hinge creaked softly. She lay with her back to these sounds in that paralysis that a bad dream brings, in which a thing will not be real until one looks and sees it standing by one's bed-

  The step came close and lingered there. There was a water-smell, a river-smell, a beer-smell unlike Haught's perfumed, wine-favoring self. It was wrong, wrong-

  She spun over the edge of the bed and came up with the knife she kept there on the floor, as someone dived across the bed at her. She leaped back with that knife held with no uptown delicacy: she was a knife-fighter, and she crouched in her be-ribboned lace and satin whipping the tail of h
er gown up and aside to clear her legs. A ragged shape hulked on its knees amid her bed, silhouette in light from the hall. It held up its hands, choked for air.

  "M-mo-ri-a," it said, wept, bubbled. "Mo-ri-a-"

  "0 gods!"

  She knew the voice, knew the smell of Downwind, knew the shape and the hands suddenly, and fled for the door and the lamp to borrow light in the hall, her hands atremble and the straw missing the wick a half a dozen times before she lit the lamp and brought it back again in both hands, the knife tucked beneath her arm.

  Mor-am her brother huddled like a lump of brown rag amid her satin sheets. Mor am stinking of the gutters, Mor-am twisted and scarred by fire and the beggar king's torture, as he was when She withdrew her favor.

  "M-moria-M-m-moria?"

  He had never seen her like this, never seen the glamor on her. She was an uptown lady. And he-

  "0 gods, Mor-am."

  He rubbed his eyes with a grimy fist. She-found the lamp burning her hands and set it on a bureau, taking the knife from beneath her arm. "Gods, what happened? Where have you been?" But she needn't ask: there was the reek of Downwind and liquor and the bitter smell of krrf.

  "I-been-lost," he said. "I w-went-H-Her business." He waved a hand vaguely away, riverward, toward Downwind or nowhere at all, and squinted at her. The tic that twisted his face did so with a vengeance. "I c-c-come back. What h-ha-hap-pened t' you, M-m-mo-ria? Y-y-you don't look-"

  "Makeup," she said, "it's makeup, uptown ladies have tricks-" She stood and stared in horror at the kind of dirt and the kind of sight she had grown up with, at the way Downwind twisted a man and bowed the shoulders and put hopelessness in the eyes. "Lost. Where, lost? You could've sent word- you could have sent something-" She watched the tic by Mor-am's mouth grow violent: it was never that way when Ischade prevented it. Ischade was not preventing it. For some reason Ischade had stopped preventing it. "You're in trouble with Her, aren't you?"