Soul of the City tw-8

by Robert Lynn Asprin

  The storm would ground the dust and douse the fires and she knew it was too great a luck for Sanctuary, the most luckless town she'd ever seen. She knew also that, inside the flaming pillar back at the Peres's, evil was held at bay by one whose name could not be spoken but could be approximated: Stonn-bringer, the Weather-Gods' father-Stormbringer, whose daughter Jihan was close at hand.

  And then there was no time to put it all together: there was a ring on the finger of Haught which she could see with her inner eye.

  This she stroked and called home to her. Its spell, still strong, would bring the scheming apprentice-if he was not already here.

  In the ground hall full of shadows she paused. The door behind her closed at a gust's whim. The slam it made was daunting.

  Her hackles rose-she hadn't thought of the ring Haught had until she'd entered. Was it her will, or only her perception, that saw him here?

  Why had she come here? Suddenly, she wasn't sure. She shook her head, on the ground floor landing, and touched her brow with her palm. She owed Tempus none of this-not so much. Tasfalen was dead, a minion to be summoned to the river house. Why, then, had she risked the streets and come up here?

  Why? She couldn't fathom it.

  And then she did, when Haught's silken voice oozed down the stairs from a shadow at their head.

  "Ah, Mistress, how kind of you to visit sickbeds with so much at stake."

  She reached out for the ring he wore, but the apprentice was reaching on his own: grown desperate, he was full of pain, and wanted to make her a gift of it.

  Suddenly (more because she underestimated what lay behind him and what hid within him than because of Haught himself) she was dizzy, spinning in another place, a place of blood and murky water-of ice and great gates whose bars were rent as if a giant shape had bent them out of its way.

  Niko's rest-place! How had she come here?... not by Haught's strength.

  And a laugh tinkled-a laugh with razor edges that cut her soul: Roxane.

  Yes, Roxane-but something less and something more hobbled through that gate, misshapen and huge, and shrunk until Tasfalen's beauty masked it.

  And then the thing... for it was part highborn, mortal lord, part witch, and part Haught... held out its hand to take her arm as if to escort her to some formal fete.

  She met its eyes and gripped her own ribs with both her hands: to touch it might imprison her here. This was where Janni had lost the last shreds of self-concern that made him act predictably in the interest of what life he still led.

  The eyes that bored into hers were gold and slitted; deep behind them glowed a purple fire she knew wasn't right.

  She forced her leaden limbs to work and backed a step, watching first her feet and then scanning the horizons, winding wards that worked in Sanctuary which were much weaker here.

  Niko's star-shaped meadow, once ever-green and pastoral, the very essence of spirit peace, was frostbitten, brown, and gray and riddled with ice like arrows. Where trees had spread rustling leaves, their boughs now held shards of flesh and writhing things resembling tiny men who cried like kittens being drowned.

  And the stream which was his life's ebb and flow ran with swirls of red and blue and pink and gold: blood shed and to be shed; magic winding it round and chasing it; Niko's faith and the love of gods bringing up behind.

  Tasfalen was cajoling: "Come, my love. My beauteous one. We'll feast." He flicked a glance to the trees hung with anguished, living things. "The boughs are ripe for picking, the fruit is sweet."

  And she knew the only salvation here, for her, was in the stream.

  She didn't know the consequence if she should do what her wisdom told her: take a drink.

  Before she could lose her nerve or be mesmerized, she whirled about and flung herself knee deep in running water.

  And bent. And drank.

  And saw Niko, when she raised her dripping lips, sitting on the stream's far side, his face calm, unravaged. His quick, canny smile came and went and she noticed he wore his panoply: the enameled cuirass, sword and dirk forged by the en-telechy of dreams.

  "It's a dream, then?" she said, feeling the icy water with its four distinct and different tastes run down her chin and hearing a lumbering behind her much louder, and a rasping breath much deeper, than Tasfalen's form could make.

  "Don't turn around," Niko advised as if he were training a student in the martial arts; "don't look at it; don't listen. This is my rest-place, after all not theirs."

  "And me? It's not mine, fighter. Nor are you."

  "And they are. I know." There was no abhorrence in the Bandaran fighter's glance, just infinite patience. And as Ischade looked, his visage changed, contorting through a metamorphosis that seemed to include all the tortures of his recent past- eyes rolled up, cheeks split over bone, lips purpled and torn, teeth cracked and crumbled, bruises filled with blood.

  Then the entire process reversed itself, and a handsome man still in the last bloom of youth regarded Ischade once more.

  "You're very beautiful, you know-in your soul," Niko said. "It shows here. In spite of everything."

  Behind her, the Tasfalen-thing was shambling closer; she could hear it splash into the stream. She almost whirled to fight it; her fingers spread into a shape suitable for throwing coun-terspells.

  Niko shook his head chidingly: "Trust me. This is my place. As for your welcome here-when I needed help, you came here, where risk is greater than mortals know, and tried to aid me. I haven't forgotten."

  "Are you dead?" she asked flatly, though it was impolite.

  His smooth brow furrowed. "No, I'm sure not. I'm reclaiming what's mine ... with a little help." Behind the fighter, the semblance of the pillar of fire came to be.

  He knew it was there without looking. He said, "See, you must trust. We're giving Janni his proper funeral, you and I. At last. And you, who kept him from worse and soothed his conscience, ought'to be here."

  "And... that?" Ischade meant what was behind her. All her hackles risen, she found her mouth dry and eyes aching-if she had a mouth here, or eyes. It seemed she did.

  "We'll put them back where they belong-not here. They're yours to deal with, in the World."

  He must have seen her frown, for he leaned forward on one straight and scarless arm that might never have been shattered when a demon raged inside him: "Roxane is ... special. Different. Less. I'm free of all but my own feelings. For that I don't apologize. Like you, I deal in more than one reality. But 1 ask you for mercy on her behalf..."

  "Mercy!" Incredulous, Ischade nearly burst out laughing. The thing that was part Haught, part Tasfalen (who was dead and had housed Roxane once and now again, if Ischade understood the rules by which Niko's magic games were played), was shuffling close behind now, intent on biting off her head or munching on her soul. It had been one with a demon; it had merged with devils; it had taken fire out of the hands of arch-mages such as Randal and used it even against her. All of this, Ischade was sure, was Roxane's twisted evil come to ground. And Niko wanted mercy for the witch that had made his life a living hell and wouldn't offer him so much mercy as clean death would bring.

  "That's right-mercy. I'm not like you, but we've helped each other. Tolerance, balance-good and evil: each resides within the other, part and parcel."

  Ischade, who'd seen too much evil, shook her head. "You must be dead, or still possessed."

  "Look." Niko's diction slipped into mercenary argot. "It's all the same-no good without evil, no balance... no maat. If we lose one, we lose the other. It's just life, that's all. And as for death-we get what we expect."

  "And you expect what?" Now she realized that Niko himself was not naive, or helpless, or entirely benign. "From me, I mean?"

  "Mercy, I already told you." The firewell behind him began to shimmer and to dance, swinging its hips like a temple girl. "To your kind; for the record. For the balance of the thing. Janni we will take now."

  "We?" It was one of the hardest things Ischade had ever d
one to engage in philosophical discussion with Nikodemos while, behind, the shambling thing had come so close she could feel its fetid breath upon her neck, and fancied that breath moist and felt, she thought, a strand of drool land in her hair. Don't look at it; don't turn around-it's Niko's rest-place and his rules, not mine, apply.

  "We," Niko said as if it were a simple lesson any child should understand. And then she did: behind him, a ghost appeared.

  She knew ghosts when she saw them: this one was a spirit of supernal power, a fabled strength, a glossy being of such beauty that tears came to Ischade's eyes when it sat down beside Niko, ruffling his hair with a fawn-colored hand.

  "I am Abarsis," it smiled in introduction, and she saw the wizard blood there, ancient lineage, and love so strong it made her heart hurt: she'd given up such options as this ghost had thrived on, long ago.

  "We need Janni's soul in heaven; it's earned its peace. Give it that, and we will restore you totally-all you were, all you had... including this northern pair of witches ... this amalgam behind you of all their hate-if, as Niko asks, you show them mercy, then the gods will be well pleased."

  "And if not?" This was no place for Ischade-she had no truck with gods or ghosts of dead priests. Damn Tempus, who muddled all the sides and made ridiculous demands.

  "That's done long since," said the ghost, unabashedly reading her mind. "We're here for Janni only, and to give a gift for your safekeeping him until we could take him home. Now name it, Ischade of Downwind. Choose well."

  She wanted only to get out of there, to be whole and well and fighting on her own terms, dealing with her own kind. And before she could say that, or think of something better, Abarsis, one arm around Niko, raised his other hand to her, saying: "It is done. Go with strength and purpose. Life to you, Sister, and everlasting glory."

  And the rest-place went out like a light. The icy stream of colored water, the pillar of fire which aped reality, the snuffling horror at her back which she'd never truly glimpsed but only felt-and the two fighters, one spirit, one man of balance: all were gone as if they'd never been.

  She was standing on the dry floor of Tasfalen's house and Haught was taunting her to come up the stairs.

  Mercy, Niko had asked of her. She wondered if she knew, still, what it was and how to show it to creatures like these.

  "Ischade... Mistress, aren't you curious?" Haught was rubbing the ring and she could feel the feedback of magic twisted, a deadly loop fashioned by a brash and foolish child.

  Temptation made her shift from foot to foot. She was stronger, she could feel it: Niko and his guardian spirit had given her that. She could end them, here and now-Haught and whatever animated Tasfalen. For, though she hadn't seen him yet, she knew he must be here: the rest-place revelation was like a map, a schematic, a design which fit over human ones. So he was here, reborn, animated by some power. And Niko had wanted mercy for Roxane....

  Two and two fit together with a snap.

  Ischade whirled on her heel and fled out the door. For a moment it resisted, but her strength prevailed.

  Haught, behind her, came running down the stairs with a shout.

  But she was faster: she wrenched the door open, slipped through, and bolted it with magic from the farther side.

  Then, stepping back, Ischade considered mercy in all its meanings: if Tasfalen and Roxane were with Haught, in any stage of being whatsoever, mercy could only take one form.

  And with strength loaned her from the rest-place of a mystery she didn't understand and under the benediction of the high priest of a god in whom she had no faith, Ischade began to weave a spell so strong and fast she had no doubt about it holding.

  All about Tasfalen's house she wove the ward-a special one, one that would keep the house sealed and keep those within locked up until they learned what mercy meant.

  When it was over, she realized she had worked her spells in the midst of a downpour which had soaked her to the skin.

  Picking up her heavy robes, she headed homeward. Perhaps she should have found the Riddler and told him what she'd done. But there were Crit and Strat to think of, and she didn't want to think of Strat-who was with Tempus by now, alive or dead.

  She wanted to think only of herself for now. She wanted things to be just as they always had been before. And she wanted to think about mercy, a quality quite strained and strange, but strengthening, in its way.

  In Tasfalen's house, what had been Roxane lay abed in Tasfalen's body, half conscious, rent in memory and power, a mere fragment knowing only that it wanted to survive.

  "Duuu," it mumbled, and tried again to move the lips of a corpse twice resurrected. "Dusss." And: "Dusssst. Haughttt... dussst."

  The ex-slave was rattling windows barred by magic, cursing horrid spells that couldn't get outside, but bounced around the comers of the house and back upon him like ricochets, so that each one was more trouble than it was worth.

  Eventually his panic ebbed and he stalked over to the bedside, looking down at the fish-white pallor of the man who'd brought him here.

  Snatched him from somewhere-from elsewhere ... perchance from oblivion. Someone else might have been grateful, but Haught was too wise, too angry: he knew that all witches took their price.

  He'd thought to win; he'd lost. He was captive now, captive in a mansion with fine stuffs around him, true. But he was caged like an animal by his former mistress. And he was here only because of Tasfalen.

  Nothing else could have done it. So he crouched down, thinking of ways to kill the already-dead, ways to get the Roxane out of Tasfalen, where it was bodiless and weak.

  But then he began to listen, to try to understand what the thing on the bed was saying: "Duuussss, duuussss, duuussss..."

  "Dust?" he guessed. "Do you mean dust?"

  The eyes of the revivified corpse blinked open, startling him so that he fell back and caught himself on his hands.

  "Duuussss," the blue lips said, "on tonnnn."

  "Dust. On your... tongue?" Of course. That was it. The dust. It wanted the dust.

  Not ordinary dust, Haught realized: the hot dust, the bright dust, the fragments of the Nisi Globes of Power. And the corpse was right: the dust was their only hope-his as well as... hers.

  For the first time, Haught thought about what it meant, being caged with Roxane, the Nisibisi witch-in-man's-body-or what was left of her. If she perished, those who held her soul would come for her. And Haught might be embroiled. Entangled. Taken. Swallowed. Absorbed like interest payments.

  His skin hompilated: there was enough intelligence in that body to have seen the answer before he did.

  What else was there, he was in no hurry to find out. And he had a long, trying task ahead of him: the dust in question must be collected, mote by mote.

  It was going to be arduous: the place was full of dust, most of it nonmagical. It might take days, or weeks, or years, to gather enough-especially when he had no idea how much was enough.

  And when he had it, what would he do with it? Give it to the invalid ex-corpse? Or find a way to make use of it himself? He didn't know, but he knew he had plenty of time to decide. And, since he had nothing better to do, he thought, he might as well start collecting what dust he could, mote by mote by mote....

  The storm pelted Sanctuary with all the fury of affronted gods. Rain sheeted so hard that it punctured skin windows in the Maze; it ran so thick and wild in the gutters that the tunnels filled up and sewers overflowed in the better streets while, in the palace, servitors ran with buckets and barrels to place under leaks that were veritable waterfalls.

  On the dockside, everything was awash in tide and downpour, which gave Tempus the perfect opportunity to suggest that Theron, Emperor of Ranke, Brachis, High Priest, and all the functionaries forget protocol and begin their procession now, to higher ground and drier quarters.

  By the time the Rankan entourage reached the palace gates, Molin Torchholder had already arrived, Kama in tow.

  In the palace temple's
quiet, he was giving grateful thanks for the storm which had come to quench the fires (that, unattended by gods, threatened to bum the whole town down) while, at the casement, Kama stared out over smoking rooftops toward uptown, where the pillar of fire spat and wriggled.

  She had sidled into the alcove, away from priestly ritual, and she couldn't have said whether it was the cold storm winds with their blinding sheets of rain so fierce that she could see it bounce knee-high when it struck the palace roof, or the demonic twistings of the fiery cone which resisted quenching that made her hair stand on end.

  She was more conscious of Molin than she should have been. Perhaps that was the reason for the superstitious chill she felt: she was about to be indicted for attempted assassination and what-have-you, and she was worried about what the priest really felt in his heart-about how she looked and whether he believed her and what he thought of her... about whether anyone of her lineage ought to be thinking infatuated thoughts about anyone of his.

  It wouldn't work; he was a worse choice for her than Critias. But, like Critias, it was impossible to convince Molin of that.

  It was nothing he'd said-it was everything he did, the way their bodies reacted when their flesh touched. And it frightened Kama beyond measure: she'd need all her wits now just to stay alive. Her father would take Crit's word over hers without hesitation; oath-bond and honor outweighted any claim she had on the Riddler.

  If she'd been born a manchild, it might have been otherwise. But things were as they were, and Torchholder was her only hope.

  He'd said so. He knew it for a fact. She didn't like feeling weak, being perceived as vulnerable. And yet, she admitted, she'd spread her legs on the god's altar for the man now coming up behind her, who slid his arm round her shivering shoulders and kissed her ear.

  "It's wonderful, the timely workings of the gods," he said in an intimate undertone. "And it's a good omen-our good omen. You must... Kama, you're shaking."

  "I'm cold, wet, and bedraggled," she protested as he turned her gently to face him. Then she added: "While you were communing with the Stormgod, my father and Theron's party came through the palace gates. My time is at hand, Molin. Don't hold out false hope to me, or gods' gifts. The gods of the armies won't overlook the fact that I'm a woman-they never have."