Window Wall

by Melanie Rawn

  “Well … no. And not just because I don’t have one. Even if I thought something up, how could I get it to happen?”

  “So what did happen?” Mieka asked.

  “He sends the Tregrefin a lectern and a copy of the Consecreations that seems to be filled with black powder. Or maybe it’s hidden in the lectern—that’s more likely. There are two candles attached to it, and I suppose that had something to do with it. But you’re right, it doesn’t matter. I only hope that whatever he comes up with next, I get to see it in advance.”

  “If it’s something you can change, then you will,” Mieka reminded him. “Now, can we get back to putting the last touches on this thing?”

  “If by that you mean we really have to think up a name for it,” Rafe said dryly, “then, yeh, let’s. Any ideas?”

  The word came out of Cade’s mouth before he knew he’d thought it. “‘Bewilderland.’”

  Rafe snorted. Jeska looked confused. But Mieka frowned and searched Cade’s eyes, and finally said, “That sounds familiar somehow. But it fits.”

  He didn’t ask Mieka just why it sounded familiar—had he mentioned it as part of an Elsewhen? Had it been part of an Elsewhen? He couldn’t quite recall.

  Neither had he asked Mieka to elaborate much on his encounter with the old man in the minstrels gallery. From the description, he had a fairly good idea of who the man might be—but that was insane. Why would Sagemaster Emmot associate himself with the Archduke? Whatever he’d done in the war for the Archduke’s father had landed him in Culch Minster with iron rings on his thumbs, and at the end of his sentence those thumbs had been lopped off as a warning to others. True, a few years after Cayden had left the Academy, Emmot had left it as well, but Cade’s understanding was that he had retired. How could it possibly be that he was in the service of the Archduke? And how old was he now, anyways—ninety? Wizardly blood usually meant a fairly long life span, though not so long as Elves and nowhere near that of Trolls. No, Cade told himself, it couldn’t have been Master Emmot. It made no sense.

  But in spite of how little help he suspected such a thing might be when it came right down to it, he began to agree with Mieka’s determination to acquire and learn how to use a sword. However convenient and even instinctive the use of magic might be—such as that time on the continent when he’d put up a wall of Wizardfire against some rather unfriendly people—the use of magic in that way, without a withie to focus it, was exhausting and, truth be told, much less permanent than the pointy end of a sword in someone’s guts.

  Not that he thought Mieka capable of killing anybody that way. Or any way. Not even by accident—and the Lord and the Lady and all the Angels and Old Gods knew full well that the Elf was careless at best and reckless at worst.

  All the same, he reminded himself to ask Derien if the King’s College taught fencing, and if so, whether the master could recommend a good teacher.

  Derien. Why had he never seen his little brother in any Elsewhen? He told himself it was because Derien made his own choices and decisions. After all, Mieka hadn’t shown up, either, because following them to Gowerion had been his own idea. Nothing to do with Cade at all. But Derien … damn the Archduke for his maliciousness, and damn him again for knowing precisely what would worry Cade the most.

  The other three had kept talking while he was ruminating. “Bewilderland” it was. Rafe said it to himself, several times, as if tasting and feeling the silly word on his lips and tongue, a slow smile beginning somewhere beneath the thick black beard.

  “So,” Cade said, “remembering all the while that we’re playing to children, how do we introduce ourselves?”

  Jeska worried at a hangnail on his ring finger, then shook his head. “Hadn’t realized that they’ll have no idea who we are or what we do. I should’ve brought Airilie along today, or Tavier and Jorie. Certainly they all ought to be at the performance. We could borrow Chat’s tribe as well—and what about Tobalt’s daughter?”

  It might have been the scant thornful of earlier this morning, or what he’d had for breakfast, or a special alertness for the quiver of a warning Elsewhen at the edges of his mind. Just before it coalesced, he wished rather forlornly that he could learn how to call them up at will. The Archduke seemed to think he could.

  { The curtain parted to rather tepid applause, led by the parents in the crowd. The little ones had no idea what to do or how to behave in this intimidating adult situation. Cade shared a smile with his partners and stepped forward.

  “My name is Cayden Silversun. I stand over here, at this wooden thing called a lectern. I’m the Tregetour, the one who tells everybody else what to do.”

  Mieka, behind the glass baskets, exclaimed, “Doesn’t he wish!”

  Ignoring him, Cade went on, “That man over there with the beard, his name is Rafe Threadchaser. He’s the Fettler. That means he’s in charge of the magic.”

  “A likely story!” Mieka grumped.

  “Rafe stands opposite me, at his own lectern. By the way, it was a gift from his lovely wife, Crisiant, who’s here today with their son.”

  Touchstone bowed to Crisiant, and Bram wriggled in his seat with delight, especially when his father grinned at him. He was almost ten, which meant he wasn’t yet old enough to think that his parents and their friends were hopelessly old-fashioned and even a bit ninnyish. Wait a couple of years, Cade thought with an inward chuckle.

  “This is Jeska Bowbender,” he went on, “and he’s the Masquer. That means he’s the person who plays all the parts. The way he can do that is by his voice, and his gestures, and the expressions on his face—”

  “And the magic!” yelled Mieka.

  “And the magic,” Cade conceded. And then he was quiet.

  “Well?” Mieka prompted.

  “Well, what?”

  “What about me, then?” he demanded.

  “What about you?”

  “I’m Mieka Windthistle!”

  Rafe said, in a loud aside to the audience, “And praise be to the Lord and the Lady and the Angels and Old Gods that there’s only one of him!”

  “I heard that!”

  “He’s Mieka Windthistle,” Cade told the audience, hooking a thumb in Mieka’s direction.

  More silence.

  The Elf stamped a foot. “Mieka Windthistle, of Touchstone!” When there was no reaction, he added, “The Glisker!”

  Still nothing.

  He picked up a pair of withies and began to juggle them. Right on cue, Tobalt Fluter—somewhere in the audience with his daughter, who was older than most of the offspring here but adored theater in general and Touchstone in particular—called out, “Is that all he can do?”

  A smattering of laughter. Mieka caught both withies in his fists and planted those fists on his hips and declared, “I’m Mieka Windthistle, the Glisker for Touchstone!” After a few moments, while he stood there looking as if expecting something—anything—by way of reaction, he stamped the other foot. “The one at the back!”

  Jeska laughed at him. Mieka twirled a withie between his fingers, then pointed it at Jeska.

  The Masquer disappeared. In his place was a very large potted plant.

  “Oy! Stop that!”

  The potted plant was replaced by a very large squirrel.

  “Mieka!” he wailed.

  By now the children were laughing. The squirrel became a lamppost and then a lady wearing a too-short purple ball gown and workman’s hobnailed boots. At last Jeska himself reappeared, glaring at Mieka.

  “Have you finished?”

  “I’ve only just got started!” Addressing the audience: “Because we’ve a story to tell you today, and what d’you say we get on with it?”

  Cheers, applause, laughter—it happened every time. Cade grinned at Princess Miriuzca, who sat in the front row with her daughter—it was Levenie’s very first time at a play—and called out, “All right, then! Let’s begin!”}

  “Well,” he heard Rafe say, “it wasn’t about the Archduke, any
ways.”

  “Just because he’s smiling?” Mieka scoffed. “Maybe he saw the Archduke getting caught up in his own plot. That’d make me smile!”

  “It’s a lovely thought,” Cade admitted. “But I doubt the boy’s got past the first guards at the Palace yet. Much too soon to see any changes.”

  “Hells,” Mieka said glumly, then brightened. “What d’you think, another half hour or so?”

  “Perhaps. But for now—Rafe, write this down. I’ve got the perfect beginning for ‘Bewilderland.’”

  And what a perfect relief it was, he thought as he told them what he’d seen, to escape into their work. If he had to sit about all day and half the night waiting to see (or not see) how the Archduke planned to thwart the Tregrefin, he’d end with his nerves scraped raw and bleeding.

  Two hours later, they’d run through the delightful silliness of a befuddled young farmer trying to find his pig’s lost oink in a journey that took him all over the countryside and featured a dog that cackled like a chicken, a chicken that mooed like a cow, a cow that chittered like a squirrel, a squirrel that baaed like a lamb, and any other absurd thing they could think of. As the farmer came upon them and they heard their own voices, which startled them at least as much as it did the farmer, they followed him and his pig (Mieka was very happy to have another pig to play with) until he finally came upon a cat that oinked. It was Rafe’s plan to have the audience help sort everything out by applauding when an animal got its own voice right again.

  Cade was just saying to Mieka, “I think you ought to work on that horse,” when the boy in Silversun livery raced back into the undercroft, red-faced and panting, with a large folded letter in one hand and the silver falcon pin in the other.

  Jeska kindly gave him a glass of Mistress Mirdley’s lemonade while Cayden broke the seal and read. His face must have shown his emotions all too clearly, for he was only halfway through the letter when Mieka told the boy to go on upstairs and change back to his work clothes before Lady Jaspiela got home and caught him. By the time the undercroft door slammed behind him, Cade had finished the letter. He cleared his throat, wished for some whiskey, and read aloud:

  I am grateful for your advice. Upon further consideration, it seems to me that the most efficient course is to prevent anything from reaching certain hands while at the same time providing proof that those hands were in fact reaching. I will inform you of developments.

  I have undertaken to repay my debt to you by paying Touchstone’s debts. If you would do me the favor of listing those establishments currently holding outstanding bills, these will be taken care of—quietly, and with no names mentioned, which I am sure you will appreciate. Once this is accomplished, I will consider my debt to be settled.

  I trust that you will communicate any further necessary information, which will reach me more surely and swiftly if your name appears on the outside of the letter.

  Cyed Henick, Archduke

  Rafe broke the horrified silence. “We’ll refuse, of course.”

  “Of course,” echoed Jeska.

  “Of course?” Mieka exclaimed. “Have you run mad? He’s offering—”

  “—to buy us,” Rafe said flatly. “Just like he did before.”

  “How is it buying us when it’s to pay back the debt he owes Cade?”

  “How is it that you’re so stupid that you think he won’t hold this over our heads? Don’t you understand that we’ll be beholden to him?”

  “Better just him than all the people we owe money to right now! Fairwalk ruined us, we’re skint, all of us—well, mayhap not you,” Mieka sneered at Rafe, “with the bakery to live over free of charge—but what about Jeska and Kazie and their new baby that’s coming? What about Cade, and Derien’s school fees? What about me?”

  Cade listened to the argument but took no part in it. He was thinking sourly how much it helped to have friends in high places. Fairwalk’s clerks had fiddled with the books of Blye’s glassworks for years; the Princess’s Gift of the Gloves had saved Blye from being investigated and taxed; now the Archduke was prepared to solve all Touchstone’s money problems. Yes, friends in high places … except that the Archduke was no friend, and—Rafe was right—if they accepted his offer, they would owe him and possibly even be owned by him.

  “—just the same as if he’d paid for the information, don’t you see?” Mieka was saying. “I’m sure he has a thousand spies all over the place doing the same thing—”

  Spies such as your mother-in-law, Cade didn’t say.

  “—somebody not even in his employ who came to him with a valuable piece of information, and gets rewarded for it! We’d be at evens with him, not beholden to him!”

  Cade raised his head from the letter. “And what makes you think,” he asked quietly, “that what we owe all over Gallybanks is worth all those lives? He’s getting nothing out of this. I have nothing to threaten him with, except knowledge of possible futures—and I can’t call those up at will, or be specific with them, which is what he’d want of me.”

  Mieka shrugged angrily. “You can tell him whatever he wants to hear. What would be better would be to tell him that whatever he’s after, he might as well stop trying, because you haven’t seen it happen.”

  “We’ve discussed this before,” Cade pointed out, reminding him of a conversation in the kitchen of Wistly Hall before setting off for Trials. “If I say that I’ve seen Prince Roshlin as King, what would you wager that he’ll do everything he can to make sure that doesn’t happen? He could plot and plan for years, or he could be more direct and—what did he say in the letter? Ah yes. Efficient. How long before the Prince has an ‘accident’ and dies?”

  Mieka squirmed slightly in his chair, then got up to pace the brick floor. “If he doesn’t do anything about the Tregrefin, he knows that you’ll know it. That’s threat enough.”

  “Really? And whom would I tell? Miriuzca? The King? Unless the Archduke works this so that he gets the credit for stopping that stupid boy, he gains nothing. That’s why the lectern and the black powder and the Consecreations were unexpected. It doesn’t get him anything. The next thing I see will be a lot more subtle and a lot more obvious, both of them together. Subtle, because nobody will die—and obvious, so he can be hailed as a hero.”

  “If you see it,” Mieka snapped. “None of this gets us any closer to paying our bills!”

  “Why don’t you buy a carriage or something really big and expensive and then take it to a pledge-broker?” Cade returned nastily.

  “I’d get less than half its worth,” Mieka shot back. “Why won’t you listen to reason?”

  “Why won’t you admit that if we accept his money, he’s bought us?”

  “Enough,” Rafe ordered. “We’re not taking his offer. And there’s an end to it.”

  “But—”

  “End to it!”

  Cade pushed himself to his feet and crossed to where Rafe sat at a wobbly old table with paper and pen and ink to make notes. Selecting a fresh sheet, he leaned down and wrote, Further information will be forthcoming. And though we appreciate your offer, we cannot accept it. He signed his own name, then held the pen out to Rafe, who scrawled his signature below Cade’s. Jeska appended his name. They all looked at Mieka.

  “Oh, all right,” he grumbled. “But it’s a good job that Auntie Brishen doesn’t charge us full price. We’re going to need all the thorn we can get, to make it through a solid autumn and winter of giggings.” He scribbled his name and tossed the pen down. “Even so, we won’t make enough to pay off everybody. So it’s the same constant working into the spring, and anything we can find during the Royal next year. That’s what we’ve set ourselves up for—you realize that, don’t you?”

  They did. But it was the only choice they could make.

  25

  With only a day left until the celebrations—a parade through most of Gallantrybanks ending at the Palace; free food and drink throughout the Kingdom (High Chapel and Low Chapel had finally coughed up); s
peeches by Court ministers (but only two; His Majesty was easily bored); performances at Court by the Crystal Sparks and Hawk’s Claw tonight, and the Shadowshapers, Touchstone, and Black Lightning on the night itself; musicians, dancing, bonfires, and fireworks—Mieka wondered if it was entirely wise, putting on this afternoon show for the Princess, her ladies, and whatever children of an appropriate age they could round up. And for free, too. He suspected that Miriuzca would have a nice jingly purse ready for them, so at least they’d be paid something. Cade said they ought to look on it as an investment in the future. Mieka saw it as something to tire them the day before they had to be at their very best, and after working for Master Warringheath at the Kiral Kellari in the morning, too. Word had it that not only would the Crystal Sparks do their wondrous version of “The Glass Glove,” but Hawk’s Claw had worked all the hitches out of Trenal Longbranch’s popular piece, “Mistress Ghost,” so that now it was as deliciously scary as it was sardonic. To complete with them, and get the most giggings this autumn and winter and spring, Touchstone had to be great, and better than great. Which would have knackered them all senseless, if not for bluethorn.

  Ah well. Perhaps Cade was right, and this performance would pay off in ways other than money. Miriuzca was as excited as the children—and there was quite a crowd, some of them page boys dressed in the various liveries of the Royal family, some of them the sons and daughters of various nobles and ladies-in-waiting. The Princess had returned to the Palace from the North Keep about a week earlier, still minutely involved in preparations for tomorrow’s festivities. Mieka thought she looked tired, and though her gaiety in front of the children was not an act, there was something strained about her eyes that worried him. She had set up a space for Touchstone’s appearance in the very back of the gardens, with a twelve-foot stone wall as a backdrop between a pair of apple trees, and a stage made of planks that rose about a foot from the ground. Chairs were scattered about for the adults, but the children would sit on the grass (which was why, he supposed, some of the mothers and fathers had brought along blankets so their offspring’s clothes wouldn’t be ruined by grass stains). Tobalt was there with his wife and five-year-old daughter, sitting in a large group that included Chat and Deshananda and their children, Kazie, Jeska’s daughter Airilie, Crisiant, Jinsie, Tavier and Jorie, Blye and Jed, Jez, and Mieka’s wife. Mieka regretted that neither Jindra not Bram were old enough to come to this, their fathers’ first performance of “Bewilderland”—and he still had no idea why that word sounded so familiar. Had he thought it up himself, or had Cade mentioned it at some point?