The Silk Map

by Chris Willrich

  With that, Dolma leapt into the rocky stream. It seemed to Bone that the rocks would surely kill her, but the fiery nimbus blazed even in the waters’ midst, regardless of the host body’s fate. Soon the Charstalker was out of sight.

  “Are you going to follow her, shaman?” Bone asked.

  “The vulture in me wants to, but I think it might be unwise.”

  “I think you’re right. Yet I also think she will be back to haunt us.”

  “‘Us.’ Then you will join my employer?”

  “For now.”

  “Good. I will relay this.”

  Bone swished his hand experimentally through Liron Flint’s head. He mimed choking the treasure hunter, then kicking him. “Hm,” he said. “Northwing?”

  “Yes.”

  “Have any of you eaten the local food?”

  “Not yet. I’ve advised against it. I’m guessing that to partake is to align one’s self with the goddess of the valley.”

  “You’ve guessed right. Which suggests I’ll have some difficulty being your ally.”

  “Nonsense. You’ll be a perfect scout. You can encounter all the mysteries of the valley. Its people. Its magic. Its monsters. Meanwhile we will sip yak’s milk and evaluate your performance.”

  “You must be a valuable servant, shaman. Because I have a feeling Steelfox doesn’t keep you around for your charm.”

  The vulture’s laughter was all the confirmation he needed.

  One perquisite of being a ghost-scout, Bone reflected, was that they couldn’t load him with extra gear. He could affect only a small amount of matter with origins outside the valley. He wondered if in time the expedition’s possessions would shift into “his” reality, having absorbed sufficient dust, mist, pollen, and so on. He made a mental note not to inquire.

  He led the group east along the southern cliffs. More and more often he caught glimpses of what seemed the very image of the lamasery spoken of by the Mad Mariner.

  Steelfox agreed the sight was worth investigating. And moreover, Bone hoped Gaunt had escaped and was traveling there as well.

  Outside of his conversations with Northwing, who followed him variously as vulture, hawk, panther, and bull, Bone was in company and yet alone. He could tell the others were uncomfortable with his present non-presence, yet in time they ignored the ignorable and began talking amongst themselves. He drifted close enough to hear Snow Pine and Flint.

  “Perhaps you and I should speak,” Snow Pine said.

  “What is there to speak about?” Flint said. “I am a traitor and a coward. That seems quite final.”

  “I was angry.”

  “You are not now?”

  “No . . . I am still angry. Furious even. Yet I can see you had your reasons. You have wanted this journey for a very long time.”

  “Since I was a boy.”

  “Children forge iron chains for their grownup selves.”

  “Is that what you think? I’ve walked in the light of Xembala for so long. It does not feel like a chain but like a lantern carried with me.”

  “What does it point you to? Not loyalty, apparently. Not . . . friendship.”

  “Part of the thrill of such a quest is not knowing just where it leads. Perhaps Xembala is paradise. Perhaps it is a trap. Perhaps it is, under the skin, much like any country, with good and bad mingled in endless hues. I am excited that I may soon know.”

  “That’s what it is for you, then. The knowledge. You’re different from Quilldrake.”

  “Quilldrake. Arthur is acting on a dream too, I believe, but it is not the wonderment of a child. It is the fancy of an aging man. He is not lit up from within but rather guided by a gleam from without.”

  “The gleam of gold.”

  “I think it is more than that. It’s triumph. Accomplishment. A feeling that one’s passage left a mark.”

  “Is that what Bone feels, I wonder?”

  “I would not know,” Flint said. “Do you not?”

  “I do not truly understand him. His wife makes more sense to me. She loves her lost child, as I love mine. I think Bone loves his son too, but it is an abstracted thing. What he truly dotes upon is Gaunt. What she wants, he wants.”

  Flint chuckled. “That, and gold.”

  “Maybe for Quilldrake, people are a close second to gold, while to Bone it is the other way around.”

  “Perhaps.” Flint paused. “I fear that for me, neither gold nor people are truly important. Only knowledge.”

  “And that’s why you sided with Steelfox?”

  “That . . . and that this alliance seemed the most likely way of keeping you safe.”

  “Oh.”

  “I am fond of you. Surely you have seen this.”

  “Fond of me? I thought people were of no matter to you.”

  He chuckled. “I place you in a category different from ‘people.’”

  She snorted. “There’s never been anyone more ‘people’ than me. I’m as common as mud.”

  “I do not really believe that.”

  “The followers of the Forest let everything wash over them, Liron. We call nature transitory, but we don’t call it illusory. Sometimes, in all these well-meaning traditions—the Swan with her self-sacrifice, the Undetermined with his enlightenment, your Painter with its justice—I see little room for ordinary folk. With their ordinary itches and laughs and farts and songs. Everything must be high-minded and shining amongst the clouds. Only the Forest, in my experience, really acknowledges darkness and pain and shit and blood as things to understand, rather than things to abhor.”

  “On behalf of all the world’s other religions, I would gently suggest you are oversimplifying.”

  “Heh. Probably. If you weren’t a traitor I’d teach you about some dark simple things right now.”

  Flint coughed. His gait slowed. The two fell behind the others a bit. Bone did as well.

  A squirrel bit Bone’s leg.

  “Ow!”

  “That’s for eavesdropping.”

  “That’s uncalled for! I was just curious.”

  “Said the duck who nested on the polar bear. Keep walking.”

  Bone grumbled, but he did as instructed. The way remained rough. He’d seen no balloons except once, in the distance, two days before, but he remained cautious.

  “I hope Snow Pine can find some solace,” Bone said. “Not sure about Flint, of course, but the alternative is Haytham—”

  “Or you?” said the squirrel.

  “I’m a married man!”

  “I know all about ‘married men.’”

  “You don’t know me,” Bone said. “Haytham, now, he’s not so bad, but regarding women he’s rather shallow.”

  “You know him well?”

  “Not well. But once I became entangled in his schemes.”

  “Do tell.”

  “I think the terrain ahead becomes very challenging soon. I will abridge my telling. So, once, far away, I was paid to investigate Haytham’s lodgings.”

  “Steal from him, you mean.”

  “No, and who is telling this story? But things went very wrong. A mummy grabbed me, one I realize now was akin to those beneath the desert. It smothered me into unconsciousness—”

  “And you died.”

  “Are you four years old, Northwing? Let me finish . . .”

  THE TALE OF THE THIEF (TRULY), CONTINUED

  I awoke within a brass prison smelling of old oil. Something about the working seemed sloppy to me, for while the chamber was oval in shape the actual contours were somewhat off. There was a straw mat and a chamber pot resembling an oversized thimble, and a drinking cup resembling a somewhat less oversized thimble.

  A booming voice resonated within the chamber. “Aha! I knew it! You carry a bit of enchantment upon you, thus you can be sealed inside the lamp.” I recognized the voice as that of my target.

  “Hello!” I called out. “Do I have the honor of speaking with the illustrious Haytham ibn Zakwan ibn Rihab, mighty among sorcerers?” I
added the last because, mighty or not, it never hurts to butter up a magic-worker. (Of course, I know you would never be susceptible to such transparent flattery.)

  “Indeed!” said the echoing voice. “Though you do not know me so well. I am no sorcerer, nor wizard, nor shaman, or whatever bizarre practitioner you might mistake me for. I am a natural philosopher.”

  “I am afraid you have lost me.”

  “On the contrary, sir, I have you thoroughly found. But as to natural philosophy. I study the ordinary workings of the world, such as any person of keen observation might glean. I lack any magical gift.”

  “You could have fooled me.”

  “Permit me to make a fine distinction, for it seems to me you might be among the few with wit to comprehend. This world has pockets of unbridled, ferocious creativity that are difficult to reproduce. Magic, we say. However, it primarily contains phenomena that are, given sufficient study, predictable. I investigate both matters, with an eye to improving human knowledge. What makes me different from a sorcerer is not just my lack of arcane gifts but my unwillingness to record transitory results. Instead I study processes that anyone with intelligence and the proper equipment might duplicate. Among these is the capture of magical beings.”

  “So you make monster traps?”

  “The process still eludes me. This is one of many vessels—bottles, urns, jars—prepared by the ancient king Younus, whom having once been devoured by a djinn in the shape of a whale, decided to return the favor. The vessels of Younus can trap a magical being upon the utterance of a command phrase. A given entity could only be pulled in thrice, however. This lamp was the abode of a djinn many years ago but was vacant until recently.”

  “Do you not run a risk, telling me the lamp’s limitations?”

  “Not really, since keeping you is not a primary goal. I have caught you for a purpose, Imago Bone.”

  “Oh?” In some ways it was less alarming to be a mere collector’s piece. “I thought it was an accident.”

  “No. Through a proxy I hired you to come here.”

  “You could have sent an invitation.”

  “You might have declined. Also, this way, you cannot appeal to the authorities.”

  “What do you want with me?”

  “I have been observing you for some time. In so doing I recognized that, while human, you are protected from mortal harm by a strong enchantment.”

  “I do not deny it.”

  “I have also noticed that you do fairly well in an area where my experiments tend to go awry.”

  “Oh?”

  The confident voice became shy. “You have a way with women.”

  “Ah. Well. One does what one can . . .”

  “As do we all. We do not all have your self-assured swagger, however.”

  “It comes of long experience, Haytham ibn Zakwan . . .”

  “Please, just Haytham, or Doctor Haytham, if you prefer formality.”

  “Haytham, the enchantment you spoke of is the source of my swagger, as you term it . . .”

  “Of that I have no doubt.”

  “For it has allowed me to live a long time in an attractive, or at least healthy, young body. I have had time to learn self-assurance. Beyond that, I’ve learned to be entertaining company.”

  “You do have charm and self-assurance, but I do not think it is truly the product of study.”

  “Oh?” I found myself surprisingly miffed by the suggestion.

  “You are inured against fear. You need not fear death, and this self-confidence bleeds over into other areas of your life. It is a contingent aspect of your enchantment, if you will.”

  “I’m not sure I do will.”

  “Irrelevant. I intend to make use of your self-confidence for my own purposes. There is in this city a tower owned by the wealthy Arkoyda family.”

  “I am familiar with it.”

  “And with its defenses, I know.”

  “So you know I would be reluctant to return there.”

  “This time you will have my help. You see, the Arkoydas are patrons of the arts, and within their tower dwell many artists. I have developed a liking for one of these, but I have been unable to obtain her affection. You will help me in this task.”

  “Confined within a lamp, I am uncertain how to grant your wish.”

  “Ha ha. I have developed a technique which I call gharbal or, alternatively, siniazo. You might translate this as “sifting” or perhaps “garbling.” I connect filaments of the Cytherean Heliodrosia, with its properties of luring humans to their doom with uncanny illusions, from the lamp to an electrum circlet around my head. Certain other elixirs and ointments are required, none of which need concern you.”

  “And as a result of this connection, you will appear to be me?”

  “Heh, no. I will be me, you will be you. But I will have your swagger, Imago Bone, and you will have my fear. I shall see what affect this has on a certain female.”

  “And after this you will let me go?”

  “That I will have to consider. As this is a foggy night, I see no reason to delay.”

  “What does fog have to do with it?”

  Ah, my foolish questions! This was soon enough answered by a sense of drifting into the air aboard one of Haytham’s earlier flying contraptions, this one a balloon utilizing a highly flammable gas. Aboard this vessel we drifted through the city until reaching the tower of the Arkoydas. The tower, I knew from experience, was of dark stone, inset with white marble representing the stars of the Greater Bear.

  I knocked on the side of the lamp. “When do we begin?”

  “Now,” said Haytham.

  The procedure worked its strange effect. I found myself looking through Haytham’s eyes and was aware he was looking through mine. Yet each of us also simultaneously peered through the eyes we were born with.

  “I think this will conjure headaches,” I said, finding I needed only whisper.

  “Perhaps,” he murmured back. “However in ordinary life each eye has a slightly different visual field. This is a harder problem but not an unprecedented one.”

  “What now?”

  “We must bypass the guard dogs of the upper levels.”

  “Do we not need to avoid the guard humans of the lower levels first?”

  “Not at all.”

  He was lowering us down a rope from the gondola of his balloon so that we would end up on a balcony that circled the whole tower at a slant, coiling for three stories. This was a popular area during parties. There was currently none such, although doors to the balcony were open.

  He’d not judged the rope quite correctly, and we found ourselves nose-first on the balcony stones but still suspended from the balloon.

  “We need to get untied,” I observed, “quick.”

  He twisted himself up to untie his feet. He was not in quite as good shape as he’d imagined; while he could twist himself to reach the knots, he could only stay up for a few moments before uncoiling. Thus escape was proving to be a wrenching process.

  I heard pattering feet. “Rats?” I wondered aloud.

  His heart pounded. “Dogs.”

  Three white lapdogs, smelling of rich perfume, bellowed onto the balcony. I think I would have feared rats less.

  I was grateful it was not my own face that was about to be gnawed off. Still, as the lamp was stowed on a pack Haytham carried, I was somewhat concerned with his success. “Close your eyes,” I suggested.

  “Why?”

  “The suffering may be less that way.”

  “I am so glad I recruited you.”

  “But also, perhaps my fingers can guide yours . . .”

  We tried it. He redoubled his efforts to stretch upward, and I undid a set of knots.

  We pirouetted on one foot. We had more sway this way and were better able to avoid the dogs.

  “Best stretch again,” I said.

  “Wait.” He grabbed a wad of plant material, crushed it into a ball, and tossed it through a door.
/>   The dogs all followed.

  “Leftover material from the Cytherean Heliodrosia. They may think they are chasing a cat, or a steak, or an appropriate mate.”

  “Or your head.”

  “Or yours, in point of fact. All right, heave—”

  With a crash that must have been painful, we were soon free. Haytham swaggered. I shivered. We closed the nearest door and headed up.

  There were no festivities, but the upper stories were frequently used as an informal salon, and I was thus unsurprised to see artistic types I’d encountered now and then in the city. In Palmary the elite artist and the elite thief will sometimes share circles, because in our own ways we all owe our livings to the rich. Thus I and Haytham were able to chat our way through a few encounters, on our way to the poet we really wished to talk to.

  And there she was. Previously I had only seen her from afar, reading her work aloud, or else crossing paths in ways that left us both in worse moods than before. I felt Haytham’s heart race. That at least I could help with. I wished him calm thoughts, chief among them that there were many days ahead, and many women inhabiting them, and that to a greater or lesser degree everything would be All Right.

  Thus calmed, Haytham was able to talk of this or that, avoiding any of the crudities I had previously brought to bear when encountering this poet.

  Thus the three of us had a conversation better than any we’d had before. I found the poet quite approachable and unaffected (previously I’d thought her vain) and was quite enjoying being Haytham’s auxiliary confidence.

  Then it all went wrong. Enrapt by the poet’s eyes, we did not quite understand the clicking hand gesture she suddenly made and the cooing sound that accompanied it.

  Not until the white, perfumed beast jumped into her lap.

  “Oh, dear—” we began, as it started yipping, attracting its companions.

  We rose, making excuses, when the thing lunged out and snapped at us, tearing at the delicate threads of Haytham’s “sifting” apparatus. In retrospect, I believe the beast wanted another taste of the same material Haytham’s distraction ball was made of, and smelled it on us. It would not be the first time a human scheme was undone by canine scent.

  Regardless, the damage had a peculiar effect. The specific illusion Haytham had arranged was undone, and a new one replaced it.